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VikingBrad writes "The Sydney Morning Herald has an article on Dr Warwick Toomey of The Unix Heritage Society claiming that SCO may not know the origin of code in System V, including claims that there is a lot of BSD software in Sys V."
Alex writes "I wondered where the 100k+ lines of copied code
in the linux kernel would come from in comparison
to the SCO Unixware stuff. Then a thought popped
up in my head: what if they just compared linewise?
All those empty lines in the code would have the
same content. But how many empty lines are in the
Linux Kernel Code? This small shell script counts them for you:
emptylines=0; function parse_dir () { for file in $1/*; do if [ -d "$file" ]; then parse_dir $file; else while read line; do if [ "$line" = "" ]; then emptylines=$[$emptylines+1]; echo $emptylines; fi; done
Kernel 2.4.22, yet cleaned of the code which SCO
claimed was stolen, has still 733140 empty lines, probably copied and pasted by the bad, bad kernel developers from the good, good SCO guys..."
+5 for the poor coward....
:30 UTC (0 Talkback[s]) (12873 reads)
Response to SCO's Open Letter
Sep 10, 2003, 05
(Other stories by Eric S. Raymond and Bruce Perens)
[ Thanks to Gerry Tool for this link. ]
Mr. McBride, in your "Open Letter to the Open Source Community" your offer to negotiate with us comes at the end of a farrago of falsehoods, half-truths, evasions, slanders, and misrepresentations. You must do better than this. We will not attempt to erect a compromise with you on a foundation of dishonesty.
Your statement that Eric Raymond was "contacted by the perpetrator" of the DDoS attack on SCO begins the falsehoods. Mr. Raymond made very clear when volunteering his information and calling for the attack to cease that he was contacted by a third-party associate of the perpetrator and does not have the perpetrator's identity to reveal. The DDoS attack ceased, and has not resumed. Mr. Raymond subsequently received emailed thanks for his action from Blake Stowell of SCO.
Your implication that the attacks are a continuing threat, and that the President of the Open Source Initiative is continuing to shield their perpetrator, is therefore not merely both false and slanderous, but contradictory with SCO's own previous behavior. In all three respects it is what we in the open-source community have come to expect from SCO. If you are serious about negotiating with anyone, rather than simply posturing for the media, such behavior must cease.
In fact, leaders of the open-source community have acted responsibly and swiftly to end the DDoS attacks -- just as we continue to act swiftly to address IP-contamination issues when they are aired in a clear and responsible manner. This history is open to public inspection in the linux-kernel archives and elsewhere, with numerous instances on record of Linus Torvalds and others refusing code in circumstances where there is reason to believe it might be compromised by third-party IP claims.
As software developers, intellectual property is our stock in trade. Whether we elect to trade our effort for money or rewards of a subtler and more enduring nature, we are instinctively respectful of concerns about IP, credit, and provenance. Our licenses (the GPL and others) work with copyright law, not against it. We reject your attempt to portray our community as a howling wilderness of IP thieves as a baseless and destructive smear.
We in the open-source community are accountable. Our source code is public, exposed to scrutiny by anyone who wishes to contest its ownership. Can SCO or any other closed-source vendor say the same? Who knows what IP violations, what stripped copyrights, what stolen techniques lurk in the depths of closed-source code? Indeed, not only SCO's past representations that it was merging GPLed Linux technology into SCO Unix but Judge Debevoise's rulings in the last big lawsuit on Unix IP rights suggest strongly that SCO should clean up its own act before daring to accuse others of theft.
SCO taxes IBM and others with failing to provide warranties or indemnify users against third-party IP claims, conveniently neglecting to mention that the warranties and indemnities offered by SCO and others such as Microsoft are carefully worded so that the vendor's liability is limited to the software purchase price, They thus offer no actual shield against liability claims or damages. They are, in a word, shams designed to lull users into a false sense of security -- a form of sham which we believe you press on us solely as posturing, rather than out of any genuine concern for users. We in the open-source community, and our corporate allies, refuse to play that dishonest game.
You invite us to negotiate, but you have persistently refused to state a negotiable claim. You have made allegations of a million lines of copied code which are mathematically impossible given the known, publicly accessible history of Linux development. You have uttered vast conspiracy theories which fail to be v
Canopy own SCO. Darl McBride can't take a dump without Ralph J. Yarro's approval.
... .
Here's some info on Ralph
from vultus.com
Under Ralph's direction, the Canopy Group has identified and invested in promising open source and Internet infrastructure technologies. Canopy's greatest strength lies in providing the companies that produce these technologies a sheltered environment in which they can grow and develop. Canopy companies are strongly encouraged to work with each in synergistic partnerships.
