The Church of the Blinding White Light of Stupidity

Show me an open source app that does not imitate an existing commercial application. We are not talking about filling the same market space, I'm talking feature for feature match.
Apache, PHP, Sendmail. Just off the top of my head.

I'm a lot like you; I like the right tool for the right job. I leave the politics to the nerds on /., which has become increasingly unreadable over the past few years. (Yet, I keep reading it...)

Well, how about...

BIND (the Berkeley Internet Name Daemon)
DHCPd (the DHCP server)

And once I heard about a programming language...

Perl

And another...

Python

Postgres was a major research project before it became a useful database engine. It still can do things that major relational engines are just now starting to do. (i.e. user defined data types)

Let's see...

I think Apache and Sendmail have already been mentioned...how about the first versions of NCSA Mosaic, which would later become the basis for both IE and Netscape Navigator?

Granted, Open Source does very well when it is derivative. But the interesting thing about it is that it tends to be far greater than the sum of its parts. It can be used to solve interesting problems in very different ways. It combines stuff that other things have done in different ways. Take the Linux kernel packet-filtering code, for example. You can do all kinds of neat things with that that you cannot do with most commercial Unices.

You guys are still looking at this from a programmer's point of view...which has nothing to do with the legalities of "borrowing" code in violation of a software licensing agreement. If any part of Linux was "derived", copied, borrowed, whatever...which you all seem to agree that it was...then IBM violated the software licensing agreement.

It doesn't matter that Linux is the greatest thing since sliced bread....if any of its code was copied from System V, IBM is in deep shit. Step back for a minute and think of it this way. Suppose you've designed a lawnmower that automatically adjusts its blade height so you'll never hit a tree root again. (I know, in my dreams.) Now, you've developed a pretty good business leasing your new & improved lawnmover to your neighbors. To protect your invention (and investment), you include a clause in the leasing contract that says that the people who lease your lawn mower can make their own modifications to your design, but they can't sell anything that includes your design even if they've made modifications.

Now your annoying neighbor, and we all have one, has agreed to this contract, paid for the lease and takes home one of your lawn mowers. Much later, you're cruising through your local Lowe's and discover a handy dandy new & improved lawnmower that's selling like hotcakes...and that includes your automatically adjusting mower blades. You check into it, and discover that your neighbor took parts of your design, improved on it, and sold it to Toro.

Do you really think you wouldn't have a valid breach of contract claim against your annoying neighbor? Or Toro, for that matter?

This isn't about the merits of open source philosophy. It's about an alleged breach of contract...a contract that IBM willingly signed.

And if SCO wins, it's going to be the beginning of the end for open source....and the way coders develop programs is going to drastically change. This is a huge, huge case and its effects on you guys are something you need to start realizing.

The wildcatting days are over....for better or worse. The lawyers have ridden into town.

: )

Rita, I didn't say Linux was in the clear. Mike was looking for examples of open source innovation and I provided some.

I don't know much about copyright law but I know IBM does. And as far as Boies' record goes, it's pretty spotty in the big cases (DOJ v MS, Gore v Bush, etc). This is far from a slam dunk for SCO.

As far as this being the beginning of the end of open source...no, I'm sorry, that's not the case. IF SCO wins (which is still a big if), it may be the beginning of the end for open source in the corporate world, which is unfortunate, but there are many places that will still find use for it...amateurs, students, etc.

Don't disagree with you at all, Marty. It's not going to disappear from the face of the earth immediately if SCO wins or IBM settles. And it will still be used by some....but so are Commodore 64's.

If Linux cost as much as Windows (or more) would it be as popular as it is now?

Ahhh... the Amiga... one of the most cost effective video post processing machines ever made, when combined with a Video Toaster. These puppies are still in use all over the world, at television stations, for doing editing, titleing and fade effects.

Good, solid design is just that. It meets the customer's need and as long as that need does not change and the device continues to function, it continues to meet the need.

I had an epiphany about two years into the computer support trade. My job is not to make kewl computer shit. My job is to make the technology invisible to the user.

A draftsman should not need to understand how a computer works to design and draw a sewer treatment plant, a secretary shouldn't have to be able to diagram the OSI stack to print a contract and the CFO has no need for an in-depth understanding of any DBMS.

All those things are my responsibility. The users must be able to draw blueprints, type letters and check the balance sheet without excessive additional training.

We are the wizards of our age, the alchemists writing in runes and chanting obscure acronyms to ward off the evil bugs.

"I call on the power of Metcalf and Norton! Oh RLL and EDSI, RPG and assembler! Debug this code and make this abend's meaning clear!"

