Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Applies For .NET Patent
Wojina writes "Microsoft has applied for a comprehensive patent on what appears to be the entire implementation of the .NET CLR (Common Language Runtime) and the framework APIs. Microsoft's CLR is an implementation of the CLI (submitted to ECMA for standardization). Does this bode ill for the Mono project? See the CNET News story." And a chaser: Nept points to this interesting Microsoft-funded .NET obfuscation project.
Hell, i think Apache can claim prior art...
Chalk another one up for greed and mis-guided beliefs. IBM backs up their talk about not charging for their patents by donating software to open source. Until microsoft puts their money where their mouth is, they just lost a huge chunk of credibility.
Linux has had platform independent coding since the days of Java,
Back up, most unix-ish C code can be compiled on any vaguely unix-like system with very little modification. I'd call that platform independence, wouldn't you?
Imagine that, and without the overhead of a bloated VM to slow things way down.
Patents have become an increasingly common way for software makers to exert control over their intellectual property.
They may also be doing it to prevent or reduce somebody else from filing a similar patent against them. IOW, protecting their own ass from stupid lawsuits. Thus, it is kind of hard to assertain the real motivation behind such.
Table-ized A.I.
1. A software architecture for a distributed computing system comprising: an application configured to handle requests submitted by remote devices over a network; and an application program interface to present functions used by the application to access network and computing resources of the distributed computing system.
:)
There is so much prior art for this claim it's not even funny.
But wait, it gets even funnier in claim #4....
4. A software architecture as recited in claim 1, wherein the application program interface comprises: a first group of services related to creating Web applications; a second group of services related to constructing client applications; a third group of services related to data and handling XML documents; and a fourth group of services related to base class libraries.
What?!! A network web service that can handle XML data using (said with pinky put to side of mouth) "CLASS LIBRARIES."
Hmmmmmm... Now where have I seen this before? Maybe Microsoft will try to patent a network service for sending and receiving text messages for the express purpose of communicating.
This is just another example of why software patents need to DIE! DIE! DIE! The sad thing is that about 50 guys had to waste their time writing this patent. Does anyone else see the irony of the first name listed on the patent, "Adam Smith"?
Adam Smith wrote in his famous book, The Wealth of Nations, "Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man or order of men."
Do you see the irony now? Today he would be be called an "ANARCHIST!" and he would definately be at home (somewhat) on slashdot.
Why is this modded down to 0? I had similar concerns about Mono. M$ went w/ gnome dudes possibly for covering fire against DoJ. An Open Source implementation of .Net gives so much validity to M$ .Net. But we all new that M$ could yank the chain and throttle Mono. It could and it will.
And a scolding is in order for Icaza and gang. Has history of M$ taught nothing to you? Do we (Linux/Apache/GNU) are server people, we need to learn from a desktop company how to put an XML wrapper around http requests!
No. First, its basic functional capabilities have pre-existed too long to be held up by patents.
.NET in a lot of people's minds.) Looks like the torpedo bay doors are coming open.
Somebody has far too much faith that the Patent Office will not issue a patent for that which has prior art. Sorry, but it doesn't look that way from here. The PTO may well grant a patent, even though it really shouldn't. Then what?
if Microsoft does patent some technology, then our plan is to [...] find prior art that would render the patent useless.
Which means a lawsuit. More specifically, it means defending against an infringment lawsuit brought by Microsoft. This is the sort of thing that the side with the deeper pockets usually wins, just because he can keep stretching things out and delaying final judgement. How deep did you say your pockets were? (We know how deep Microsoft's are.)
I've always been of the opinion that Mono was a misguided waste of development time and talent -- precisely because Microsoft could (and would) torpedo it before it became a real threat (and after it had soaked up a ton of open source developer time and "validated"
-- Alastair
Patent Everything NOW, so that in a couple of decades it will ALL BE FREE. I just wish all this crap had gone down during the Reagan administration -- then we'd be reaping the rewards today.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
"if you were to look at Microsoft as a person in your life, you'd wonder what was wrong with him or her such that so much had to be controlled by that person."
thats where miguel has gone wrong. you should not be investing in a project that relies on the continued good will of MS. especially if that project is esentially aiming to take some control away from redmond
"castles made of sand, melt into the sea, eventually"
'Be the change you want to see in the world' - Al Gore
Anyway what is .NET? .NET is _not_ platform independent. You're definitely expected to run it on a Windows server. And to access it with IE. In fact it generates code (this particular code I don't think you can even get at) that makes it favor IE - it writes Javascript functionality for you on the fly but if you're what it calls a "downtarget" browser -- anything but IE - some things are not as nice. For instance validations that in IE happen on the client require a server trip; things like that.
