When is it Legal to Reverse Engineer Software?

A not-so Anonymous Coward asks: "I'm the lead developer of SciGraphica, an open source application for scientific graphics that runs under Linux, and is based on Microcal Origin, the commercial application for Windows. When we contacted this company, they let us know that a port for Linux or other operating systems was not in their plans, and that they were not willing to make their proprietary file format available. However, we realized that it is in fact easy to reverse engineer to create a filter that would allow our program to read Origin files. Are we walking into a case of patent infringement, or this is a legitimate solution? If this is problematic, is there a way to allow people to legally have access to the filter?"

Comments

The Legal Issue Isn't The Patent...

[Ieshan]

It's whether or not it's legal for a software firm to market only to a specific operating system.

Reasoning states that it's completely illegal for a software firm to only sell to a single operating system manufacturer without giving their code to other operating-systems so that they can produce a workable solution.

Picture this: Hot-Dog Bob buys Ketchup from Heinz. Heinz refuses to sell ketchup to ANY other stand, because they like the way Bob does business. Is this legal, to deprive all the other Hot-Dog stands of a widely used condiment on the basis that they like the way bob does business? (without even adressing the concerns of the other hot-dog owners in general?)

I don't really think so. Software is as basic a part of computing as the operating system is, and being that way, the company should be required to allow distribution of their specific application across a multitude of platforms. After all, that's all software really does: a function, a thing. A tomato-taste.