Ralph also servers as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Angel Partners, a 501(c)3 support organization for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. He is also a Trustee for the Noorda Family Trust, the Scenic View Center, and the Worth of a Soul Foundation. He is the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Altiris, AP Software, Caldera Systems, Center 7, Coresoft, and Helius. He sits on the Board of Directors for: the Canopy Group, 2NetFX, Arcanvs, Cogito, DataCrystal, Expressware, Global Prime, The Guy Store, HomePipeLine, iBase Systems, Interworks, Lineo, MTI, ManageMyMoney, Nombas, Profit Pro, Recruit Search, Troll Tech and TugNut.
The way to get a Ralph is though these company he controls.
Hey, I'm sorry to you guys that love these companies, but the way to hurt Ralph Yarro is to go for jugular. If the guys that ran these companies called up Ralph and told him to knock it off, the suit would get dropped tomorrow. As long as they can go scot-free taking Canopy money and not paying the consequences, then Ralph can do what ever he wants.
Time to attack this bastard on all fronts.
grep -r '^\s*$' * | wc -l
Shell independant, most likely much faster and easier to remember and type for future uses. I belive that the -r flag is only available for GNU grep.
One of the submitters to this article got Warren Toomey's name wrong.
farrago Ok, now I'll admit ESR has a bigger vocabulary than I do!
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
Linux marches on, despite of SCO. Data center makeover, part 1: Linux topples college's IT Tower of Babel.
Also, Dell today said they aren't and will not pay any licenses to SCO.
Sun on the other hand seems to be playing into the SCO "indemnification" FUD with a new java license?
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Alas, such stories don't get referenced by Yahoo! Finance and most SCO investors don't search Google News, (but should).
NewsFactor already has it showing up as a press release, available here.
My understanding is that they own something like 5% of Troll Tech. Yeah, it makes me queasy, too. But it's not like the Trolls could do anything to stop them.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Over at Groklaw there is a large set of comments forming in the hopes of drafting an open letter response to McBride's. It is my hope when they are finished that the /. editors will publish the text of said letter in an effort to debunk his claims and outright lies and misquotes.
I tried to post my comment on there but for some reason it wouldn't take. I offer my services to mirror a PDF or HTML copy of the response once it is finished. I hope others would follow suit, and perhaps some of the readers here with connections can get it published on high-profile sites or even pass it along to CIO/CEO/CTO type people in an effort to dispel SCO FUD.
There are only 10 kinds of people in this world... those who understand binary and those who don't
Darl also does interviews.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
IBM has taken steps to silence them.
Go to groklaw and read up on IBM's subpoena agains canopy (not SCO!). IBM has done the right thing, in that they are avoiding beating an already dead horse (SCO) and going for its owner.
Canopy will happily lead SCO to corporate suicide, as long as they are able to cash in. IBM now has changed the rules of the game, because they have signaled they are going to drag Canopy from their VIP lounges onto the playing field.
The above subpoena is IMO the most interesting and important development in this whole SCO fiasco, and I'm really surprised that it doesn't get the attention it deserves.
It's only PR Newswire that keeps spreading SCOs shit around w/o rebuttals. But then again, that's what they're paid to do.
If you're not happy w. SCOs' fud, there's nothing stopping you from calling up your local news writers and giving them the low-down :-)
I haven't seen this anywhere yet, but yesterday Raymond apparently announced that he had written a "Comparator" program to compare source trees and that now he is 'grinning a grin that should frighten the thieves and liars at SCO out of a week's sleep...'
Remember, ESR has previously stated that he has a copy of the SCO Unix source tree. He could theoretically now do the full analysis.
Here is the Linux Today article about Raymond's Comparator:
-braddock
There's an article over on Infoworld that includes an Open Letter from Linus Torvalds on the situation. I won't quote the whole article, but here's the letter:
We call it art because we have names for the things we understand.
emptylines=0; function parse_dir () { for file in $1/*; do if [ -d "$file" ]; then parse_dir $file; else while read line; do if [ "$line" = "" ]; then emptylines=$[$emptylines+1]; echo $emptylines; fi; done
It don't work none.
A programmer is a machine for converting coffee into code.
"Jonathan Cohen of JHC Capital Management recommends SCOX and thinks that "The company has the ability to earn in excess of $3 a share over the next couple of years"
This Jonathan Cohen?
