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Samba Team Urges Novell To Reconsider
hde226868 writes "The team responsible for Samba has just asked Novell to reconsider its recent patent agreement with Microsoft, arguing that the agreement is a divisive agreement, effectively splitting the open source movement into groups with and without commercial status. Samba argues that with this move Novell is disregarding the will of the people who write the software sold by Novell and that Novell has 'no right to make self servicing deals on behalf of others which run contrary to the goals and ideals of the Free Software community'."
just like the samba team, I don't think that this agreement with microsoft will bring good fruits. what I like about the open source movement is that it provides you with software that allow you to go to sleep at night without worry. the software that will result from this agreement will be everything except that.
'no right to make self servicing deals on behalf of others which run contrary to the goals and ideals of the Free Software community'
Actually they have every right to do whatever they like as long as it is within the law. There is nothing specific in the GPL that says they cannot make a deal with Microsoft. The only thing that will stop companies from doing things like this, is if they lose customer support. If you don't like it, don't buy their products.
I'll probably be modded down for this...
Sure does seem like it and frankly I have not been able to work my brain around the notion this agreement DOES NOT violate some aspect of GPLv2. And maybe, just maybe that's what Microsoft was REALLY after.... to get Novells right to distribute GPL code revoked. If that were to happen it seems to me it would put a big hurt on Novell. Microsoft is not known, nor has it been known NOT to stab a company in the back or setup a chain of events that in the long run damages or distroys it's competitor.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
This is just Microsoft trying to get Linus to reconsider and try and move the kernel to the GPLv3.
Move along.
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
"First, Novell isn't making deals on behalf of others."
well, yes, they did. the deal was done on behalf of Novell's customers. the deal is specifically designed to indemnify Novell's customers from patent lawsuits brought by Microsoft. thus, Microsoft can pursue a patent suit against Samba, but if you bought a Microsoft approved distribution you won't be penalized.
At a philosophical level, Novell probably didn't want to sign the agreement with Microsoft either ... heck, Microsoft basically destroyed them as a leading software provider. But they're in an unenviable position of trying to turn a profit. That's the double edged sword of large companies getting in the open source game. On one side, they offer massive resources that can champion and push forward technologies that groups working in their spare time cannot. On the other, they must find a way to recoup some of those expenses, which sometimes lead them down the path that we've all worked hard to stay off (namely, software patents, commercialization, and closed sourcing parts of their product).
Unfortunately I think we'll just have to deal with some closed source Linux programs and some software patents for technologies that required massive investment. The key is to pick our battles - e.g. to ensure that the entire Linux kernel, and all "typical" programs are open source and protected under the GPL (or other similar license).
Crack - Free with every butt and set of boobs
Where's Linus durring al of this? I mean he's vocal as all hell when the GPL3 drafts start floating around, but on this he's silent?!
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
you are also correct. however, the downside here is that if users, especially businesses, feel a need to take advantage of this "protection" then Novell has succeeded in delegitimizing other distributions. i'm no GPL geek, so I don't know specifically what the license has to say on this, but if programmers or vendors are forced to question their rights to code or distribute then we've lost something.
> Ultimately people won't pay you money for something that they get for free elsewhere.
oh I don't know, it has worked for hookers for thousands of years for much the same reasons people will pay for OS: service level agrements and a no quibble contract
Considering that MS, Novell, and SCO have been interwined for 20 + years, Yes. Keep in mind that Novell owned SCO at one time and sold it off to Caldera. Of course, Caldera was a start-up from who? Novell's own Ray Noorda. Now, I liked Ray, but the whole Novell, SCO, Caldera is an inbred world. The best thing that Novell could have done was kept the SUSE team together for diversity. But they dismantled the group. What is left now, is a group that is trying to figure out how to take over the number one spot from Redhat without regard to the long term impact of the linux world. These guys think very short term. Once they increase the value of the company, they will break it apart and sell it off. Remember what happened to SCO? Same thing.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I agree wholeheartedly. What should have been said is that Novell, by making this deal, is behaving against the ethics of Open Source and Free Software. Microsoft is a perfectly legal company... and has engaged in behavior that many consider highly unethical. Thus many people think poorly of their business dealing. This is a matter of ethics, not a matter of law or rights.
