It took more than two and a half years, but the SCO Group finally has disclosed a list of areas it believes IBM violated its Unix contract, allegedly by moving proprietary Unix technology into open-source Linux.
SCO Describes Alleged IBM Unix Misuse to Court
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Eugenia Loli
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I really don’t see this affecting Linux now. Obviously, there is no code literally copied from SysV/Unixware into Linux. If there was, either SCO, IBM, Novell or someone would have found it. SCO is relying on IBM having broken a contract with SCO. Well, that’s all fine and dandy, except IBM breaking a contract with SCO has NO effect whatsoever on anyone else. So this brings us to Red Hat’s Lanham Act Claims against SCO, IBM’s Lanham Act Claims against SCO, and then Novell’s Slander of Title and Contract claims against SCO. As for IBM’s alleged contract breaches, these letters may clarify those matters.
http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/pdf/6_9_03_n-sco.pdf
http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/pdf/6_12_03_n-scoandibm.p…
http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/pdf/10_7_03_n-sco.pdf
http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/pdf/10_7_03_n-sco_sgi.pdf
http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/pdf/10_7_03_n-sco_tla.pdf
http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/pdf/10_10_03_n-sco_ibm.pd…
http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/pdf/10_10_03_n-scoandsgi….
Even if there was (after all this screwing around on SCO’s part) code directly copied from Unix into Linux, SCO is required under the law to mitigate their damages, which, if this was the case, they clearly have not done so.
Again, a disclosure that discloses nothing.
Fud, fud, fud and more fud. Nothing more, and nothing less. The whole SCO vs IBM schmozzle should be held in stasis until the SCO vs Novell case has been heard and judged.
Dave
I sure hope there is no trial in Utah.
Reason: Remember how Kodak sued Sun over patents in Java? There was a trial in Rochester which happens that Kodak is the biggest employer in Rochester. Even though there was ton of prior art, they still lost. Obviously, the jury was very biased.
I see the same thing happening if the trial is in Utah.
Obviously, the jury was very biased.
I see the same thing happening if the trial is in Utah..
Yeah but which way do you mean? Novell was founded in Utah and played a huge role in bringing technology to the area. Novell has also seeded many local tech companies with former employees. This includes Mr. Noorda who founded the Canopy Group, who itself has parented many local tech companies (including the current SCO Group).
Having lived in the area for over 30 years and seeing myself how these companies came to be, I would have to agree that the locals would be biased but could easily see how it could be towards IBM with SCO being on one side and Novell, IBM, etc on the other. Very few people are as fimilar with SCO as they are with Novell.
Remember how Kodak sued Sun over patents in Java? … Even though there was ton of prior art, they still lost.
Yes, lots of prior art such as the fact that Microsoft, HP and IBM had all previously licensed the Wang Labs patents that Kodak was using against Sun:
http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/10/04/HNpatentfight_1.html
In fact, Microsoft had already been sued over those same patents, and had licensed them in 1996:
http://www.endgame.org/microsoft.html
(Search for “Wang Labs” in 1996 in the above document).
We may not like software patents, but the Kodak/Sun lawsuit was a fair trial, over existing patents that had been previously found valid (as valid as a legal settlement, anyway). If there were any useful prior art, it would have been raised earlier. It wasn’t.
Furthermore, how can SCO be allowed to not have to disclose all of these so called infringements? Unless the items were trade secrets, there is no excuse not to make them public.
Dave
Unless the items were trade secrets, there is no excuse not to make them public.
Give the man a prize!
This is beginning to shape up as if SCO actually have a reasonable argument behind all the Slashdot FUD. If commercial secrets were used to improve Linux, which is a direct competitor, why shouldn’t SCO be able to sue the guilty party?
Let’s face it. Without the generosity of commercial players, a lot of the major improvements to open source wouldn’t be anywhere near where they are now. By acting like the dog that bit the hand, it’s heading to be put down. What a show!
I don’t agree. Trolls these days just aren’t that clever, nor are they very original. Good try, but you’re sorta boring, and just not smart enough to keep it “funnier every minute.”