Perens didn't say there was an error in the development process, AFAIK, he said there was an error in a "Linux developer's process (at SGI)" - specifically a developer at SGI. The quote: "In this case, there was an error in the Linux developer's process (at SGI), and we lucked out that it wasn't worse. It turns out that we have a legal right to use the code in question, but it doesn't belong in Linux and has been removed. These slides have several C syntax errors and would never compile. So, they don't quite represent any source code in Linux. But we've found the code they refer to. It is included in code copyrighed by AT&T and released as Open Source under the BSD license by Caldera, the company that now calls itself SCO. The Linux developers have a legal right to make use of the code under that license. No violation of SCO's copyright or trade secrets is taking place." If such inaccurate quoting is any indication of McBride's ethics and honesty (like we need more of that)... The original article from Bruce is at http://perens.com/SCO/SCOSlideShow.html
I don't know if I have missed this here on Slashdot, but here it is (again?):
"Open letter to Darl McBride -- please grow up. Dear Darl, Thank you so much for your letter. We are happy that you agree that customers need to know that Open Source is legal and stable, and we heartily agree with that sentence of your letter. The others don't seem to make as much sense, but we find the dialogue refreshing. However, we have to sadly decline taking business model advice from a company that seems to have squandered all its money (that it made off a Linux IPO, I might add, since there's a nice bit of irony there), and now seems to play the US legal system as a lottery. We in the Open Source group continue to believe in technology as a way of driving customer interest and demand. Also, we find your references to a negotiating table somewhat confusing, since there doesn't seem to be anything to negotiate about. SCO has yet to show any infringing IP in the Open Source domain, but we wait with bated breath for when you will actually care to inform us about what you are blathering about. All of our source code is out in the open, and we welcome you point to any particular piece you might disagree with. Until then, please accept our gratitude for your submission, Yours truly, Linus Torvalds"
As seen in an InfoWorld article.
gee Alsee. if you had REAL research skill, you'd cite the case that came from. Then again, since you spend all your time posting to slashdot, you probably indeed have no research skills.
Moron.
Dowling v. United States, 473 U.S. 207 (1985)
In contrast, the Government's theory here would make theft, conversion, or fraud equivalent to wrongful appropriation of statutorily protected rights in copyright. The copyright owner, however, holds no ordinary chattel. A copyright, like other intellectual property, comprises a series of carefully defined and carefully delimited interests to which the law affords correspondingly exact protections. "Section 106 of the Copyright Act confers a bundle of exclusive rights [473 U.S. 207, 217] to the owner of the copyright," which include the rights "to publish, copy, and distribute the author's work." Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enterprises, 471 U.S. 539, 546 -547 (1985). See 17 U.S.C. 106. However, "[t]his protection has never accorded the copyright owner complete control over all possible uses of his work." Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U.S. 417, 432 (1984); id., at 462-463 (dissenting opinion). For example, 107 of the Copyright Act "codifies the traditional privilege of other authors to make `fair use' of an earlier writer's work." Harper & Row, supra, at 547. Likewise, 115 grants compulsory licenses in nondramatic musical works. Thus, the property rights of a copyright holder have a character distinct from the possessory interest of the owner of simple "goods, wares, [or] merchandise," for the copyright holder's dominion is subjected to precisely defined limits.
It follows that interference with copyright does not easily equate with theft, conversion, or fraud. The Copyright Act even employs a separate term of art to define one who misappropriates a copyright: "`Anyone who violates any of the exclusive rights of the copyright owner,' that is, anyone who trespasses into his exclusive domain by using or authorizing the use of the copyrighted work in one of the five ways set forth in the statute, `is an infringer of the copyright.' [17 U.S.C.] 501(a)." Sony Corp., supra, at 433. There is no dispute in this case that Dowling's unauthorized inclusion on his bootleg albums of performances of copyrighted compositions constituted infringement of those copyrights. It is less clear, however, that the taking that occurs when an infringer arrogates the use of another's protected work comfortably fits the terms associated with physical removal employed by 2314. The infringer invades a statutorily defined province guaranteed to the copyright holder alone. But he does not assume physical control over the copyright; nor does he wholly deprive its owner of its use. While one may colloquially link infringement with some general notion of wrongful [473 U.S. 207, 218] appropriation, infringement plainly implicates a more complex set of property interests than does run-of-the-mill theft, conversion, or fraud.
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
...it doesn't seem to have affected SCO's stock price.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
The Perens, Raymond letter is covered in this mainstream press article.
The Sydney Morning Herald is one of Australia's largest newspapers.
:wq
Not only is this unnecessarily complex, you have a fork/exec for every file, plus one for the find and a needless one for wc. (Not to mention pointlessly running awk on directories requiring you to redirect stderr to make the output look nice).
At least the original one was slightly clever in that it didn't run any external commands, but try this instead. It will be by far the fastest, and it is the easiest to understand. I challenge anyone to come up with a solution that is cleaner, or one that is more than 1% faster.
find . -type f -print0|xargs -0 grep '^$'|wc -l
Of course, if Unix didn't suck, you could do this: awk '/^$/{A+=1}END{print A}' `find . -type f`
For anyone who is interested, my own Open Response, previously posted here, has been *extensively* revised.
You can view it on my journal page here.
Also, if the method can be shown to be trivial, obvious, etc., the patent protection is lost. That's the law. Any patented process or method has to demonstrate originality, non-obviousnes to those specialized in the field, not be trivial, no prior art, etc. Failing any one of these invalidates the patent (which is why so many software patents aren't valid. Even the USPTO admits they dropped the ball on this issue, and have to revise their procedures).