The next development version of the Linux kernel is going to be 3.1. And after that for some bizarre reason Linus is going to call the next kernel 3.11. After that, the next version will be Linux 95, and then Linux will only be 15 years behind Windows!
Speaking of the section bar, is anyone else seeing really out of date data there? Just now it updated (with the addition of the games category) but until a minute ago it was still reflecting April 20th data.
Software and business model patents have evidently effected comprehension of what a patent entails.
"A computer, examining a set of video images, to perform lip reading" is not patentable. HAL would be prior art for this; but it doesn't matter because there isn't any inventive step here anyway.
"A computer, processing a set of video images by locating what appears to be a set of lips, selecting recognizable points, using the movement of those points to track the deformation against a 3D model, comparing against a table of syllables to compute the probability of each particular syllable, and using knowledge about a language to determine which syllables are most likely to follow each other" could be patented. HAL would not be prior art for this, because there is no indication of how HAL performed the lip reading.
Somehow, I doubt that Microsoft would care about the slashdot effect. I doubt their network administrators have even noticed it. Even if they had, burning a few gigabytes of bandwidth is going to be much cheaper than annoying a highly paid employee.
Remember when mafiaboy knocked amazon, cnn, yahoo, and ebay offline? He also attacked Microsoft -- and managed to take their availability from 99.9% down to 99.5%.
"This is not an unsubtle attempt..." means "This is not (an unsubtle attempt)..."
The meaning you ascribe would be possible for "This is a not unsubtle attempt...", because that could be parenthesized "This is a (not unsubtle) attempt...".
This might be on Microsoft's servers, but it's in Daniel Weise's private webspace (he being one of the three authors). No, this is not an unsubtle attempt at pro-windows propaganda.
How much is a piece of code worth? How much is the design behind that piece of code worth? What if I don't like your design?
The question here is of rating the relative value of different contributions; that can only be done by mutual agreement -- ie, negotiation. Obviously if the question is of distributing unknown future earnings, this means allocating shares.
Ultimately when someone offers a patch, you have to be prepared to say how many shares it is worth, and to refuse to accept the patch if its originator wants more than you're willing to offer.
I disagree. If an interviewer asks a technical question, they should be looking for a technical answer. If they ask a non-technical question, they should be looking for a non-technical answer.
"How many bits are there in a byte" is a technical question; "on which machine architecture?" is an appropriate response. "How many bytes of RAM does your laptop have?" is a non-technical question; to that, "192 million" is an appropriate answer.
A study [...] has put paid to the common myth that GPL software cannot be included in proprietary software without the entire mix having to necessarily be released under the GPL. [...] The study pointed out that if a developer wanted to create free or open source software which he or she wanted to use in proprietary software without that proprietary software itself coming under the GPL, they could use the Library GPL, which was specifically designed for this purpose.
In other words, the GPL is less restrictive than the XP EULA because there's an entirely different license called LGPL which is more permissive.
In other news, North Korea has a stronger economy than Russia, because South Korea has a strong economy.
I ran into this issue at Oxford University, which lays claim to potentially marketable IP produced by its students (which includes myself). Talking to the Research Services Office, however, I explained that being able to distribute my work was critical for the success of my research, and they agreed that "a university member's research must take priority over any commercial benefit"; once I put together a copyright statement which disclaimed all liability -- several times -- they were quite happy to let me distribute my work.
In short, if this is research, it's quite likely that the university will allow you to distribute it regardless of the official policies; but if you were hired for the purpose of writing a piece of software... well, it belongs to the university and they can do whatever they like with it.
It hurts like a sonuvabitch, if you use your fingers. If you have a meter which allows you to draw blood from somewhere other than your fingers -- eg, from your arm -- then it doesn't need to be painful at all.
Which pair is more similar, a web browser and a database, or a web browser and a BIOS?
It seems to me that this name change had nothing to do with trademark law or avoiding confusion, and everything to do with who has the most lawyers.