No, it just gets more convoluted and stupid every minute. Just as SCO’s claims lack substance, your pathetic attempt at a troll is similarly lacking. In fact, it’s so obscure, so vague that it is difficult even to tell what your point is. After symbolic analysis it seems that you claim that the secrecy of SCO’s sealed filing proves its substance. Sorry… Non Sequitur. It proves nothing at all… at least until it’s unsealed. It’s kind of like ten minutes of silence followed by shouting, “Ah! Ha! Gotcha!” in a loud, supercilious voice.
It’s comical even to refer to this filing as a “disclosure,” since nothing is disclosed. It’s the same nonsense argument we’ve had from SCO for years: “IBM has misappropriated our proprietary technology, but it’s all secret so we can’t tell you what it was; just take our word for it and award us $10G and an injunction against IBM to prevent them from doing something that they haven’t done and aren’t doing.”
Actually, the past couple of years have amply demonstrated that SCO has to try and make their arguments without disclosing anything (if such a thing is even logically possible), because everytime they release anything vaguely resembling a meaningful body of facts, it is quickly decontructed, showing the utter lack of substance behind their claims. This sealed filing is probably just an attempt to avoid another public humiliation at the hands of the growing body of experts that SCO’s squalid little enterprise has called together.
“This is beginning to shape up as if SCO actually have a reasonable argument behind all the Slashdot FUD. If commercial secrets were used to improve Linux, which is a direct competitor, why shouldn’t SCO be able to sue the guilty party?”
The problem is that until they switched to full litigation mode, Linux wasn’t a competitor of SCO, it was one of their own products. SCO (AKA Caldera) was a Linux Distro, they didn’t get into the unix business till later. In fact they continued to offer linux for years after starting their fud campaign complete with the GPL, even though they claimed that it was illegal, unconstitutional, and that Linux was their property. It may even be available from them this way to this day on their website.
>>
If commercial secrets were used to improve Linux, which is a direct competitor, why shouldn’t SCO be able to sue the guilty party?”
<<
If Oracle uses commercial secrets to impove their database, which is a direct competitor to other databases, why shouldn’t other database makers be able to sue Oracle? It should therefore be illegal for anybody to improve their software products with commercial secrets, is that what you are saying?
For starters, who owns those commercial secrets? Obviously, scox only has a basis for a lawsuit if the trade secrets belonged to scox to begin with. Otherwise, nobody would be able to improve their software products (or other products, I suppose).
So what trade secrets does scox own? Scox claims to own sysV, although even that is in dispute. Funny thing, scox is not even claiming that IBM is exposing those secrets.
This is beginning to shape up as if SCO actually have a reasonable argument behind all the Slashdot FUD. If commercial secrets were used to improve Linux, which is a direct competitor, why shouldn’t SCO be able to sue the guilty party?
If Commercial Secrets were used to improve Linux, then yes, SCO should get paid for damage. But, you see, SCO has to prove that this is so. SCO has not done this. SCO has narrowly avoided two court orders telling them to do this in the past. IBM has demanded that SCO tell them what the case is about before, and SCO has refused.
As for Trade Secrets, SCO approved of textbooks being used at schools teaching the internals of Unix. You can’t claim trade secret on something being taught in a bloody university. You also can’t claim trade secret on code you distributed yourself in source form (SCO posted old Unix code to its website under the BSD license, then tried to terminate SGI’s UnixSysV license for taking some of this code and putting it into Linux, which is allowed under the BSD License. after this was pointed out, they yanked the code off of their site).
Had you actually been following the case, you would know it was IBM, not SCO who pushed for SCO to be forced to turn over all allegedly infringing code. Just like back in 2003, when IBM was sitting there saying “what the f–k is this case all about?” and SCO essentially said “you tell us, you stole the code, but we don’t have to prove it, so figure it out yourself”. Let’s not forget the SCOforum slideshow, where SCO proved that code had been copied into Linux…..from BSD (it was copied into Unix also).
