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.

Comments

Re:Lots of reasons why I want .NET to fail

[Goalie_Ca]

Maybe if you post this a few more times you might finally get +5

Re:Okay

[AJWM]

So you're saying that unless you work for Microsoft, you shouldn't be a programmer?

Your words, not mine. Perhaps you were just setting up a strawman to knock down with a clever (not) retort. Or perhaps you just couldn't quite comprehend what I wrote. Okay, I'll try to keep it to words of one or two syllables:

It was a mistake to try to copy MS's newest APIs and designs because they can (and will) patent that stuff and shoot you out of the water. Besides (the part of my first comment you ignored), it also makes the MS idea seem better in the eyes of users, and why settle for a late copy when you can have the real thing?

As for your other comment: MS couldn't sue over Linux because any relevant IP belonged to AT&T -- and that court fight was settled with BSD. (Besides, the one patent AT&T had on Unix, the suid bit (things were different about software patents in those days) had both been released to the public domain and expired. Copyrights didn't enter into the Linux effort the way they did with BSD, Linus never saw AT&T code.)