Ethics is part of business. I know I've had the opportunity to screw over my business partner many times in the nine years we've been working together. I'm sure he has as well. We have both behaved as ethically as we possible and we trust each other. The same goes for the companies that we have brokered deals with. We behave in an ethical manner and we receive business because of our reputation. Microsoft has partnered with many companies and subsequently screwed them over. That should be a consideration when dealing with them, and Novell -- as an OS/FS company -- is now dealing with them. This will certainly chill relations with the people who develop the product they sell, and likely some customers. Dealing with unethical people or companies does impart a certain taint to you and your product. That is what is occurring here, not a violation of law.
Just because you have a right to do something does not make it right to do.
--
Evan
"$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
"At your expense"? Like, what, exactly? If you wrote any OSS code, and gave it away, then there is no expense for you if it is used by Microsoft or anybody else.
Microsoft is just now getting around to "art of war" type tactics: divide your enemies. "He will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks." They're trying to divide the open source movement's spirit.
:)
Everything up to this point has been driven by hubris on their part. Now, they're finally serious about fighting open source.
This is gonna be fun.
You are completely missing the point. It's not that the agreement between Novell and MSFT has resulted in any immediate damages to end users, it is that the agreement raises the specter of litigation to all non-Novell Linux distributors and their clients. FUD. Microsoft is trying to drive a great big wedge in the open source community by appointing Novell, the distributor with the least market share, as the "approved" Linux distributor. Balmer himself said that everyone else is open to legal action as they're not covered by this bogus cross patent licensing. Just because you Joe-six-pack might not wind up in court doesn't mean that enormous damage hasn't been done to the community as a whole.
Boycott Novell. If you have servers on SuSe, move them to another distro.
CommentBot 0.7a running with args "-module irritate,disagree -target random"
And at least with a hooker you KNOW you're getting screwed.
The current SCO is really Caldera.
Unixware was ATT Unix that was then sold to who? Novell. Novell then "rented" Unixware to original SCO. Original SCO than moved to pretty much supporting nothing by unixware (the old xenix/sco unix was folded into this). Caldera was created by Novell Ray Noorda and a number of Novell folks WHILE they were at Novell. It was too be offered as Novell Linux. But Ray and others felt that they would do better without the Novell issues. So they spun it off from Novell's "permission" along with the DR-dos suit. Caldera then bought everything of SCO (save tarentella). The current SCO was owned by Novell and almost likely the IP will be shown to belong to Novell (in spite of what current SCO says).
So yes, Novell owned "SCO", just not the original.
Novell destroyed themselves.
The only thing that Microsoft did was release WinNT without the license broadcast that NetWare boxes did. I could use one license and setup 1,000 WinNT boxes on a network. If I used the same license on 2 NetWare boxes on a network, they'd broadcast their license codes, see that they were duplicates and shut both boxes down. "Piracy" gave Microsoft the edge.
After that, it's been 100% Novell fuck ups.
Why buy SuSE when for a LOT less money you can just hire Linux developers to write the code/apps you want? You spent $210 MILLION.
Okay, you own SuSE now, why is it easier to run GroupWise on Windows than on Debian? Microsoft is a bigger threat to your existence than Debian.
Why haven't you ported the look and feel of you NetWare apps (inetcfg, nwconfig, etc) over to SuSE?
Service Pack 6 for NetWare 6.5 is over 800MB. Compressed.
As is every other company out there. McDonald's manages it, yet their costs have got to be higher than cooking healthier food, yourself, at home.
No. The problem is when closed source companies don't bother to understand the Open Source environment and believe they can treat it the same as their closed source products.
Which is exactly what Novell is trying to do.
Instead, Novell should have spent a one tenth of the money they spent on SuSE and paid lots of programmers to port Novell's money-making products (GroupWise, eDirectory, ZENworks, etc) to Linux. Go ahead. Try to get eDirectory running on Ubuntu. It's pretty easy on SuSE, but damn hard on Ubuntu.
Oh really? You mean like Oracle? Their stuff is still closed. Yet they seem pretty happy with running it on Linux.
This message posted with 100% Ubuntu Edgy Eft.
Thanks
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
From your description, you're a prefect client for Microsoft.
/.?
So if there's no time or money to be wasted, and time is money, why are you wasting time on
Instead of wasting time here, you would (more logically) be better off spending time on various Windows tech forums. You'll want to learn MORE about the systems that you use right now than spending time chatting about systems that you aren't going to use. (And you've detailed the reasons that you aren't going to use them.)
Strange how that works.
