Slashdot Mirror

I'm trying master.

The truth is that I post there so frequently, and I was so peeved about the GL site being temporarily Slashdotted that I didn't even think about making a link.

Besides, anyone familiar with the SCO-Wars should have it bookmarked already and constantly open in another tab.

Because he made a link ;) Learn well young padawan, slashdot mods are easily willed by shiny links all over the damn place.

Read here, here, here.

MO'G, is supposedly a tech "journalist" who has been covering amongst many other subjects the SCO vs everybody story. Basically, the open source community dislikes her ( as I see it) because 1. She is obviously biased against Linux, and pro SCO. This is not an opinion, as much as fact. Simply by reading what she writes and seeing that no matter what the decision is in the court case, it is always a win for SCO, even the time the Judge in the case said that so far SCO has provided no evidence of their claims, MO'G painted it as a win for SCO because he had denied a motion they had put forth. 2. She has made rather vile accusations, and published personal information about Pamela Jones, the host of the website Growlaw (http://www.groklaw.net/) who has been providing, what I consider to be a very detailed and comprehensive site tracking every bit of the SCO vs the Linux world cases. 3. She is a hack writer. If I claimed to be a journalist, I would at least try to make sure that what I was writing was close to being correct, but it seemed that even when she could have easily gotten the correct facts, she preferred to write her own version of what happened during court appearances, even though she wasn't there.

The Growlaw site is at least truthful. Documents are retrieved, or linked from the court, volunteers go to the court sessions and write what actually occurred. MO'G wouldn't have attracted so much attention if she had at least been a little more intelligent about how she wrote her stories about the trial. I mean,lots of journalists are writing the story, and some are SCO positive, and they aren't attracting the same level of criticism that she is.

Hopefully this helps a few of the people who were unsure of who MO'G is, and if you want more information, go to the Groklaw site.

Pamela Jones (PJ) of GROKLAW posted her response on her weblog.
Printable Version.

Pamela Jones (PJ) of GROKLAW posted her response on her weblog.
Printable Version.

So PJ is a 61 year old Jehovas Witness with an iffy car and poor interior decorating skills.

SO

FUCKING

WHAT?

Pardon the use of strong language but this has really got me annoyed. Perhaps that is what Maureen is after. Maybe she WANTS us to get pissed off at her so that someone does something stupid that can be used as evidence that the Open Source Movement consists of spotty teenage thugs.

At this moment in time that sound preferable to being a religious bigot. Criticising someone based on their religion is wrong. Criticising someone based on their age is wrong. Printing personal details on someone as part of a "news" story without their permission is not only wrong but it verges on intimidation.

Yes Maureen - you look like a small minded bigot. An idiot of the highest order. It does not matter one jot whether Pamela Jones is a 61 year old Jehovas Witness as this does not change anything that has been written on Groklaw. Fact are facts Maureen - as you would understand if you really were a journalist and not just a third-rate hack.

PJ could be a Jewish black guy called Bob with poor personal hygiene and it STILL wouldn't change a thing that has been written on Groklaw (other than making the red dress comments a bit creepy).

Hopefully people will not stoop to giving you a taste of your own medicine such as posting your personal details, telephone number, photos of your house.

Even if you deserve it.

So to wrap this up:

Maureen - FUCK YOU AND THE HORSE YOU RODE IN ON.

You'd better hope that the idea of Karma and re-incarnation is wrong otherwise you could be spending the next couple of lives as a dung beetle.

But then again - would we notice the difference?

More importantly, go here and read this:

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200505091 45744287#comments

from http://www.groklaw.net/comment.php?mode=display&si d=20050507193419581&title=&type=article&pid=311460 #c311509
PJ's take lets move on:

Authored by: PJ on Sunday, May 08 2005 @ 10:45 AM EDT
I agree. The person who originally suggested you all
go and look used a Long Island, NY, IP address, and
guess where you-know-who lives?