It is supposedly "language agnostic", which means that it can subclass a VB.NET parent in a C# child. This agnosticism only extends to the languages MS has supported for it, namely VB,C#,C++(which is in some way I don't know the details of non-standard C++ in order to be .NET compatible) and J# (if anyone uses J# please tell me I'd be surprised)
What .NET really is in my opinion is a supercharged development tool, and a respectable new language. C# is actually pretty cool, they hired the guy that was the brain trust for Borland Delphi and copied lots of Java ideas - but hey Java is very much a copy of C......But the main thing is it is a very nice environment to code in. You can make a call to SQL Server (of course non-MS databases need not apply for this) and step through the code going through VB and C# function/object calls and then step through the SQL proc all without skipping a beat. And there's lots of type-ahead type things. If you define a function or a class method when you make a call to it the args are displayed. The debugger is very nice, you can roam through the code with a mouse and variables show their values as you pass over them.
I guess what they're going for is convincing tech managers that their programmers will be sufficiently more productive with their stuff to make up for the license costs. I try to find open-source equivalents for any features I like in the MS stuff, there are some respectable things like DDT (I think - the C/C++ debugger) - many emacs packages, JDEE in particular - Wing for Python (not open source though) - but the MS stuff really has some nice features for coders. You can get used to it.......and then news like this comes out and you remember what MS is all about.
Microsoft's CEOs have made it "patently" clear that they intend to restrict competing .Net implementations by cultivating Microsoft's patents, such as United States Patent Application #20020059425 "Distributed computing services platform" which covers the design and inter-operation of .NET based implementations.
Although there is prior art examples of individual technologies such as the JVM etc, Microsoft patents such as the one mentioned, define and claim the interoperation of the components, in such a way that any re-implementations will be sure to be covered by the patents. This remains true even for the Microsoft specs submited to standard
In comparison, Sun has granted the Apache and all open source developers FULL access to the specs, test kits and granted the full rights to develop competing products under the JSPA . Sun has also fully pened up the Java development standards process under the new Java Community Process (JCP) . Even to the point of granting full open source re-implentations of J2EE such as JBoss ...
There those that claim that .NET is open to re-implementation, but until Microsoft make a simliar public legal declaration to Sun's JSPA, any .NET reimplementation represents a pending legal mindfield.
In that case, Dave Winner and his XML-RPC project that existed before SOAP is very much prior art. I don't have time to dig up links right now, but he's written a lot about it, and SOAP.
See http://www.scripting.com for more info.
You can't trust Microsoft. Unless they had signed a solid, binding legal document...
.NET.
You can't even trust them then. Unless you've only been hitting Slashdot for the past week you couldn't have possibly missed the whole Sun vs. MS deal with Java. Legally binding document or not -- they'll still try and f-over the competition.
Now they're trying to get a legally binding document to help them cover Java, web services, XML, RPC, and SOAP by wrapping it up in somthing called
If it were IBM, Apple, or Sun I'd give them the credibility to assume they're patenting it to keep it from being non-controlled, and just letting the patent ride out so nobody else can patent it and enforce it. Not with Microsoft though; for them it's all about the short-term money.
However, this patent shows bad faith by Microsoft. If Microsoft wanted C# to be perceived as an open language and core set of libraries, this is the last thing they would want.
Where does this leave us? We have two companies, Sun and Microsoft, that are engaged in some bizarre battle to try and control the software industry. Both have attempted to get patents that allow them to use the patent system to control who implements the language and how (yes, Sun has patents on key aspects of Java). Both are trying to keep control of the software, APIs, and future language evolution. And what is particularly ironic is that all this battle is about decades old technology.
What does this mean? Both open source and commercial users should say "no thanks" to both Java and C#. We need to get back to a model where programming languages and libraries are standardized through open standards processes and where the core language and APIs and are not covered by patents. C, C++, Smalltalk, Ada, and many other languages have shown that this is possible. In fact, had Sun not derailed and preempted the adoption of those other languages with promises of a bright Java future (on which they have failed to deliver), we might well be using some language now that is technically superior to both Java and C# and is covered by a truly open standard.
You are mistaken. The parent requested examples of occassions when Microsoft has actually pursued an incident of patent infringement by means of litigation, not claims that they would pursue them.
