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Did Microsoft Borrow GPL Code For a Windows 7 Utility?
Goatbert writes "Rafael Rivera over at WithinWindows.com has found evidence that Microsoft has potentially stolen code from an open source/GPL'd project (ImageMaster) for a utility made available on the Microsoft Store to allow download customers to copy the Windows 7 setup files to a DVD or USB Flash Drive. If Rivera's evidence holds up, this could be some serious egg in the face for Microsoft at a time when they're getting mostly good press from the tech media."
The code in question seems to be called into scrutiny because the two areas of code bear the same name (ReadBytes) and operate similarly.
The longer you work in the development of software, the less magical it all becomes. The first time you plugged some code into a terminal and it worked, it seemed like an amazing amount of wizardry and behind-the-scenes stuff that you could never fully fathom. Compilers, binary code, arcane source languages, electronic signals. It's amazing to a neophyte just how much stuff is going on.
But the longer you plug away at it, the more you realize that it's just code. Nothing special is really going on. You're mostly moving data from one area of memory to another. It's almost a form of Nirvana once you reach this point.
So when someone comes along and says "OMG YOUR READBYTES METHOD IS JUST LIKE THIS ONE IN SOME GPL CODE!!!!11", it kind of pegs that person as someone who doesn't really have much experience with real programming. Sure, they may use a lot of tools, and know how to recompile their kernel, but they really don't have a firm grasp of what and why they are doing what they are doing.
So the evidence is a ReadBytes snippet?
I'll wait till there's evidence before even commenting about the ramifications of something like this. This is just wild speculation at this point.
) Human Kind Vs Human Creation
) It'd be interesting to see how many humans would survive to serve us.
Yep - it's not like they have never done anything like that before (Stacker).
They never lie, cheat, or steal. Never, ever, ever.
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
Come on people, you can't have it both ways. If you can't "steal" music, you can't "steal" code. MS "stealing" this code didn't deprive the Open Source community from using the code (i.e. stealing my car), or at least that's the argument /.er use whenever the word is used in conjunction with music and movies. Eat your own dog food.
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
Maybe you're very young, but I seem to recall that Microsoft was at one time held as a sort of liberator from IBM's hegemony. I guess it's all a matter of perspective...
That was a very short period of time. As soon as Microsoft had established itself - even before Windows - they started their campaigns against any competitors.
Uh, they kind of have to *prove* that Microsoft actually copied their code first. You're missing a crucial step to the process in your scenario.
Comment of the year
By whom?
My memory of the early days of Microsoft was surprise that their nasty behaviour was tolerated.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Seriously, what he shows to be evidence looks like code that was written straight from reading the ISO disk image specification. Next up, school math class accused of mass cheating for solving math problems in similar ways.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Probably those who get paid to work on GPL software...
Your point is? Do you have an accusation to make?
No sig for the moment.
With the amount of "evidence" in the article, the same accusation could be made against the GPL project. Perhaps the author of that project illegally gained access to Microsoft code and used it as a starting point for ImageMaster.
Ever think that if this code was stolen it was done by a lower level employee and not an executive. It is way more likely that a small group of employees couldn't hit a deadline or something and so they borrowed code form other places to get it done. I know executives and have heard many executives speak... they don't like legal exposure, they don't want to do things wrong because it is their neck on the line. It is way more likely that it was the average slashdot user who did this than it was a "Microsoft Corporation" decision.
I also don't know the validity of these claims but I read some posts saying that this stuff was outsourced. aka Microsoft didn't even claim to code it, they just bought botched code. Good going with your theory... it appears even more that the "evil" people in this situation are lowlife developers and not the "Corporate Suits" that your agenda is pushing.
Microsoft as a corporation is the victim here TBH.
Considering the existence of laws such as the "The Artists' Rights and Theft Prevention Act of 2005", the "The Digital Theft Deterrence and Copyright Damages Improvement Act of 1999", and various others, it seems clear that the US Congress disagrees with you.
It's .NET code. It's already "Open Source" by virtue of tools like Reflector existing.
I do not think that that is what "Open Source" is generally taken to mean.
I don't think everyone here believes you can't steal music, first off.
Speak for yourself. I do believe you can't steal music.
You could steal the original copies. You could steal a famous painting. But "stealing" music? For instance, what IS music? It's nothing but a mathematical concept involving harmonics and sound.
What are words? You can't "steal" what I said. This isn't like the little mermaid where you could steal someone's voice and leave him/her mute.
Non-physical works CANNOT be stolen. Unless you're talking about a PHYSICAL COPY, you cannot steal it by definition. Copying a work? That's completely different. But if it's a non-destructive process, you're not stealing it. You're just COPYING it.