If we make the above assumption, we may deduce that
this was done for one of the following reasons:

1. to get you guys mad so you would act like "extremists" so
MOG and the mob can attack you again;

2. to get me mad so I sue her for slander, thus revealing
where I really live;

3. to set me up for the next "suicide" -- over my
"distress"
over "losing" my privacy. I have had some, including one
ex SCO employee, suggest this latter scenario as being
plausible. It seems not everyone in Utah thinks the
"suicides" were suicides.

Just in case 3 is true, let me state for the record that I
couldn't care less what MOG thinks of me, even if what
she wrote were true. I also don't care what anyone else
thinks. I'm proud of who I am and the choices I've made
in my life. I don't even care if Groklaw came to an end
tomorrow. I have no ambition, never have, didn't do
Groklaw to become famous or rich, so I truly don't
care. I would never commit suicide over anything, because
I think it's wrong, and I surely wouldn't over anything MOG
wrote, for I hold her in the deepest disdain, when I'm not
laughing at her.

function DiffBySccs {
(( ShellDebug )) && set -x
SccsFile=$(Sourceid2vc $2)
if [[ -f $SccsFile ]]; then
echo "===> $1 $4 -> $3"
sccsdiff -r$4 -r$3 $SccsFile
else
echo "===> $1 ($SccsFile) not found"
fi
}

IBM then matched those files names and identifiers to corresponding Source Code Control System ("SCCS") files. These SCCS files are the files maintained by IBM that provide the file development history since 1991 (or the inception of the file) for the particular corresponding source code file in the AIX operating system or related source code.

This came up on Groklaw a little while back and I took the trouble to check up. The speech was made in the House of Commons (and not broadcast, of course). Extracts were read on the radio news that evening but not by Churchill, who did not record the speech during the war, either. So despite being embedded in the group consciousness, fewer than a few hundred people actually heard Churchill use those words during 1940. The 'beer bottles' meme has no authority that I can trace, and I label it apocryphal. The Groklaw thread is here.

Since it seems most folks don't have a clue how patents work, but might want to learn, here's one place to start: http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page= 20050402193202442

Perhaps the ironic point of the Tiger-Cats team's offer is that a football team owned by a FLOSS operating-systems [mb]illionaire is just as much in the same business as a designer operating system, no more no less, tha a retailer of hardware systems and vanilla operating systems. Any court with a broad enough reading of Trademarks to consider granting relief to Tiger-Direct (TD) here would have to consider the Tiger-Cats (TC) license to Tiger-Apple (TA) as plausible. Which is just funny.

The above referenced USPTO webservice reports

Word Mark TIGER
Goods and Services IC 035. US 100 101 102. G & S: Mail order catalog services featuring computers and computer related products; and Retail store services featuring computers and computer related products. FIRST USE: 1987 1020. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 1987 1020

The hopless litigant's TITLE tag says

TigerDirect.com - Computer Parts, PC Components, Desktop Computers, Laptops, Notebooks

IANAL but that Claim sure looks like they're claiming the Mark in the Mailorder and reatail business they're in (trading in computers etc), not in Computers etc. Since Tiger OS is only usable on PPC Macs, and Mac users wouldn't shop at a Wintel only outlet like TigerDirect, what's the possibility for brand confusion again?

If Apple opened "Tiger Express" stores adjacent to their AppleDirect stores in the malls, that would be a direct conflict with the claim (IANAL).

IANAL but I did a bit of Pre-Law ... so I'm anxiously waiting to see what PJ has to say on this one.

What of the charge that PJ has retroactively modified comments on this topic?

Authored by: PJ on Saturday, April 30 2005 @ 03:05 PM EDT

I just got it. He objected to my saying it was a stopgap.

I modified the sentence he objected to, so as to say that it was viewed from 2000 onward as a stopgap for ebusiness customers, but not necessarily for all. I felt he was right about that point. I do fix articles all the time, when I learn more or realize I have made a mistake or need to nuance something. I had an article ready to say so, but his article came out while I was sleeping.

It's why my readers trust Groklaw, actually, I think. They know I care about being accurate above all things, and if anyone has more information that would result in further editing or correcting, I'm happy to receive it.

