Slashdot Mirror
openSUSE Hobbled By Microsoft Patents
kripkenstein writes "openSUSE 10.2 no longer enables ClearType (which would improve the appearance of fonts). The reason given on the openSUSE mailing list for not enabling it is, 'this feature is covered by several Microsoft patents and should not be activated in any default build of the library.'
As reported on and discussed, this matter may be connected to the Microsoft-Novell deal. If so, Novell should have received a license for the Microsoft patents, assuming the deal covered all relevant patents. Does the license therefore extend only to SUSE, but not openSUSE?"
The GPL is very clear on one point: if you know your software infringes on some patent, you can't distribute it, even if you have a deal with the patent holder enabling you to do that*. Can Novell now be prosecuted? Is that code GPLed (it seems to be KDE, so it probably is)?
* Unless that deal is extended to everybody that touches the code.
Rethinking email
Out of curiousity, do other major distributions enable this either? In other words, is this news at all?
A page on the FreeType project site says:
Finally, many Linux distributions seem to distribute a patched version of FreeType 2 with the bytecode interpreter activated, unlike to the sources we distribute.However, I've previously been under the impression that most distributions would ship at least without some features covered by patents. On the other hand, it's not only MS who owns patents that concern subpixel rendering, and I don't know who owns what, so that's why I'm left wondering if someone else actually knows.
The funny thing is I just installed OpenSUSE 10.2 alpha 3 and the fonts look better than ever; if this is how they look without cleartype, who needs it?
I seem to recall about 10 years ago font copyrights, etc, and the ClearType issue came up regarding Linux. The question then was whether it was OK to do *something* like this, or include fonts, etc, in OSS files and/or SW. Anyone remember the details?
Pavlov wouldn't be so famous if he'd used a can opener instead of a bell.
IIRC different displays may have different order of R,G,B component pixels which may require a reversed antialiasing pattern (as if the screen was flipped upside-down). Though the effect is subtle it also shows a red and/or blue fringe. Though that may not be what you are talking about.