WASHINGTON (CNN/Money) - A witness appearing on behalf of Microsoft Corp. in the ongoing antitrust action conceded Monday that the company continues to engage in tactics that appear to be heavy-handed attempts to crush competitors and force the computer industry to adopt Microsoft's technology.

Under cross-examination, Scott Borduin, chief technology officer of software developer Autodesk Inc. (ADSK: up $0.54 to $38.74, Research, Estimates), said he complained to Microsoft in September 2001 when he discovered the company would no longer let programs written in the Java programming language run with future versions of its Internet Explorer Web browsing software, and by extension the Windows XP operating system, the company's flagship product.

Microsoft (MSFT: up $0.24 to $56.87, Research, Estimates) pulled the Java Virtual Machine, the plug-in software used to run Java programs, after settling a long-running legal battle with Sun Microsystems Inc. over Java in January of last year. In a separate antitrust case related to the ongoing hearings, an appeals court found that Microsoft viewed Java as a threat to its monopoly power in the market for desktop computer operating systems and illegally attacked it.

Borduin told U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly Thursday morning that some of his company's products were written entirely in Java. Presented by government lawyers with internal Autodesk documents from last year, Borduin said he'd complained to Microsoft, saying this appeared to be an attempt by Microsoft to strong-arm software developers like Autodesk into adopting Microsoft's .NET platform, an alternative to Java.

The Java Virtual Machine still can be downloaded over the Internet and added to a computer system, but now Autodesk can never be certain its products will work on the latest versions of Windows, Borduin said, because the Java Virtual Machine might not be there.

"We cannot rely on it being installed on the user's machine," he said.

One of Microsoft's chief complaints about the proposed restrictions that the judge is considering imposing on the company is that forcing Microsoft to offer items like its Web browsing software, Internet Explorer, separately from the operating system would lead to a Balkanized world in which developers could never be sure that their products would work, increasing expense and decreasing reliability for consumers.

Borduin's testimony endorsed that view. But under cross examination he admitted that Microsoft itself had Balkanized the Windows environment by removing the JVM from Windows XP.

After Borduin was excused, Brent Frei, chief executive officer of Onyx Software Corp. (ONXS: down $0.09 to $4.14, Research, Estimates), took the stand. He too testified about the dangers of Windows Balkanization.

But government lawyer Laurie S. Fulton produced handwritten notes Frei created when he was called by Microsoft's general counsel Bill Neukom and asked to testify on Microsoft's behalf. Frei's notes indicate that Neukom asked him to express concern about Balkanization of Windows. Fulton then asked Frei if he had known what the term Balkanization meant, and Frei said that he'd had to ask Neukom for an explanation.

"You didn't write the first draft of your direct testimony, did you," Fulton asked.

"I did not," Frei replied.