Our policy from the beginning has been to correct anything that needs correcting, so don't hesitate to let me know if you see any needed corrections. We are striving for an accurate portrayal of the SCO litigation, for future historians, and so getting it right is vital. And Groklaw's advantage is that it's a group effort, not just me, so all the input is of great value.

Call Daniel at home and ask why he did this? He put his phone number in the document

It's 317.861.6415 See page 4 of the complaint.

This lawsuit is so nonsesial that it will be dismissed on summary judgement. I read the complaint (all 4 pages of it: here ). I don't even know where to begin. Too bad in US you don't get penalized for filing something this stupid. Oh well -- at least it will shut up the trolls who were saying that GPL is untested.

Read the complaint that is linked in the groklaw story.. (http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/Wallace-Complaint.pdf)

It starts out as "The Plaintiff Daniel Wallace......"

and in the damages section changes to "The Defendant Daniel Wallace..."

what a moron..

The above link will take you to Orlowski's reply to PJ's Response to The Register article.

--

The parent poster is confusing two completely different stories. The author who is not using his real name is Paul Murphy who wrote the story about how SCO has IBM on the ropes.

The Register article's claims about PJ retracting statements are not backed up by any evidence.

Strange, since PJ concedes that she changed a statement after the article.

Summary: the Register saw a flaw in some groklaw articles (about the 'stopgap' claims), wrongly interpreted some other comments (proof that SCO knew about Monterey on Power) in that context, and wrote a very long article about it. PJ's response, unfortunately, only goes into those last claims, not the critique on the stopgap claims, which are justified, IMHO.

Anyway, storm is a glass of water.

Jan

As others are reporting, postings to daddypants@slashdot.org are ignored...

Why not present both sides fully? PJ has already posted a rebuttal to this on Groklaw.

And for the record: Groklaw gets it right

PJ's Rebuttal

It's the same guy that thinks SCO have a good case as reported here some days ago:
http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/05/04/29/1950245.shtml ?tid=123&tid=136&tid=88&tid=155

And since also on Groklaw:
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200504291 84804444

Also, IBM specifically has the right to develop and market products employing ideas and concepts in UNIX:

Nothing in this agreement shall prevent LICENSEE from developing or marketing products or services employing ideas, concepts, know-how or techniques relating to data processing embodied in SOFTWARE PRODUCTS subject to this Agreement

Viewed against the backdrop of SCO's plethora of public statements concerning IBM's and others' infringement of SCO's purported copyrights to the UNIX software, it is astonishing that SCO has not offered any competent evidence to create a disputed fact regarding whether IBM has infringed SCO's alleged copyrights through IBM's Linux activities.

-Dale A. Kimball
United States District Judge

IBM pretty much disputes SCO's claim in their response to SCO's Amended Complaint. (links are to PDFs) See paragraph number 2. SCO says they own "all right, title and interest in and to UNIX and UnixWare operating source code, software and sublicensing agreements, together with copyrights, additional licensing rights in and to UNIX and UnixWare, and claims against all parties breaching such agreements." IBM denies those claims as they relate to IBM and says they don't have enough information on whether those claims are true for anyone else. That should be enough for the issue to be disputed regardless of whether IBM has taken the issue to task yet.

IBM pretty much disputes SCO's claim in their response to SCO's Amended Complaint. (links are to PDFs) See paragraph number 2. SCO says they own "all right, title and interest in and to UNIX and UnixWare operating source code, software and sublicensing agreements, together with copyrights, additional licensing rights in and to UNIX and UnixWare, and claims against all parties breaching such agreements." IBM denies those claims as they relate to IBM and says they don't have enough information on whether those claims are true for anyone else. That should be enough for the issue to be disputed regardless of whether IBM has taken the issue to task yet.

You wrote: "PJ ... may even have made a few bucks selling Linux insurance."

But you must've missed it back in Nov when PJ resigned from Open Source Risk Management, which is what you're clearly referring to. You really should read her reasons. It will make you feel very very guilty. That is, if you were honestly misinformed, and not trying to spread nasty rumors.

At any rate, in my mind, PJ's esaay in the link above was an amazingly inspirational act. You'll know what I mean when I say that she's a real role model, not deserving of this kind of smear.