Personally, I think that the Firebird database should be renamed the Mozilla database... because, hey, Mozilla's own lawyers (ok, AOL's lawyers, presumably) have obviously decided that nobody will ever be confused between a web browser and a database.
The fact that distributing derivative works of code distributed under my license under NDA without forbidding further derivative works is forbidden has no impact upon the use of said code in standards. My code is publicly available -- why would anyone want to put it under an NDA? The simple solution is for a company to distribute their own work under an NDA, and include a copy of my code (or derivative thereof) without the NDA.
As for calling code from a GPLed program, look at clause 2(b) of the GPL: You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.
You can't relicense my code under the GPL; thus you cannot obey the GPL's requirement that your program is licensed "as a whole... under the terms of this license".
I'm really glad this is printed on acid-free paper. Because, you know, I'm really likely to be wanting to read this book fifty years from now.
Before you worry about finding a storage medium which will survive for a long time, think about how long the information you're storing will be useful.
What you want is 4c and to clearly state that it applies to the source code. Ie the user has the option of including the source code, but the source code is copyrighted, and if included it is subject to the given terms.
If that's what I wanted, that's what I could have done.
4b is much more onerous than 3b and thus seems to actively discourage release of modified source code
4(b) and 3(b) serve different purposes. 4(b) exists because I want people who release open derivatives to mark what they've changed and where. For closed derivatives, that's irrelevant (because nobody is going to be doing anything with the source code even if it is distributed); all I want is to ensure that people aren't mislead about what they're getting.
Also disallowing GPL applications from *using* your code is a serious discrimination against a very large pool of software developers
I don't disallow GPL applications from using my code. The GPL disallows the distribution of code which links GPL-licensed code to my code.
(from another post) I work for a company that sells software including source code under NDA to other companies. Inclusion of a single line of your code would make such an NDA impossible.
You're right. Of course, the same applies to the GPL.
Without clause 3(c), someone could take my code, modify it, and distribute the result under the GPL. The section headings "Modification and redistribution under closed license" and "...open license" serve only elucidatory purpose and have no legal meaning.
The core of the license is the interaction of 3(c) and 4(c) -- allowing completely closed redistribution and open redistribution under the same license, but nothing in between.
Note that my license says nothing about source code; people can distribute source code but prohibit the distribution of derivative works (djb's code is an example of this), or could distribute binaries only and allow derivative works.
Clause C seems to say that you are not allowed to give away even any version of the program (closed or open source) in any way where the receiver is allowed to do anything other than run the program. This completely disallows all similarities to the BSD or public domain license, and even means that reselling is not allowed.
Are you reading the same license as I'm talking about? Maybe we disagree about how to interpret the English language. Please tell me what you think the following license means:
1. You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of this work.
2. You may modify your copy of this work and distribute the resulting derivative work, providing you do so under this license.
3. You may modify your copy of this work and distribute the resulting derivative work, providing that you stand on your head for six hour while eating jelly beans and shouting "hello world" as loud as possible.
Clause C seems to mean that on one level of derivation can be done.
Read the license again. Look at section 3. Now look at section 4. They both give you sets of rights.
You may *either* modify my work, preserve the copyright notices, mark the fact that you have made changes, and distribute the result under a license which forbids further derivative works (ie, normal closed-source copyright), *or* modify my work, preserve the copyright notices, clearly mark what you've changed, and distribute the result under my license.
In other words, derivative works have to be either "completely closed", or "completely open"; "license creep" is forbidden.
As stated your license is unacceptable to me, because it allows a company to steal my code, extending my work with small fixes, and take full advantage of it with no compensation to me.
*shrug* In that case, you'd probably never consider releasing code under a BSD license either. I have no objection to Big Evil Corporations using my code.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, since you asked...
The next development version of the Linux kernel is going to be 3.1. And after that for some bizarre reason Linus is going to call the next kernel 3.11. After that, the next version will be Linux 95, and then Linux will only be 15 years behind Windows!