If you want to use an appropriate term for what Microsoft supposedly did with this GPL code, it's called plagiarism. Sure, it's called "stealing" nowadays, but using this word is oversimplifying.
Did Microsoft Borrow...
Microsoft borrows, everyone else steals?
I wonder if I can try that with the RIAA/BSA?
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
You may not ... reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble the software, except and only to the extent that applicable law expressly permits, despite this limitation;
Which seems to be exactly what the Author has done. Sucks to be him, or anyone else trying to find out if M$ has stolen your code and violated your license, since the only way to find out, is to violate M$'s license agreement. Have fun in court.
Yes, after reading the original letter I have one: how does that letter prove that Microsoft is evil? The only thing Gates is saying is that he and his company has invested around $40000 in building and supporting the software, and the return was so small, it was just enough to break even. The pay, he states, was $2 an hour. If you don't mind working for $2 an hour, that's ok of course, but most people probably wouldn't go to the university to learn computer science if their pay was less than that of a mcdonalds employee.
Apple has "Mac vs PC", Microsoft has "Laptop Hunters", Linux has recession
Stealing is stealing. Period.
Yes, and copyright infringement ain't it, no matter how much your employer wishes otherwise.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
No, there is one major difference. If I steal your car, you can't use it any more. If I copy your software, you can still use it. I don't take something away. In most cases, the copyright holder doesn't even notice.
It's the copyright holders that are trying to mislead people and contort the English language by saying stealing is the same as copying.
the US Congress is free to be as wrong as it wants to be.
The differences you fail to make clear is that copyright infringement isn't stealing something physical as in all your cases. Copyright infringement is making a copy without the permission of the copyright holder. It isn't like you denied the copyright holder any of their possessions as NO ONE can guarantee that the infringer would have bought the work to begin with. This is well a established precept.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
We have a society where a huge proportion of people violate copyright and feel okay doing it. Why would anybody give a crap when Microsoft does a little of the same? People will start taking the GPL seriously when they start taking copyright in general seriously. That is, never.
Copyright infringement isn't theft, as the pirates always tells us on Slashdot, so nothing was "stolen."
Luckily IBM never lowered themselves to such despicable practices.
This isn't about IBM. We're over them. Microsoft is still an overwhelming force in the industry.
They abused their monopoly by forcing OEMs to give them unfair advantages over competition. This isn't just an opinion... the only real competitor (Apple) has complete control over their hardware systems, and that's why they can compete.
All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.
The difference being, when IBM was threatened with anti-trust action, they tried to please thr justice department, but when Microsoft was threatened prosecution, they defied the justice department all the way, until a "business friendly" administration dropped the ball.
Copyright infringement IS stealing
No, it isn't. Here is a handy guide illustrating the difference.
it just has a different legal definition.
And you know *why* that is? Because *IT'S NOT THE SAME*. If copyright infringement *WAS* the same as theft, we wouldn't need a special law dealing with it - it could be covered by theft laws. The fact that it isn't should tell you something.
It literally fits the non-legal definition.
No, it doesn't. It fits the propaganda term. Just because some media trade groups misapply a term as an act of propaganda does not make it so.
Why is it that the only copyright violations that upset the /. masses are those involving code under the GPL?
You are believing "facts" quoted by Gates that you can't check. (I'll believe that he hired people for $2 / hr. I won't believe that that was *his* recompense...though he *might* have been living on his family.)
Still, his "open letter" wasn't as bad as his business practices at the same time...though that got a lot less publicity.
Companies that trusted MS tended to go out of business even then. MS was still small, though, so many of them just had trade secrets stolen, and their going out of business was delayed until MS became a more significant competitor. Also: Gates didn't invent dumpster diving, but he practiced it.
Still, there was a period when I though MS would be a less abusive company to deal with than IBM. And for around five-seven years it was true. This was probably because IBM wasn't allowed to compete by a consent decree, so IBM basically ignored the personal computer.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
So it's Okay for MS to use open source code but any open source project that uses MS code can be hounded and threatened? Let's see, is it 238 patents MS complains open source uses of MS's?
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
We aren't "over IBM". They are still one of the dominant forces in the industry. But IBM *did* actually reform. It took them decades, but they did. So far MS has shown no indication of even wanting to (outside of PR moves).
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
It's that time again. Before anyone comments on GPL lifting, please take the GPL quiz:
The GPL Quiz
Anyone who gets a perfect score may comment in this thread, all others please keep uninformed conclusions out.
The Right Reverend K. Reid Wightman,
I think most people think Outlook is pretty bad, until they actually have to *use* Notes... believe me, if you believe Outlook sets a low bar, Notes' bar is underground.
I'm certainly not going to suggest Outlook is perfect, or even good. But compared to the alternative, it's incredible.
