Comments

"We now base our systems on SuSE Linux..." might be worthwhile to point out that SuSE is the [link|http://www.caldera.com/unitedlinux/|continuation path of Caldera] in any event, through [link|http://www.unitedlinux.com/|United Linux], and is in fact what you'll find on Caldera/SCO's own support FTP site, at least as far as the kernel goes, if not the rest of the packages. SuSE is the core remaining UL member. Makes a better case to your customers IMO.

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"The Canopy Group, the investment organization that controlled Caldera, brought in a new CEO..." details of compensation and incentives structured into it are of possible interest. Covered at Groklaw, looking for links XXX.

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"Boies' firm ... is reputed to have taken the case on contingency" there are reports he's received interim payments. In particular, there have been some special issues of stock possibly related to Boies. Also worth noting that the other firm in the case is that of the son of Utah's US Senator, Orrin Hatch.

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"IBM started warming it's legal rock crushing machine" s/it's/its/

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"This license is further muddied by side letters between AT&T and IBM." Not to mention side letters (unpublished) between Novell and Caldera/SCO, and the terms of the BSDI settlement (unpublished).

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"SCO Group has refused to provide any verifiable evidence..." what evidence has been produced under NDA has been roundly criticized ([link|http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6956|Ian Lance Taylor's NDA SCO code review]). Code shown at Caldera/SCO's annual user group meeting purporting to show infringement by Linux was rapidly shown to be publicly available, unhindered code. ([link|http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/08/20/HNscomoreflaws_1.html| Robert McMillan, InfoWorld]). You cover much of this later in the article.

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"SCO Group, even with it's stock price..." s/it's/its/

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"The [BSDI] case became a total fiasco and was settled favorably to BSD but the code is still in there." Might be worth noting that the terms of settlement were not disclosed, though it is widely rumored to have involved minor edits of three files by BBSDI to settle AT&T's copyright claims. You cover this later.

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"Further, under it's previous management" s/it's/its/

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"It's become obvious..." Got one right ;-) Might be worth noting, though, that [link|http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/09/09/1062902037394.html|SCO may not know origin of code, says Australian UNIX historian]

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"SGI is moving all it's systems to Linux..." s/it's/its/

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"Several research repositories were quickly constructed ..." [link|http://www.groklaw.com/|Groklaw] very much deserves mention here.

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"RedHat, the leading publisher..." It's "Red Hat". Two. Words. All occurances.

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"Outside the Linux kernel, the GNU people have kept scrupulous records and analyzed every inch of code for IP violations before issuing it ..." Could stand rewriting. I don't know that the GNU Project performs code audits. They do, however, require a copyright assignment by the contributing author, of which one component is a representation by the author that the work is either theirs of original authorship or licensed under terms compatible with those of the work as a whole. More significant I feel are the following two points. 1. Over the two decades in which free software has been available (the GNU Manifesto was published just over two decades ago), this is the first time a major claim of copyright misappropriation has been made -- and the raw material requred for any organization to make such a claim, the program source code, is generally available. 2. Free software isn't the only software which includes free software. A search of Microsoft's own souce code will show significant amounts of BSD-licensed code (FTP.EXE is the classic example). This is entirely legal, but it's also possible that proprietary software contains illegally appropriated free or prprietary software. The situation faced by Linux is hardely specific to free software. What it is is far more readily determined and corrected.

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"they've never attacked RedHat by name..." s/RedHat/Red Hat/g

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"The weakest points in IBM's counter suit and RedHat's suit" s/RedHat/Red Hat/

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"AT&T Unix System Vr4.0 "unified Unix" was released in 1989 ..." or as [link|http://twiki.iwethey.org/Main/PiratesOfPenguinance|The Modern SCO Executive puts it:] "But please don't ever hit me with our POSIX system standard score. / I'm always quite confused by that infernal nonsense System 4." Didn't realize how fully apt that was when I wrote it. Thanks for that history.

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Other than these minor edits, class work Gryg.

A search of Microsoft's own souce code will show significant amounts of BSD-licensed code (FTP.EXE is the classic example). This is entirely legal, but it's also possible that proprietary software contains illegally appropriated free or prprietary software.