Hmm, doesn't quite have the right ring to it.
Speaking of the section bar, is anyone else seeing really out of date data there? Just now it updated (with the addition of the games category) but until a minute ago it was still reflecting April 20th data.
Software and business model patents have evidently effected comprehension of what a patent entails.
"A computer, examining a set of video images, to perform lip reading" is not patentable. HAL would be prior art for this; but it doesn't matter because there isn't any inventive step here anyway.
"A computer, processing a set of video images by locating what appears to be a set of lips, selecting recognizable points, using the movement of those points to track the deformation against a 3D model, comparing against a table of syllables to compute the probability of each particular syllable, and using knowledge about a language to determine which syllables are most likely to follow each other" could be patented. HAL would not be prior art for this, because there is no indication of how HAL performed the lip reading.
Somehow, I doubt that Microsoft would care about the slashdot effect. I doubt their network administrators have even noticed it. Even if they had, burning a few gigabytes of bandwidth is going to be much cheaper than annoying a highly paid employee.
Remember when mafiaboy knocked amazon, cnn, yahoo, and ebay offline? He also attacked Microsoft -- and managed to take their availability from 99.9% down to 99.5%.
Note the order of "not" and "an".
"This is not an unsubtle attempt..." means "This is not (an unsubtle attempt)..."
The meaning you ascribe would be possible for "This is a not unsubtle attempt...", because that could be parenthesized "This is a (not unsubtle) attempt...".
This might be on Microsoft's servers, but it's in Daniel Weise's private webspace (he being one of the three authors). No, this is not an unsubtle attempt at pro-windows propaganda.
You've been doing it wrong for years.
How much is a piece of code worth? How much is the design behind that piece of code worth? What if I don't like your design?
The question here is of rating the relative value of different contributions; that can only be done by mutual agreement -- ie, negotiation. Obviously if the question is of distributing unknown future earnings, this means allocating shares.
Ultimately when someone offers a patch, you have to be prepared to say how many shares it is worth, and to refuse to accept the patch if its originator wants more than you're willing to offer.
...until someone sends an envelope full of Anthrax up there.
Would they ever be able to decontaminate the place, or would they have to scrap the entire station?
Personally, I think selling an "Intel 3.06GHz Pentium 4 Retail Box" for $300 is worse. (He was, of course, selling the *box*.)
I disagree. If an interviewer asks a technical question, they should be looking for a technical answer. If they ask a non-technical question, they should be looking for a non-technical answer.
"How many bits are there in a byte" is a technical question; "on which machine architecture?" is an appropriate response. "How many bytes of RAM does your laptop have?" is a non-technical question; to that, "192 million" is an appropriate answer.
A study [...] has put paid to the common myth that GPL software cannot be included in proprietary software without the entire mix having to necessarily be released under the GPL.
[...]
The study pointed out that if a developer wanted to create free or open source software which he or she wanted to use in proprietary software without that proprietary software itself coming under the GPL, they could use the Library GPL, which was specifically designed for this purpose.
In other words, the GPL is less restrictive than the XP EULA because there's an entirely different license called LGPL which is more permissive.
In other news, North Korea has a stronger economy than Russia, because South Korea has a strong economy.
Well... usually 8, and by definition it is supposed to be 8
Which definition would that be? Bytes can be any size. *Octets* are 8 bits.
It's news because these are students, and the readership of slashdot feels more connected to them.
I ran into this issue at Oxford University, which lays claim to potentially marketable IP produced by its students (which includes myself). Talking to the Research Services Office, however, I explained that being able to distribute my work was critical for the success of my research, and they agreed that "a university member's research must take priority over any commercial benefit"; once I put together a copyright statement which disclaimed all liability -- several times -- they were quite happy to let me distribute my work.