Comment of the year
Look, when you take to functions that do essentially the same thing, and you compile them, to optimized code, there is a good chance, if the compiler is doing its job that the compiled byte code looks a lot a like. This code HAS to act the same, its reading the same data format. Its no surprised that when you decompile different versions that they look the a like, I would be concerned if they didn't.
Go ahead and decompile it, so you aren't seeing the original source, you're seeing a decompilers version of the optimized code.
I could probably write that function 100 different ways in one day and get the exact same thing out after compiling it to optimized byte code and then decompiling it. Its a rather specific process at that point for dealing with a standard. You almost HAVE to do things in that function that way in order for your code to actually work. There are a few changes that could be made, some branches could be done in different orders, but once you throw the optimizer at it, those branches are likely going to be reordered the same way to reuse registers and such rather than wasting extra ones.
The author of the article is a newbie at best. Its fairly clear that he doesnt' actually understand what has happened in this process and has provided no evidence other than 'the end result looks the same!'. It could have went both ways, neither project was the first to write a UDF reader. My guess would be the first C# UDF code was actually a port of some C code to do it anyway.
Finally if you read the comments section of the article, the ImageMaster credits.txt contains a link to MS source, while I haven't bothered to download the linked SDK, its a safe bet that the reason the code looks the same is because it probably is, ImageMaster PROBABLY pulled that function from an MS example. It happens ALL THE TIME.
There is no MS conspiracy, just some douche bag blogger wanting to get posted on the front page of slashdot to increase his ad revenue.
The proper thing to do is to remove this story from the front page to deny that traffic to him.
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it's interesting how the FOSS movement delightfully and intentionally has made every piece of GPL3 code a trojan horse that can destroy a company's business model if a single programmer without the knowledge of the business copies a snippet of code to make his job easier.
It's interesting how companies that produce proprietary code have made all their code a trojan horse that can destroy anyone who copies their code and uses it.
Because people are making money off it.
Because the people violating that copyright are invariably the same people campaigning for the death penalty for other copyright violations.
There are other, less obvious rteasons. But in summary, there are a lot of differences between the two situations, assuming you're comparing this and the mp3 issue.
Breaking Into the Industry - A development log about starting a game studio.
Why is that? Why is it OK to violate my copyright but wrong to violate the GPL?
It looks like Microsoft's defence will be that the EULA says ""You may not reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble the software". They'll probably charge the guy with a DMCA violation...
Legally speaking, what does it mean to disassemble a program? Is it to convert its machine representation into a more readable format? Every processor in every computer does this, it just disassembles to a language that is not composed of English words and numbers. \
If someone owns Visual Studio and another program on their system crashes, what happens? A little dialog box asks the user if they want to debug. If they say yes, Visual Studio fires up with a disassembly view of the program that crashed!
Isn't the entire Wine project basically reverse engineering the Windows APIs?
You make it sound like the evilness (read: utter lack of ethics) were a funny meme, not a plain, cold fact.
Want to hear the voice of GOD? cat
You're calling me an idiot and I'm the one displaying irrational hating behaviors?
Calling names is irrational.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
That's crap. You do too take something away - you take away the renumeration you should have paid.
That's crap. Not giving something is not the same as taking something away.
And "renumeration" is not a word.
No, there was a cheap and nasty OS based on a hacked version of CP/M that came with the original IBM PCs.
When the PC and PC clone market took off, the company making it went along for the ride. They got lucky.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
"But IBM *did* actually reform."
Really, how so?
IBM really were a malign force in this industry when they were dominant, using grossly unethical tactics against competitors and stifling innovation to an extraordinary extent. Between 1960 and 1980 IBM were the evil empire - probably worse than Microsoft have ever been. These days, ethically, IBM seems to be an 'average company'. It does some good stuff, it acts on the whole as a good citizen, it contributes to standards processes and mostly abides by the standards that are agreed. Of course, this may simply be because it no longer has the power to bully and intimidate like it once did - but this is nevertheless a huge change.
However, 'better' does not necessarily mean 'good', particularly if you start from where IBM started from.
And being 'not quite as bad as IBM at it's worst' doesn't make Microsoft good, either - they have always, from the very beginning, been an exceptionally unethical company.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
Saved your life!
See, I was going to kill you but I didn't, so I saved your life.
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
the Corporation of Microsoft behaves in an aberrant, selfish fashion. If there is GPL code that is being misused, it is not because "Microsoft is Evil', but more likely because they hired a contractor who lifted some open source code and though it would not get noticed. MS may be sociopathic and short sighted, but they are not going to as a official policy do something like this.
I have said it before here, Microsoft does some really stupid shit. Don't just assume that everything that looks bad is their fault though. That is just being lazy.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
No, some companies try to make good products.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."