In order to defend against SCO's claims, various people developed and refined the "shredding" method of comparing code for similarity. I don't know if this can also be run against compiled code, but it would be interesting to start running proprietary code against OSS products with similar functionality.

Even more intersting would be to find copies of actual MS source code. I wonder if anyone who has such would be interested in publishing the shred checksums.

Post #119,785 by kmself 10/2/03 6:10:44 AM Reply	Comments "We now base our systems on SuSE Linux..." might be worthwhile to point out that SuSE is the [link\|http://www.caldera.com/unitedlinux/\|continuation path of Caldera] in any event, through [link\|http://www.unitedlinux.com/\|United Linux], and is in fact what you'll find on Caldera/SCO's own support FTP site, at least as far as the kernel goes, if not the rest of the packages. SuSE is the core remaining UL member. Makes a better case to your customers IMO. \r\n\r\n "The Canopy Group, the investment organization that controlled Caldera, brought in a new CEO..." details of compensation and incentives structured into it are of possible interest. Covered at Groklaw, looking for links XXX. \r\n\r\n "Boies' firm ... is reputed to have taken the case on contingency" there are reports he's received interim payments. In particular, there have been some special issues of stock possibly related to Boies. Also worth noting that the other firm in the case is that of the son of Utah's US Senator, Orrin Hatch. \r\n\r\n "IBM started warming it's legal rock crushing machine" s/it's/its/ \r\n\r\n "This license is further muddied by side letters between AT&T and IBM." Not to mention side letters (unpublished) between Novell and Caldera/SCO, and the terms of the BSDI settlement (unpublished). \r\n\r\n "SCO Group has refused to provide any verifiable evidence..." what evidence has been produced under NDA has been roundly criticized ([link\|http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6956\|Ian Lance Taylor's NDA SCO code review]). Code shown at Caldera/SCO's annual user group meeting purporting to show infringement by Linux was rapidly shown to be publicly available, unhindered code. ([link\|http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/08/20/HNscomoreflaws_1.html\| Robert McMillan, InfoWorld]). You cover much of this later in the article. \r\n\r\n "SCO Group, even with it's stock price..." s/it's/its/ \r\n\r\n "The [BSDI] case became a total fiasco and was settled favorably to BSD but the code is still in there." Might be worth noting that the terms of settlement were not disclosed, though it is widely rumored to have involved minor edits of three files by BBSDI to settle AT&T's copyright claims. You cover this later. \r\n\r\n "Further, under it's previous management" s/it's/its/ \r\n\r\n "It's become obvious..." Got one right ;-) Might be worth noting, though, that [link\|http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/09/09/1062902037394.html\|SCO may not know origin of code, says Australian UNIX historian] \r\n\r\n "SGI is moving all it's systems to Linux..." s/it's/its/ \r\n\r\n "Several research repositories were quickly constructed ..." [link\|http://www.groklaw.com/\|Groklaw] very much deserves mention here. \r\n\r\n "RedHat, the leading publisher..." It's "Red Hat". Two. Words. All occurances. \r\n\r\n "Outside the Linux kernel, the GNU people have kept scrupulous records and analyzed every inch of code for IP violations before issuing it ..." Could stand rewriting. I don't know that the GNU Project performs code audits. They do, however, require a copyright assignment by the contributing author, of which one component is a representation by the author that the work is either theirs of original authorship or licensed under terms compatible with those of the work as a whole. More significant I feel are the following two points. 1. Over the two decades in which free software has been available (the GNU Manifesto was published just over two decades ago), this is the first time a major claim of copyright misappropriation has been made -- and the raw material requred for any organization to make such a claim, the program source code, is generally available. 