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IBM Ordered to Show More Code to SCO
editingwhiz writes "Bob Mims of the Salt Lake Tribune has the scoop straight from the courthouse steps: 'A federal magistrate has handed a partial victory to Utah's SCO Group, ordering computer giant IBM to turn over more of its Linux operating system-related program codes. U.S. Magistrate Brooke Wells' ruling, released just minutes after Salt Lake City's federal courthouse closed Wednesday, came in the Lindon software company's contractual suit stemming from Big Blue's alleged distribution of Linux applications purportedly tainted with SCO's proprietary Unix code.' If at all possible, SCO's going to be even more insufferable now -- it has a glimmer of hope."
who's going to examine the code? SCO doesn't have any developers left, do they?
This is just another meaningless delay of the case. Such things are actually a victory for IBM. IBM can afford to have this drag on forever. SCO's days are numbered.
I'm a big tall mofo.
The magistrate (who is presiding over pre-trial discovery, not the trial, where a judge will be in charge) noted that the contract between SCO and IBM may well give SCO more rights to the code than copyright law does. Thus IBM might be liable to SCO for putting code in Linux that doesn't violate any copyright SCO may have. IOW, Linux would be OK, IBM would not.
Another theory advanced by SCO that the magistrate did not dismiss out of hand is the possibility that internal IBM AIX and Dynix code changes may show a path between SCO code and Linux. IBM has been contending that if a bare comparison between Linux and SCO code shows no obvious copying, anything IBM did internally is irrelevant.
The bizarre bit is a footnote paying tribute to New York Giants football player Mel Hein that (to mix sports metaphors) comes from way out in left field. It's also ungrammatical ("He played 15 seasons going 60 minutes a game without nearly any rest"), which I'm definitely not accustomed to seeing in Federal court orders.
NOW SCOG/Caldera's lawyers have told the judge - "nope we can't find any infringements here, we need more" and the judge has ruled that they can have every version of AIX and Dynix which ever existed in version control including all notes made by anyone who worked on the project.
This is just another delay... in part because IBM's defence was that producing all the version controlled source was too hard and would take to long. Now they have to work hard and take long or get branded as liars. They'll probably just run through source control, and for ever single commit they will burn a stack of source code CDs. I expect that will run to a few truckloads of CDs which SCO/Caldera will then decide will take years to sift through... and blah blah blah the glacial US legal process drags on until SCO runs out of money.
But never fear! Even if there is code there which ended up in Linux, they don't have a prayer. IBM owns a developers license to Unix (bought from AT&T) to modify Unix and sell it as its own product AIX. SCO (which bought the license rights) says the license also says that new code IBM has added to Unix to produce AIX cannot also be donated to Linux, but that's just plain nuts. If they write B and insert it into A, how can the license agreements with A prevent you from adding the same code to your own product C?
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our American dead!
It's possible that Judge Kimball could make Judge Wells' ruling moot when/if he ever rules on IBM's Partial Summary Judgment motion. Wells has to favor SCO in that she has to consider the possibility that giving them what they want might improve their case.
I'm hoping that since Wells has likely been advising with Kimball on this that Kimball's decision will come soon on IBM's PSJ motion. I'm also hoping that goes in IBM's favor since it would pretty much kill all of SCO's other lawsuits.
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The contract isn't between SCO and IBM. It's between AT+T and IBM, and everyone at AT+T gave a deposition that says IBM gets to keep it's own code. That's in addition to the side letter AT+T sent to IBM that says IBM keeps it's own code, and the @echo newsletter that says the exact same thing.
As for SCO's theory of copyright, well, SCO would have to own the copyright first (it doesn't, Novell does). Then, they'd have to find their so-called path, which doesn't exist. If it did, they'd have found it in the 272 versions of AIX that IBM already handed over, and would have to have disclosed it by now. Should they manage to conjure one up with their illegal fishing expedition, they'd still have to slip that completely unsupported by case law copyright theory of theirs past Judge Kimball, which isn't likely.
If I were IBM, I'd file a motion to kick Darl in the nuts. Chances are this judge would grant it just to avoid the inevitable "I didn't get to kick Darl in the nuts, therefore the trial is invalid" appeal. Honestly, how much anal probing does SCO get to do before the judge can decide that their case is composed completely of crap?
SCO's claim that they "know" there is copied code is derived from the extaordinarily arrogant premise that there's "no possible way that a disorganized bunch of hackers developing code in their spare time could produce anything resembling an enterprise class operating system without somehow deriving from code that SCO controls" (paraphrased, but essentially that's what they said).
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
What I don't understand is what they are going to do with this. Does SCO have and programmers left? Or any money to pay contractors? Who is going to do the analysis?
I find it odd that SCO can demand all this code and continue with this law suite against IBM, while the Novell case still isn't finished. It would be really embarassing, if after all the money they have spent, it was shown that they never fully owned UNIX. Just think of the law suites SCO would have to face if Novell showed that they still owned the UNIX copywrites, especially with IBM's backing for Novell.
So, bottom line appears to be that all SCO really needs is to do a direct source-code to source-code comparison then weed out stuff they can't possibly claim ownership (such as BSD code added to SysV.)
Of course that wouldn't keep the case in the courts for a prolonged time and it wouldn't require any of the stuff they are asking for in discovery these days. (Not to mention the fact that those who have compared the code can't find any line-for-line copying... not even the millions of lines of line-for-line copying SCO claimed were in Linux when they started this whole mess.)
Even if their claim of viral licensing terms were correct, there is still the question of whether SCO actually even owns ANY of the code it claims it does. Novell (most recent undisputed owner) says that they never sold SySV to SCO... just the right to sell licenses. Even that right was tempered by Novell retaining rights to control the termination of any such license... which they did regarding IBM saying that no SCO could not terminate IBM's license.
This will end, either because SCO runs out of money, or IBM wins the case outright. Then, IBM sues SCO for what remains of their assets. Given the amount of money IBM has spent already, there is no way that SCO will be able to pay the damages that will be awarded to IBM.
Rather then forcing SCO into bankruptcy,IBM purchases SCO for pennies on the dollar. IBM now owns all licenses for unix, which given IBM's current stance means that unix is now effectively open source. The software karma is now balanced.