You might also discuss the legal and policy importance of procuring software using open file format standards, a subject discussed at length in the article. Microsoft Office's XML Reference Schemas, because of an overly-restrictive patent license, do not satisfy such requirements, which are critical to software interoperability in eCommerce and eGovernment. OpenOffice file formats do not suffer from that vulnerability.

There is also the important issue of vendor lock-in. OpenOffice, being cross-platform, is a giant step in the direction of freeing organizations from the necessity of using a proprietary operating system. Moreover, even should the school ultimately decide to continue using the Windows platform and Microsoft Office, it can likely receive a far lower bid from a MS Office vendor by using a specification that would allow selection of OpenOffice.

Drafting government specifications in such a way that only one vendor can supply the procured product, particularly in a time of shrinking government budgets, is wasteful and anti-competitive. You might consider developing or requesting an estimated cost comparison, using the previous MS Office licensing cost as the base. A substantial savings is likely, freeing funds for other purposes.

Apparently he telnetted to a BK server, typed "clone" and recorded the output he got back....

Don't worry, I will stop laughing about this massive violation of BK's IP at some point :)

Solaris isn't going to be closed for long.

Is Tridge the elusive IBM hacker who "hacked" into SCO when the claimed:

"IBM exploited the bug to bypass SCO's security system, hack into SCO's computers, and download the very files IBM has now attached to its motion"

-clueless

So far, the only article I've read where he explains what he did involves him telnetting to a BitMover server, and entering the command "HELP", which gave the game away.

Link 1, Link 2.

A number of people have speculated he did packet sniffing, but, honestly, I don't think those people have ever done real reverse engineering. First rule of reverse engineering is: you do the easiest things first.

(Cue all the "No, the first rule is you don't talk about reverse engineering" jokes. Har har har not.)

telnet <hostname> <portnumber>
help

Plus there are many different standalone PDF readers out there for MS-Windows, Linux, OS X, and so on. MS-Word doesn't have a standalone reader except on ... MS-Windows. And if you already have MS-Windows, MS-Office is probably already on the machine.

PDF's can even embed metadata, which is a great bonus for locally searching your collection. e.g. Finding all documents of a particular author, or in a particular project, or about a particular topic.

The big drawback to PDFs is that it is not practical to re-edit them. But then that's not what they're for. They're essentially paper that hasn't come out of the printer yet.

For editable documents, the industry looks to be moving towards OpenDocument, which is a vendor-neutral, open, royalty-free, XML-based file format being shaped up by OASIS. All the big (and many of the small) international names in electronic publishing are members in OASIS. OpenDocument is being supported and encouraged by the EU as well and will be the main format for OpenOffice.org, StarOffice, AbiWord, Kword, and others. Google already indexes it.

From Groklaw

Groklaw's stevem heard Tridge's speech today at the LCA 2005 conference, Australia's national Linux conference, and he has a report for us:

This was taken from my memory of Dr. Andrew Tridgell's keynote at this years LCA2005 Conference.
Essentially Tridge did *NOT* do anything that anyone could ever possibly ever take as breaking a BitKeeper licence, as far as I can see. How was it done? He, like any good sysadmin would, first off telnetted to the BitKeeper port on a BitKeeper server.

$ telnet thunk.org 5000
WhooHoo! Connection! So, next obvious step that we *all* do is type in the obvious:

help
Back came a list of commands to manipulate the BitKeeper server and ask things of it. Well, according to Tridge, a bit of reading of the LKML (Linux Kernel Email List) shows that the "clone" command is the way to checkout someones source code repository.

So Tridge's massive "reverse engineering" project came down to a single line of shell script:

$ echo clone | nc thunk.org 5000 > e2fsprogs.dat
Hey presto, Tridge has just checked out from a BitKeeper repository into the file e2fsprogs.dat.

The audience was laughing and cheering Tridge on as he explained just what a Mountain had been made of this Molehill. And I mean made by both sides of the issue -- those who he said he was some Uber Reverse Engineering Wizard and those who claimed that he MUST have used a BK client.