I can't have some hacked together stuff that that may or may not interact well.
If this is the case, then you're definitely using the wrong solution. MS only interacts well with MS (if even then..interoperability in MS solutions isn't universal or without its' own problems), with only a few exceptions. Even those exceptions are usually a result of the work of people outside of MS, reverse engineering things with, at the very least, no help from MS...that is, if MS doesn't actively work through multiple means to impede or halt any such efforts outright.
One of F/OSSs' main strengths is the ability to interoperate without artificial barriers for the sole purpose of increasing corporate profits, lock-in, and marketshare.
There are F/OSS alternatives available already to accomplish everything you've cited. I know, I've done it. A few minutes' googling will usually result in multiple F/OSS apps/systems/OSs, etc to accomplish a given task. That you chose the MS solution is just that; *your* choice.
However, saying that you have no choice in order to stay in business and/or avoid firing employees is disengenuous. There *are* choices, you just *chose* not to avail yourself of them. Citing "peace of mind" and "interoperability" as reasons is facetious, as it has been widely acknowledged that both qualities are present in spades with current non-MS approved/certified F/OSS solutions.
If you're so concerned about the welfare of your employees, perhaps the money you could save using F/OSS solutions could be used to hire more employees or increase benefits/pay rates of current workers.
Just my 0.02
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
and avoid them like hell. Anything done under such debatable license, and anything done in conjunction with microsoft, i would avoid like hell.
Microsoft is not trustable in my opinion, in regard to freedom of anything. This is no 'j00B micro$oft eviLLaZ' type of thought - it is based on practical reasons : microsoft have never been a trustable ally in matters related to openness, freedom, and it is fat chance that they will - with all those shareholders.
So, i would avoid them like hell, and advise all my colleagues to do so always.
Read radical news here
Actually, some of the developers may indeed take it back through the courts. That is yet to be decided. But even if they don't take it back, a lot of those developers will go to GPL3 just because of this. Including important stuff like the C library and GCC (which FSF owns). And it's already been made clear that GPL3 will close this loophole.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
(chronology and events altered slightly for creative license)
Microsoft introduced Xenix, spun it off and begat Santa Cruz Organization -- The Old SCO(tm) and it was good; an affordable x86 Unix environment.
Novell was a very proprietary company which improved their products v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y ('80s through mid '90s) so SCO a group of engineers and execs left Novell and begat Caldera. Caldera bought DR-DOS after the Windows incompatibility fiasco (deliberate sabotage by Microsoft), declared that "OSes want to be free" and opened up their DOS source for all to see. Caldera begat Free DOS, and it was good.
Novell saw their market declining due to interoperability problems introduced by Microsoft, and by utilities introduced by Microsoft which were promoted for use for bypassing Novell's per-seat restrictions. Novell examined their positions, saw that Unix had a strong future, so they bought the IP for Unix, assigned SCO as the license broker for Unix IP, and saw that it was good.
Caldera looked upon the Free DOS and their gaining a decent following, and declared that open source looked promising, so they introduced a Linux distribution that was a bit ahead of its time. They looked upon their package management and update download-equipped open-source Linux operating system and saw that it was good.
Santa Cruz Organization saw its Unix product's future shrinking, and even with their 5% comission on Unix licensing they could read the writing on the wall for their core product, so they sold the "SCO" name and Unix products and contracts to Caldera, and thought all was well. The New SCO renamed Caldera Linux to SCO OpenLinux and claimed that it was good, and all was well.
Enter the serpent who goes by the name Darl McBride; a sneaky if not clever demon who felt that he could tempt investors to take a bite from his fruit of profit. He declared that Linux Stole SCO Code and thart SCO in fact owns the IP to all Unix-like OSes. In doing this the serpent indeed deceived them and got them to take a nibble with his declaration that Linux infringed upon his Unix IP and that all Linux users must pay him $699/processor/Linux box. Linux users grumbled to the Lord.
The serpent bit AutoZone's and Daimler Chrysler's heels, took them to court, and the judge did stomp on the serpent's head, crushing it, and rendered its vemon harmless. Linux users rejoiced, singing "O where is SCO's sting?"
Serpent McBride of SCO, relentless in his evil, pursued Lord Novell and Lord IBM into court. The courts did chuckle, but granted the serpent access to the throne. McBride shouted "I will own Linux! I will own Unix! Users will bow down to me and I will be like the most high Novell!"