...He adjusts his black wizard hat with a Digital Research logo on it and produces an eight and a half inch floppy from beneath his robe...

"With this sacred disk I beseech you to reboot clean, to post and function without error."

What's the point of being a wizard if everybody can change lead to gold?

Ironically enough, I used Linux to help DR my Windows ME box today. (I own a legitimate license to ME so re-installed it in preference to XP Pro, which I don't have such a license for.)

One of the essential driving forces behind Linux is its zero cost nature. If it were just as expensive as Windows, it would be exactly where BeOS is today.

Linux has succeeded because of its technical merits, because of it philosophy, and because of the incredibly low barrier to entry to getting effectively a real Unix running on a PC.

You can't divorce freedom from Linux - they are intertwined.

The Debian project is already working on GNU/FreeBSD, GNU/OpenBSD, and GNU/NetBSD. Some people in the community, believe it or not, have never been happy with the Linux kernel.

But before we spend too much time debating doomsday scenarios for Linux, let's remember what happened when Bell sued UC Berkeley. Not only did Bell lose badly, they were forced to admit that they had done the same thing to Berkeley code (i.e. steal code without proper attribution). Berkeley was forced to remove 4 files from its kernel source tree, and the resulting 4.4BSD-lite became the basis of all modern free BSDs.

I've read a lot about the specifics of the case. The kernel itself is really the only major vulnerable spot, and if the Linux kernel is vindicated it will be a very good thing for open source.

"if the Linux kernel is vindicated it will be a very good thing for open source" I think you absolutely right there.

One thing that concerns me about the SCO suit is that I understand the value of your being able to look at some code and say "Wow, that's pretty cool. But you know, it would be even cooler if you took that bit of code and did...." And restrictions on derivative innovations can greatly hamper that process. On the other hand, it provides protection to the coder who slaved getting that code to work.

From what little I understand about open source philosophy, they're willing to forgo the protection in favor of innovations. Non-open sourcers are not. The bigger picture of the SCO case is a battle between these two, which is why I find it so interesting from a geek standpoint.

It's not all that interesting from a legal standpoint really....a breach of contract dispute, how boring is that? And it may end with a whimper, not a bang. But it sure do make for some interesting conversations, don't it?

It does indeed.

Your summary is essentially correct - the most important (and exciting, for those on the inside) thing about open-source is the ability and indeed the invitation to look inside, see how things are done in a particular implementation, and see if it can't be improved on in some way. One of the most interesting ways this shows up is with embedding of one project within another, as Apache has done with Perl.

By themselves, Apache is a very good webserver and Perl is a very good utility language. But by fusing them (embedding Perl in Apache), they become capable of a lot more than they could otherwise. In the commercial world this is hard to do, because of all the IP and licensing restrictions. As a freelance hacker (in the sense of, someone who enjoys learning programmable systems) working at home, I like being empowered in that way, and knowing that I can use that infrastructure to sell goods and services if I wish.

Another example is Linux emulation by things like FreeBSD. Emulation is tricky in the commercial software world because you are typically tracking a moving target. Linux is also a moving target but because all of the development is done in the open, it's easy to follow and easy to make sure it works right.

Anyway, back on to a legal topic - I was thinking, even if SCO wins, how binding is that on Linux development in the rest of the world? I know that when the crypto export regulations were in full swing (they relaxed somewhat in 2001), most of the interesting crypto development just moved to Canada, and we "imported" it from there.

Crypto is an interesting discussion by itself. Perhaps better done in a separate thread. :)

Interesting point Marty....I'll have to ponder that one for a while, international law not being one of my strong points. My knowledge is pretty much limited to knowing where to look up whether a technology can be exported to a certain country.

Brings to mind that infamous quote by President Jackson on the US Supreme Court's decision re removal of the Cherokees from Georgia: "The Court made its decision, now let's see them enforce it."

And they couldn't.

SCO is very specific about Linux Kernel 2.4 and later. So any Kernel before 2.4 is not affected? How about the BSDs? How about the claim by Novell, that SCO does not own the copyrights to System V, but is trying to buy them from Novell in recent weeks and months, and Novell refused?

If patents are involved, how long will those be valid? 20 Years? Then the Open Source just needs to hold on for 20 years, until proprietary software is public domain.

SCO knows this, they use this lawsuit. Microsoft knows this, they use TCPA.

In the meantime let's see whether one or all of the BSD's can do what Linux can do now. OpenBSD for servers and FreeBSD for desktops and notebooks? Shouldn't be too difficult, although I'm not a programmer, but in the end it's just bits and bytes.