Funny report, isn't it? Anyway, now you know Tridge's side of the story.

I guess this is the logical place to note the newest Groklaw story, Tridge Speaks where Tridge tells his side of the story, or at least a brief overview from his perspective.

The story is here

Well, you're certainly welcome to write your own drivers for something that had to be held back in OpenSolaris due to a 3rd-party's constraints which are external to Sun. Come on, isn't that one of the beloved Linux mantras?

Under the CDDL they would have to be rewritten anyway if we wanted to make our own Solaris distros, because the 3rd party patent deals / licence grants apply only between that party and Sun. About which, more below...

The thing cynical /. posters seem to be missing here is that Sun /did/ look at the GPL... they didn't outright dismiss it. Sun found that they were encumbered by 3rd-party constraints which the GPL was incompatible with and so they had to short-circuit to the next best thing - the CDDL.

Is the next best thing the CDDL, or is it the MPL upon which the CDDL was based? Under the MPL (section 3.4), Sun would have had to disclose the extent to which the code was encumbered by third parties. One of the few differences between the CDDL and the MPL is the removal of this clause. The implication of this is that Sun (who already has IP deals with the third party vendors) can use CDDL code in commercial products without any legal worries. But open source developers distributing CDDL cannot, and Sun's modification to the licence means that the encumbered parts of the code cannot be distinguished from the unecumbered parts.

The point of the CDDL seems to be to supply Sun with free development and debugging for code which only it can safely distribute. Lest you think this is me donning my tinfoil hat, please read the relevant Groklaw commentary.

I am not asking Sun to release other people's encumbered code. I just want them to identify (and, for bonus points, encapsulate it) so that it can be replaced with unencumbered code.

Solaris is an awesome technology. You would be - no pun intended - CLOSING yourself off if you think being able to look at and use the Solaris source is irrelevant.

Solaris does have a lot of cool stuff in it. Sadly, learning from some of that stuff could get us into legal trouble. It might be better for people who also do GPL development not to even look at the code.

Gee, I didn't hear people complaining when they opened the source to Open Office, their grid control, or any number of other things.

Open Office was a great contribution, but sadly this is not more of the same. See PJ's comments on the CDDL for details.

The references to being tested in court is for the part Pamela mentions about SCO wrapping themselves in the GPL flag in court against IBM charges of copyright infringement. Also, one of the other cases had an element of GPL in it iirc.

And in Germany, the GPL has been ruled on in two cases where the GPL was held to be enforceable. I believe Stu Cohen or Eben Moglen have used those two cases as examples of cases that are going to be used in international law as a basis for future decisions, and will probably be used for similar legal reasonings in court decisions to come in the US.

So the GPL has been tested in court, at least twice directly in German court, and at least twice indirectly or as part of preliminary arguments for pre-trial hearings in the US.

How the fuck you got modded up to +5 insightful when you're talking out of your ass is beyond me. 5 mod points for first post?

Here's some background on Val from her brother. Sheds her in the light she apparently deserved, rather than from the weaseling vulture we know as Maureen O'Gara.

In order to make heads or tails out of this mess, here's some helpful links:

The original Groklaw article re: SCO's Ex Parte Motion to Adjourn the April 21, 2005 Argument on SCO's Motion to Amend Its Complaint

The original Groklaw article re: SCO's Reply in Support of its Ex Parte Motion to Adjourn the April 21, 2005 Argument on SCO's Motion to Amend Complaint

Groklaw's article that discussed the Ex Parte motion before it was turned to text and analyzed in depth

Hopefully with those three clues, we can end the stream of articles wondering what this whole thing is all about.

Also, when PJ's writing, she tends to group things together in order to save herself time. I don't think the filing of the 10Q for FY2005Q1 merits its own article, nor does the motion re: SCO wanting to depose IBM's CEO Sam Palmisano, who I'm certain knows nothing at all about the Linux track that IBM has taken.

