"Once you see the importance of the issue, then the fact of that decision obviously helps our case," government lawyer David Boies said at a news conference in Washington.

On Tuesday, a federal judge in San Jose, California, backed claims by Sun Microsystems Inc. that Microsoft had "polluted" its Java programming language, which is provided with Microsoft's Windows 98 system.

Boies said the significance of the Sun ruling was underscored when a Microsoft lawyer raised issues from that case during cross-examination of an IBM executive on Wednesday.

However, Boies said that the effect of the ruling would depend on judge Thomas Penfield Jackson, who is presiding over Microsoft's antitrust trial in Washington. The federal government and 20 states have charged Microsoft competed illegallyagainst Netscape Communications Corp. in a bid to dominate market for software for browsing the Web.

Microsoft associate general counsel Tom Burt said the California ruling would not affect the antitrust trial.

"The ruling is a narrow ruling and that actually will have very little implications on the case here in Washington, D.C.," Burt said.

Burt and Boies both spoke at a news conference on the sidelines of the antitrust trial in Washington.

US district judge Ronald Whyte's preliminary injunction granted in California requires that Microsoft alter its Java software within 90 days to comply with Sun compatibility tests or pull it from the market.

Software makers had to write to Microsoft's version of Java or wind up with software that ran sluggishly on Windows, Sun said.

But writing to Microsoft's specifications prevented the software from running on other systems, defeating the goal of Java to run on any kind of computer, Sun alleged.

During the trial, Microsoft lawyer Steven Holley cited anAugust 13, 1997, memo from IBM executive John Thompson and suggested that IBM and five other companies had "colluded" to fight Microsoft.

Cross examining John Soyring of IBM -- who had never seen the memo before -- Microsoft's Holley demanded:

"Do you think it's appropriate for six of the largest software companies in the world to agree with each other to collude with one another to compete with Microsoft?"

A government lawyer objected to the question and Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson ruled it out of order. It was a rare move for Jackson, who has allowed most questions at the trial.

Later the government asked if IBM had tried to split markets and Soyring said it had not.

Thompson suggested in the memo to Netscape, Sun and fellow executives of IBM that they get together with Oracle Corp., Novell Inc. and Apple Computer Inc.

The memo suggested the companies "put Microsoft on the defensive" and work with each other to bundle Netscape's Navigator browser and Java compatible software.