JavaSoft Inc.'s 100 Percent Pure Java program is raising concerns at Microsoft Corp.

"No one knows what exactly it means to be '100 percent pure,' " said Charles Fitzgerald, program manager of Microsoft's Internet client and collaboration division. "Microsoft can guarantee today that any application you write using AFC [its Application Foundation Classes] will be cross-platform, but that doesn't mean it'll be pure according to Sun's definition because no one knows what that definition is."

A JavaSoft spokesperson said the criterion simply is whether the application is written in pure Java.

JavaSoft unveiled its 100 Percent Pure Java program in December at the Internet World show. The company released a white paper on the issue in January and plans to release the specification and the "cookbook" for building 100 percent-pure applications this month or early next month, the company said.

At the Java-One conference in April, JavaSoft will launch the program and start taking submissions to the branding program. But some say there already is a list of preapproved vendors, whose products have been rubber-stamped as 100 percent-pure Java. JavaSoft said no such list exists.

Yet Access Graphics Inc., one of Sun Microsystems Inc.'s largest master resellers, told CRN that JavaSoft's parent company, Sun Microsystems Inc., and IBM Corp. are circulating a list of Java developers they have endorsed as doing "pure Java." Access Graphics is using the list as a reference for its Weblink program, which links resellers to innovative developers.

"No, the tests aren't done yet, but as far as Sun is concerned, they've worked with these vendors closely and they will pass," said Jay Bright, senior program group manager at Access Graphics. "Java will only be as successful as these applications getting to market and becoming mature and tested."

Access Graphics said "recommended" vendors include Enterprise Productivity Systems Inc., which transforms Adobe PostScript into digital Java, and OpenConnect Systems Inc., which offers connections to midrange and mainframe applications data from any Java-capable browser.

Microsoft's Fitzgerald is concerned whether, according to JavaSoft criteria, Microsoft cross-platform technology could still not be "pure."