2. Free software isn't the only software which includes free software. A search of Microsoft's own souce code will show significant amounts of BSD-licensed code (FTP.EXE is the classic example). This is entirely legal, but it's also possible that proprietary software contains illegally appropriated free or prprietary software. The situation faced by Linux is hardely specific to free software. What it is is far more readily determined and corrected. \r\n\r\n "they've never attacked RedHat by name..." s/RedHat/Red Hat/g \r\n\r\n "The weakest points in IBM's counter suit and RedHat's suit" s/RedHat/Red Hat/ \r\n\r\n "AT&T Unix System Vr4.0 "unified Unix" was released in 1989 ..." or as [link\|http://twiki.iwethey.org/Main/PiratesOfPenguinance\|The Modern SCO Executive puts it:] "But please don't ever hit me with our POSIX system standard score. / I'm always quite confused by that infernal nonsense System 4." Didn't realize how fully apt that was when I wrote it. Thanks for that history. \r\n\r\n Other than these minor edits, class work Gryg. --\r\n Karsten M. Self [link\|mailto:kmself@ix.netcom.com\|kmself@ix.netcom.com]\r\n [link\|http://kmself.home.netcom.com/\|http://kmself.home.netcom.com/]\r\n What part of "gestalt" don't you understand?\r\n [link\|http://twiki.iwethey.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/\|TWikIWETHEY] -- an experiment in collective intelligence. Stupidity. Whatever.\r\n \r\n Keep software free. Oppose the CBDTPA. Kill S.2048 dead.\r\n[link\|http://www.eff.org/alerts/20020322_eff_cbdtpa_alert.html\|http://www.eff.org/alerts/20020322_eff_cbdtpa_alert.html]\r\n
Post #119,800 by drewk 10/2/03 9:46:42 AM Reply	That raises an interesting possibility A search of Microsoft's own souce code will show significant amounts of BSD-licensed code (FTP.EXE is the classic example). This is entirely legal, but it's also possible that proprietary software contains illegally appropriated free or prprietary software. In order to defend against SCO's claims, various people developed and refined the "shredding" method of comparing code for similarity. I don't know if this can also be run against compiled code, but it would be interesting to start running proprietary code against OSS products with similar functionality. Even more intersting would be to find copies of actual MS source code. I wonder if anyone who has such would be interested in publishing the shred checksums. === Implicitly condoning stupidity since 2001.
Post #119,801 by Andrew Grygus 10/2/03 9:53:54 AM Reply	Thanks - and Damn - forgot the its scan again! Well, it was 1:30am at the end a hard day. All your points are good, and some of them I considered but didn't get them in because you just have to put the thing up sometime or other. I'll be working your suggestions in during the next day or so - but I'll do the its scan now. [link\|http://www.aaxnet.com\|AAx]
Post #119,803 by drewk 10/2/03 10:09:44 AM 10/2/03 10:11:45 AM Reply	While you're scanning ... "GPL License" is to fingernails grating on a chalkboard as "ATM Machine" is to salt in an open wound Geez Andrew, drink some coffee if you're going to write after midnight. :) Oh, and: Other factors mitigate against SCO Groups success SCO Group's === Implicitly condoning stupidity since 2001. Edited by drewk Oct. 2, 2003, 10:11:45 AM EDT Expand All History
Post #119,804 by Andrew Grygus 10/2/03 10:17:11 AM Reply	That was something I considered at length. To us it is anoyingly redundant, but my target audience is not techies and isn't likely familiar with the GPL, so clarifying it as a "license" now and then seemed like a good idea - especially for people who skip around rather than read sequentially through the thing. [link\|http://www.aaxnet.com\|AAx]
Post #119,805 by drewk 10/2/03 10:20:05 AM 10/2/03 10:39:18 AM Reply	Wondered if that's what it was Did you define GPL elsewhere in the article? Can't recall if you did or not. I know that typically in newspaper or magazine articles, even long ones, they'll define an acronym the first time it's used then just use it. But if you're going to use it that way, the word "license" should be either upper or lower case each time. You've got it both ways. PS: IBM's only response was, "Our license is perpetual and irrevocable" (A16), End with period instead of comma. filed a multifaceted countersuit.including Comma instead of period. Later in same sentance "SCO Groups" instaed of "SCO Group's" again. === Implicitly condoning stupidity since 2001. Edited by drewk Oct. 2, 2003, 10:20:49 AM EDT Edited by drewk Oct. 2, 2003, 10:23:33 AM EDT Edited by drewk Oct. 2, 2003, 10:39:18 AM EDT Expand All History
Post #119,817 by Andrew Grygus 10/2/03 11:23:39 AM Reply	Thanks, got 'em all. [link\|http://www.aaxnet.com\|AAx]

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