The parent was mistaken in thinking that I had said Microsoft had a history of using Patent litigation as a means to chill Free Software, and in thinking that only a past history of filing patent suits against other companies was relevant in determining their intentions. I had said we can infer Microsoft's intentions based upon their past predatory actions. Microsoft's repeated criminal abuse of its Monopoly status, its actions towards Netscape, Java, DR-DOS, Stac, and countless other products, along with the threatening language they've used towards free software projects like those cited in my post, can be used to easily infer Microsoft's likely intentions.
It's entirely acceptable for any corporation to publicly declare that they would pursue patent infringement in court, because otherwise they would be opening themselves up to shareholder lawsuits. They have a covenant with shareholders to earn money, and not piss it away by allowing their competition to infringe on their patents.
It's entirely legal and acceptable yes, but it is not necessary to prevent shareholder lawsuits. Patents do not need to be enforced to remain valid, unlike Trademarks. Microsoft holds a number of very broad patents which any number of companies could be said to violate, and yet they are not enforcing them. The CIFS licence patent mentioned above is available for use royalty-free, as long as the software is not covered by the GPL or LGPL. By your logic, the shareholders should be sueing Microsoft for not charging royalties to every company making use of that patent, but that hasn't happened at all. And the same example does demonstrate Microsoft's use of patents to hinder the Free Software community.
Just because a patent is issued doesn't necessarily mean it will be held up in court. It helps to have the FSF standing behind you in these situations. See, it's amazing who you can get pro bono these days. Look at the folks who have been doing work for the EFF lately.
.Net to the EMCA, etc. would be bad publicity. It would definitely make people reconsider developing for .Net.
Besides, MS has little to no history of suing for patent infringement. Just because they're filing for patents, doesn't mean they're automaticly going after mono. In this day and age tech companies are using patents as a way to keep score. "See, we're making major technological breakthroughs. We recieved X thousand patents last year." This would be an example of good publicity. Suing the Mono project when they're submitting
About Java it is not a matter of "platform independent coding", but a matter of "platform independent binary" !
.net, even if the core is technically a Java platform clone, the trouble come from the fact that it is Windows centric & tied. No, do not expect mono (or other kiddies) to be real world stuff. MS spokesman has clearly said : "we could we cross platform agains MS various OS !"
... but i can not and i will not run a real world application.
... but the very truth is that what MS promiss for tomorrow is already there with Java since nearly a decade !
... and what great news here was we've got plenty of solutions in our pocket to shape the best solution: change OS, change VM, change J2EE appserver, change hardware, ... but without changing a very single line of the application !
...
;-)
The goal here is that once a developper has build a binary it is valid for each and every complient platform.
About
So, no, dotNet is not and will not be an competitor against Java platform on the "WORA" ground !
(WORA = Sun's Write Once Run Anywhere)
MS has clearly seen that Java new coding habits bring more productivity than previous technologies without compromissing the reusability of the solutions.
That's the reason, after leaving the Java project for policy reason, they 've decided to build a clone.
The fact they pushed the very core to any kind of standardization process only shows that they do no intend to standardize other part of the platforms (non-CLI APIs for instances !). This have a major impact over the potential portability of designed solution.
To explain this, if you want to design real world dotNnet solutions you are in a way or an other constraint to use the COM+ container (to get transact features for instance), by doing so, your solution become practicaly (but even virtually) Windows tied. Just because COM+ is not part of any standard stuff and is only implemented on Win32. Here is fact !
That's the reason i said earlier, mono is not real worldstuff ! It is fun : ok i can run a Csharp class or two
Here MS has done right pushing affiliates and spinnoffs to FUD the community
Want more fact ?
I got customer of mine whom first run their J2EE applications on Win2k but as soon as they realize if could not stabilized under load, they think of "what if we evaluate an other solution" ?
So we start to test and bench alternatives
At the end we came up with a high power rock stable : Linux with IBM VM, with Opensource J2EE appserver on the same hardware.
That was just amazing, cost were drastically down, stabillity was here and customer thanks lords to have choosen Java 2 years before !
Gess what, i love to have choice
If this application was running on dotNet what would be his choice ?
- Rebuild bottom-top a new application
- Go and pray for a miracle
- Buy a new cluster or blades
- Wait for Windows2003 SP2
That's why i do argue that Linux and Java are the killer team. Java legitimate the linux choice without having to tied the solution to yet another OS.
As a conclusion, i would like to publically thanks all the Java opensource community that brought us very brilliant and reliable software solutions (JBoss, Tomcat, ant, xalaan, Batik, jedit, !
Special thanks goes to the Jakarta Apache groups
-SLK
Feel the choice for liberty !