Someone once made a comment about Microsoft being the most Powerful Software Company in the world, and SCO being the most ridiculous. They were dead on the money.
I seriously don’t know how anyone can be dumb enough to believe them anymore. They have lied far too many times. They claimed 1,000,000 lines of code were copied from Unix into Linux, then said in the IBM case that this was not so. They claimed that the AT&T-BSDi settlement prohibited BSD code from being licensed under the GPL. Groklaw obtained a copy of the settlement, and this was not the case. They claimed they didn’t know IBM was using SVR4 on AIX for Power, yet they had f–king Powerpoint documents that they themselves made on their internal computers boasting that this was the case. After the initial outburst between Novell and SCO in public, their continued to be arguements over the copyrights, patents and contracts in the background (read about it here http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/zip/correspondence.zip ). Novell even waived some of SCO’s claims, as per the APA. SCO lied to a reporter about this, saying Novell had backed off and agreed with SCO about the copyright issue. They never even mentioned Novell as a risk in their SEC filings. They are compulsive liars.
SCO is the most ridiculous, scummy, pathetic company I have ever seen.
So, please, I ask of you, point to one single thing, one single piece of evidence, that supports SCO’s case in any way, shape or form that hasn’t been thouroughly debunked.
Amen!
Dave
{If commercial secrets were used to improve Linux}
1. There are no trade secrets in Unix – BSD code reveals how Unix works, as does a multitude of textbooks on the topic.
2. SCO have dropped all trade secret claims in this case.
3. SCO are talking about **IBM** code (from AIX and OS/2) in any event – not Unix code. By what right do SCO claim to have trade secret rights over **IBM’s** code?
They’re *trying* to claim that they own Unix lock, stock & barrel, and thus can dictate how software that is made for the Unix environment, by “it’s” licensees, is used, sold and integrated with anything else, other than Unix. And then, although they can’t own the copyright on it, they want to get license fees for this software developed by 3rd parties, for doing absolutely jack shit. Does it really make you wonder?
SCO have provided absolutely nothing in 30 months. IBM have been bent over backwards, screwed up the ass by SCO, with the court watching and doing nothing. The US legal system is a joke. Just wait till Microsoft bribes the US government into a “first to patent” law, then all patent hell will break loose, as prior art is screwed up the ass.
If the US government really wants to foster true competition, they need to do the following:
1. reduce software copyrights to 20 years maximum.
2. once copyright has ceased, software is public domain. No ifs, buts or maybes.
3. remove software patents completely, nullify all current software patents.
4. Remove the DMCA, since it is effectively a restriction of trade.
5. Enforceable remove DRM from software applications.
I guarantee that the software industry would flourish under these changes, strengthening the US economy in the process.
Dave
>Let’s face it. Without the generosity of commercial
>players, a lot of the major improvements to open source
>wouldn’t be anywhere near where they are now. By acting >like the dog that bit the hand, it’s heading to be put
>down. What a show!
Get a grip, man. Any “generosity” the commercial players may have shown is so that they can get a slice of the big pie that is open source. Are you astroturfing, or just senseless?
Get a grip, man. Any “generosity” the commercial players may have shown is so that they can get a slice of the big pie that is open source. Are you astroturfing, or just senseless?
Hah. If it were not for the commercial players, the Linux kernel would not be scalable from watches to super-computers with hundred of CPUs. Or are you telling me that some Joe Random would have hacked a scalable SMP implementation with his uniprocessor box in his basement? Same for SELinux and a number of improvements. That’s without mentioning contributions to major projects like X.org, the major DEs, many office tools, IDEs…
Even though some people are going to deny this, I believe both are living in a symbiosis. The UNIX empires would probably crumble without open-source but the progress of open-source wouldn’t go at this pace without any commercial interests (IBM, Novell, Sun, Redhat, SuSE…).
Hah. If it were not for the commercial players, the Linux kernel would not be scalable from watches to super-computers with hundred of CPUs. Or are you telling me that some Joe Random would have hacked a scalable SMP implementation with his uniprocessor box in his basement?