In order to make heads or tails out of this mess, here's some helpful links:

The original Groklaw article re: SCO's Ex Parte Motion to Adjourn the April 21, 2005 Argument on SCO's Motion to Amend Its Complaint

The original Groklaw article re: SCO's Reply in Support of its Ex Parte Motion to Adjourn the April 21, 2005 Argument on SCO's Motion to Amend Complaint

Groklaw's article that discussed the Ex Parte motion before it was turned to text and analyzed in depth

Hopefully with those three clues, we can end the stream of articles wondering what this whole thing is all about.

Also, when PJ's writing, she tends to group things together in order to save herself time. I don't think the filing of the 10Q for FY2005Q1 merits its own article, nor does the motion re: SCO wanting to depose IBM's CEO Sam Palmisano, who I'm certain knows nothing at all about the Linux track that IBM has taken.

In order to make heads or tails out of this mess, here's some helpful links:

The original Groklaw article re: SCO's Ex Parte Motion to Adjourn the April 21, 2005 Argument on SCO's Motion to Amend Its Complaint

The original Groklaw article re: SCO's Reply in Support of its Ex Parte Motion to Adjourn the April 21, 2005 Argument on SCO's Motion to Amend Complaint

Groklaw's article that discussed the Ex Parte motion before it was turned to text and analyzed in depth

Hopefully with those three clues, we can end the stream of articles wondering what this whole thing is all about.

Also, when PJ's writing, she tends to group things together in order to save herself time. I don't think the filing of the 10Q for FY2005Q1 merits its own article, nor does the motion re: SCO wanting to depose IBM's CEO Sam Palmisano, who I'm certain knows nothing at all about the Linux track that IBM has taken.

You can find summarization of the whole fiaSCO right here.

An ex parte motion to adjourn refers to a motion by one party in the case, without consultation nor agreement with the other party, requests the court to delay the hearing for a period of time for whatever extenuating circumstantial reason (in this case, simply to delay having to show the code in question and to avoid having it ripped to shreds by the Linux community).

IOW, SCO is trying to delay this case yet again for no good reason other than to keep the FUD flying.

• SCO asks for a delay so they can review all the code they got from IBM.
  
• The judge just told them to get stuffed.
  
• The trial now enters the "put up or shut up" phase.
  

That's a nice summary, but it's not related to the article in any way, shape, or form.

Here's another groklaw article explaining what this one is about.

Not that the public domain will exist in 5 years.

What do you mean '5 years', have a look http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200504122 25604578

The short course is that (at least in music) while the copyright for the creator, (songwriter, musician, etc.) may expire, the publisher continues to have 'common law copyright' on anything produced pre 1972. With the extension of copyright currently to between 75 and 95 years, it's going to be 2067 before anything music wise goes into the public domain, by copyright expiration, again. (Longer if Disney decides that Mickey might get in the public domain too early, in say 2020 or so...) Expect to see similar effects in software, games, and other media shortly unless the supreme court shoots the ruling down.

-Rusty

1. OSDL had two staffers who were trying to reverse-engineer their product, contrary to the terms on which they were donated the licenses
2. Bitkeeper tried to reach some resolution with OSDL over this over a period of about 5 weeks, but was unable to
3. Bitkeeper has stated that they would have no problem comping (giving complementary licenses) to Linus and Andrew again, but not while they are employed with OSDL

There's room for both proprietary and open and free and shareware and public domain software - it's a big world out there.

This whole thing is a tempest in a teapot compared to, say Jonathan Schwartz's latest brainfart against the GPL.

We need a new poll:

Sun and the GPL/Open Source schizophrenia thingee

[ ] Sun doesn't "get it"
[ ] Jonathan Schwartz is off his meds again
[ ] If this is Tuesday, open source is bad
[ ] MicroBitch paid them off ... again ...
[ ] "There's no such thing as bad publicity"
[ ] We have to extract *some* value out of our SCO Unix license
[ ] All the above

So, back on-topic, OSDL was, IMO, in the wrong on this one. That the employees in question were doing the reverse-engineering on their own time is irrelevant. It still broke the terms of the deal. It's also a pretty shitty thing to do, akin to biting the hand that feeds you. I'd have been pissed, too.