In short, if this is research, it's quite likely that the university will allow you to distribute it regardless of the official policies; but if you were hired for the purpose of writing a piece of software... well, it belongs to the university and they can do whatever they like with it.
but at least BSD got rid of the spectre of SCO lawsuits ten years ago.
It hurts like a sonuvabitch, if you use your fingers. If you have a meter which allows you to draw blood from somewhere other than your fingers -- eg, from your arm -- then it doesn't need to be painful at all.
Which pair is more similar, a web browser and a database, or a web browser and a BIOS?
It seems to me that this name change had nothing to do with trademark law or avoiding confusion, and everything to do with who has the most lawyers.
Personally, I think that the Firebird database should be renamed the Mozilla database... because, hey, Mozilla's own lawyers (ok, AOL's lawyers, presumably) have obviously decided that nobody will ever be confused between a web browser and a database.
If you think the GPL is violated then you admit that your license has restrictions that are not in the GPL.
Absolutely. The GPL allows derivative works to be licensed under the GPL; my license doesn't.
The fact that distributing derivative works of code distributed under my license under NDA without forbidding further derivative works is forbidden has no impact upon the use of said code in standards. My code is publicly available -- why would anyone want to put it under an NDA? The simple solution is for a company to distribute their own work under an NDA, and include a copy of my code (or derivative thereof) without the NDA.
As for calling code from a GPLed program, look at clause 2(b) of the GPL: You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.
You can't relicense my code under the GPL; thus you cannot obey the GPL's requirement that your program is licensed "as a whole... under the terms of this license".
I'm really glad this is printed on acid-free paper. Because, you know, I'm really likely to be wanting to read this book fifty years from now.
Before you worry about finding a storage medium which will survive for a long time, think about how long the information you're storing will be useful.
What you want is 4c and to clearly state that it applies to the source code. Ie the user has the option of including the source code, but the source code is copyrighted, and if included it is subject to the given terms.
If that's what I wanted, that's what I could have done.
4b is much more onerous than 3b and thus seems to actively discourage release of modified source code
4(b) and 3(b) serve different purposes. 4(b) exists because I want people who release open derivatives to mark what they've changed and where. For closed derivatives, that's irrelevant (because nobody is going to be doing anything with the source code even if it is distributed); all I want is to ensure that people aren't mislead about what they're getting.
Also disallowing GPL applications from *using* your code is a serious discrimination against a very large pool of software developers
I don't disallow GPL applications from using my code. The GPL disallows the distribution of code which links GPL-licensed code to my code.
(from another post)
I work for a company that sells software including source code under NDA to other companies. Inclusion of a single line of your code would make such an NDA impossible.
You're right. Of course, the same applies to the GPL.
Without clause 3(c), someone could take my code, modify it, and distribute the result under the GPL. The section headings "Modification and redistribution under closed license" and "...open license" serve only elucidatory purpose and have no legal meaning.
The core of the license is the interaction of 3(c) and 4(c) -- allowing completely closed redistribution and open redistribution under the same license, but nothing in between.
Note that my license says nothing about source code; people can distribute source code but prohibit the distribution of derivative works (djb's code is an example of this), or could distribute binaries only and allow derivative works.
Are you reading the same license as I'm talking about? Maybe we disagree about how to interpret the English language. Please tell me what you think the following license means:
Clause C seems to mean that on one level of derivation can be done.
Read the license again. Look at section 3. Now look at section 4. They both give you sets of rights.
You may *either* modify my work, preserve the copyright notices, mark the fact that you have made changes, and distribute the result under a license which forbids further derivative works (ie, normal closed-source copyright), *or* modify my work, preserve the copyright notices, clearly mark what you've changed, and distribute the result under my license.
In other words, derivative works have to be either "completely closed", or "completely open"; "license creep" is forbidden.
As stated your license is unacceptable to me, because it allows a company to steal my code, extending my work with small fixes, and take full advantage of it with no compensation to me.
*shrug* In that case, you'd probably never consider releasing code under a BSD license either. I have no objection to Big Evil Corporations using my code.