I think what is saying is that commercial players have participated in Linux because they see a return in investment, so it’s not really generosity as much as what I’d call “enlightened self-interest”. So you guys are actually kind of agreeing.
Same for SELinux and a number of improvements.
Actually, SELinux was contributed by the NSA, a government organization (and therefore not a “commercial” player).
Interesting that thou dost claim clarvoyance to what could have been if the sands of time had changed…
Your ignorance .. shines forth!
Linux is so unstable one can obviously conclude that there is no commercial code in it.
“Linux is so unstable one can obviously conclude that there is no commercial code in it.”
ROFL
1. Windows ME was the least stable non-beta OS that I ever saw in my life, I guess there couldn’t possibly have been any commercial code in it 😉 .
2. Linux is rock solid and can run for years on end with normal, or even harsh use. I’ve only ever had to hard reset a Linux system twice in over five years of use, and only then because I use the development releases as a contributor who hopes one day to become a professional Linux developer.
That’s why almost nothing works without re-compiling source code. Because it is so made not-easy to use, it means it is simple, non complicated, it never messes up like WinME.
“We reveal major UNIXâ„¢ IP violations”
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/11/20/we_reveal_major_unix_trade/
Happy reading.
PS: I am the one who submitted the story to the register (in the form of links). It was written up by “Andrew Orlowski” for the enjoyment of the community.
Excellent link. Thanks!
From TFA:
The Lindon, Utah-based company did provide some information about what it believes IBM moved improperly to Linux, though.
“Some of these wrongful disclosures include areas such as an entire file management system; others are communications by IBM personnel working on Linux that resulted in enhancing Linux functionality by disclosing a method or concept from Unix technology,” SCO said.
They’ve already gotten their rears kicked over trying to claim IBM had no right to contribute JFS to linux, and that “methods and concepts” bunk was a complete laugher to everyone in the business. If this is really all they’ve got in their FIVE WHOLE PAGES, IBM is going to roast them alive.
Don’t the Americans see that their juridical system is kinda really badly broken? Go to the court, tell that a party is breaking your rights and let that party and the whole court search for evidence as if they were a bunch of clowns. And the worst thing: the court still didn’t reject the case. That costs just too much money for the state.
For two years (or three? I don’t remember it anymore) SCO was going to the court and had nothing in their hands against IBM. Instead they made IBM to provide them evidence. Still, nothing happened – they found no single line of code.
That shows how badly the system is broken. Thanks to the court SCO made A LOT OF money with their course jumps – else no one would jump onto such boat which is going towards delta and no one comes alive to the finish …
Another great production brought to you by SCO and financed by Microsoft. They can juggle court cases like no clown on earth and tie up a decrepid Legal System for years with no Substantial Burdon of Proof.
Wait for the next co-production where they will claim they invented the internet and all its protocals without revealing a shred of evidence and again employ many wonderous leaches in the US Legal System for another 5 year show.
When are people going to get that what functions as a Legal System is nothing more than a tired bad joke destroying creativity and productivity.
I’m bored with re-runs.
This must be a joke. I wonder why the remaining couple of investors who still have some money in SCO don’t finally pull it out before SCO is accumulating more debt. At least from a financial perspective this company is as dead as it gets.
since Thom (our famous anti-Groklaw zealot) won’t accept stories from groklaw, I might as well mention that if you want a honest and precise analysis of the SCO-IBM trial, then head for Groklaw.
However, be prepared: PJ is clearly biased in favour of open source, and she doesn’t hide that. However, it does not effect her analysis nor does it prevent her from presenting the cases from all points of view.
But it can be annoying if you are against FOSS (like Thom).
Yep, PJ is incredibly biased, but it really doesn’t matter, because she provides links to back up everything she says. Court documents, exhibits, interviews, other news articles, you name it. This is why people quit reading O’Gara’s pieces in favour of PJ’s, and why O’Gara hates her so much.
hear hear.
Dave