Linux users, seeing through the deception, grumbled to the Lord, and proclaimed "Woe unto SCO, for they are evil and their king Darl McBride shall surely perish." The Lord IBM and The Lord Novell heard their grumbling and took offense at SCOs actions. They dragged SCO back into court, presented their counterclaims, saw SCO's stock plummet, and it was good.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
from my understanding, this shouldn't violate V2 of the GPL as it does not mention patents; however, I think there is a potential problem in it for Novell in that they will via the GPL be providing people with a license to indefinitly copy and distribute a program to which they via contract with MS have limited access to distribute. The question I have is what happens to Novel in five years when they've given everyone the right to redistribute the software under GPL 2? Providing a second contract for the patents would violate GPL 2 as that inherently would violate the clause preventing additional restrictions.
As an alternative, Novel could provide compatibility plugins under a different license and do a hybrid distribution much as exists with commercial distributions on the market. In a business sense, this is very powerful as it would give novel the ability to gain traction and provide a much needed service - a linux environment with better windows compatibility. OVer the course of this five years, it could in theory strengthen the adoption of linux amongst the crowd that need windows compatibility for smooth day to day function. What happens in five years is that they will have linux systems in their environment that hopefully are deeply embedded enough that transitioning back to windows quickly would be a challenge. In such a setup, they will be more free to transition to an environment w/o windows present.
I personally think this deal is not as big an issue as it is made out to be. What it does point out is the dangers of patent pacts to small businesses and independent inventors. I think that eliminating patent pacts as being anticompetitve is necessary to force competition. Of course this will just heighten the worries and abuse of the patent system, but maybe that abuse will force the big corps into supporting patent reform instead of using patent arseonals to smother the competition.
Sadly to say IBMs response to SCO largely reflects their abuse of the patent system. SCO attacks and they respond with countersuits using their massive stockpile of patents. While in this case, sco may be deserving of annhiliation - the method used is still that of a bully.
Attacking this deal is missing the target completely. Businesses will do what they need to to compete. Rules need to be changed to adapt to a changing environment. All this attention should be more strongly focused on patent reform and a stronger lobby needs to be made to see it happen.
alright, done ranting... if you got this far, you can go about living your life as u were.
When all else fails, try.
There's a simple way to make Novell uncompetitive: release your code under the GPL version 3. What's touch and go in version 2 is clarified in version 3.
Novell, most likely, won't be licenced to use your code. You get the additional benefit of community defence against future antisocial and free-riding behaviour.
Wikileaks, no DNS
Actually, MS was going to trash Xenix, when a father-son team went looking for something to do. They decided to make an offer to MS for Xenix who said something for nothing is good. It was not an active spin-off from MS.
Novell bought USL (Unix System Labs) long before Caldera came along. They also bought the rights to DR-DOS before Caldera. In fact, when Novell engineers started up with a Linux group, ppl such as Dvorack ripped Novell for even looking at Linux. So the engineers convinced Ray to spin them off and back them. Ray quit Novell and spun off all the Linux and DR-Dos work with a new company called Caldera (which became 2 companies for IPO purposes; but I forget what the name of the embedded one was).
Novell then sold the rights to re-sell Unixware to original SCO. Note, that does not include the IP (supposedly). SCO then merged Unixware and sco unix.
As SCO saw the future, they sold this same Unix rights and the name to Caldera. Caldera kept the Caldera Name for about 1-2 years. Once McBride cut a deal with MS and Sun, they switched back to SCO name and started their infamous Linux crap.
BTW, I used all of these environments at one time, including MS Xenix.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Yeah well I work for Novell. So what do you have to say about that ?
I can say this statement was agreed upon unanimously by the Team.
Jeremy Allison,
Samba Team.
Microsoft owned SCO at one time. In fact, the Santa Cruz Office of Microsoft became SCO. I have a machine here in my collection with pre-SCO Microsoft Xenix installed and running on it. Microsoft in their pre-MS-DOS days developed the first port of UNIX to run on the Intel 8086 processor, called Xenix. When Billy decided he didn't want to do UNIX anymore, it was all split off to become SCO.
SCO was an entity formed by Microsoft. It was once owned by Microsoft.
Yes, but I feel at least one important factor is missing in it, he failed to mention the red dressed archangle Pamela and her heavenly troops who rose from nowhere to hit SCO's litigation with facts and research.5 0515115448782
http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=200
605413? Yes, it's a prime.