The contract isn't between SCO and IBM. It's between AT+T and IBM
Well, to be a bit more accurate, the original contract was between AT&T and IBM, and SCO obtained rights under that contract from AT&T (precisely what rights are one of the numerous subjects of dispute in the lawsuit).
The depositions from AT&T people will likely be considered by the judge in determining the meaning of the relevant contract provisions, barring the unlikely event that the judge finds the contractual wording is so plain on its face that no additional evidence is needed regarding interpretation.
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.
this is one of the most ridiculous things I have seen here in a while. It's like saying that key locks aren't good because somebody could break into your house and replace the lock with one they had the key for.
Errm, no. It's more like someone breaking in to your house and stealing all your ID documents, then replacing any photos, height and weight data, etc., with their own, and then not leaving, but instead proceeding to live in your house, drive your car, etc., and there's nothing you can do to convince anyone to help you, because as far as the world is concerned, they are you.
wait, they are already logged in as superuser at this point. See what I'm saying?
Yes, I know exactly what you're saying. Your imagination is too limited. This is no electronic equivalent of a purse-snatching we're talking about. Google for stories under "identity theft" and extrapolate....
Until they learn to read your mind (or find that paper where you've written them all down), at least passwords force someone to take minor electronic trouble to crack your security.
...is the name of a fine book, probably out of print by now, that exposed many of the fallacies behind tests that purport to measure aptitude rather than raw knowledge.
I remember one wonderful example from the book that gave 4 reading comprehension questions from a recent SAT. I got all 4 correct - it was easy. The kicker is that the book leaves out the excerpt that the test-takers were supposed to read and comprehend. The test wasn't measuring reading comprehension nearly so much as it was measuring test-takers' abilities to "smell" the phrasing of an obviously wrong answer.
Yep, I'm serious about bloated and slow. I'm using "bloated" to describe IE's code size vs. Opera's. Re: "slow," I've been running Opera for years, until very recently on dialup. At work (T1 line), IE is the official "corporate desktop" browser app. Page render times for Opera, even on dialup, compared favorably to what I saw on IE at work.
A couple of years ago at work I ran Opera "unofficially" until I was asked to remove it, and recently I was granted permission to use it again at work. Much of my work involves legal research on the Web. I find that due to page rendering times as well as various Opera UI features (MDI, mouse gestures, tabbed browsing), I am approximately 50% more productive with Opera than with IE.
This Is to MS's Clear Business Advantage...
on
IE Shines On Broken Code
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· Score: 2, Insightful
It encourages web authors to make pages that don't work in other (standards-compliant) browsers. But even MS is getting a bit tired of this, because (1) there are now plenty of pages that don't work even with IE (I encounter them all the time at work), and (2) all the error correction code helps to keep IE bloated and slow.
Quicksilver seemed polymathic, almost Pynchonesque, to a degree. By the time of The System of the World, the Cycle seemed to me to have changed to a good yarn about old friends. To what extent was this pre-planned (the change in style, not the Pynchonesque business), and to what degree did it naturally evolve while writing?
I mean those of us who autohide the taskbar. It's not clear whether the notifier will pop up or not (and we may not want it to - the possibility for distraction is obvious).
You can get it to play a sound, but the FAQ says it may notify in error up to two minutes after all new mail's been cleared. Beep! Beep! BEEP! Urrgh....
SCO claims IBM didn't have a license to use SCO's SVR4 product, which it obtained during the abortive "Project Monterey," to enhance its [Linux][AIX] offerings. SCO says it will be able to prove this through IBM's own internal documentation consisting of [records of contributions to Linux][e-mails concerning AIX licensing].
The same reasoning that makes insuring against this sort of thing difficult would also, it seems to me, make reinsurance difficult to get.
Reinsurance is appropriate when a risk is insurable, but more capital is needed. Here there's some question regarding whether the risk is sufficiently appealing to (re-)insurers as a business proposition, especially when part of that risk is made up of potential defense costs and SCO, as we all know, is rather litigious.
Hope you make your goal, Poul-Henning, or rather that the community makes it possible. I'm shoveling all my money into a new-house-sized hole as fast as I can or you'd have my donation already.
Just Wondering If This Is What Dawes et al. Want?
on
XFree86 4.4 Released
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· Score: 4, Interesting
I noticed when Googling around about Dawes that (besides the fact that apparently he lives rather close to me) he is running a business based on X, offering stuff like automagic configuration (at least some of which has made it into the X CVS). Could dropping the latest X from the major Linux distros leave Dawes as the only game in town for enterprises seeking the most enterprise-ready solution? And he wouldn't have to take responsibility for pulling it from his competition....
SCO Is Legally A Cucumber
on
SCOoby Snacks
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· Score: 2, Funny
So they run McDonald's systems, eh?
OK, I think we all know who it is behind that Hamburglar mask now.
Linus is correct about copyright law, but he's got to watch getting too involved in a back-and-forth with SCO. Imagine Linus on the witness stand in a year and a half (if it ever gets to that) being asked if he said that everything else in the GPL besides the expectation of some form of return is "legal fluff."
SCO had the gall to cite ESR's definition of 'FUD,' which at the time related the origin of the acronym as applied to IBM. When their papers were already filed with the court, ESR tacked on a little 'bonus,' which the court will read because SCO cited it:
Slashdot Mirror
You're correct. I just wanted to keep things very simple. Putting it yet another way: SCO is at the end of a chain that begins with AT&T.
The contract isn't between SCO and IBM. It's between AT+T and IBM
Well, to be a bit more accurate, the original contract was between AT&T and IBM, and SCO obtained rights under that contract from AT&T (precisely what rights are one of the numerous subjects of dispute in the lawsuit).
The depositions from AT&T people will likely be considered by the judge in determining the meaning of the relevant contract provisions, barring the unlikely event that the judge finds the contractual wording is so plain on its face that no additional evidence is needed regarding interpretation.
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.
Work with layers, a powerful feature usually found only on expensive commercial applications
Hrrmm...
Though I must say that even after growing somewhat accustomed to it through constant use, I would love to explore any alternative to the GIMP's UI.
this is one of the most ridiculous things I have seen here in a while. It's like saying that key locks aren't good because somebody could break into your house and replace the lock with one they had the key for.
Errm, no. It's more like someone breaking in to your house and stealing all your ID documents, then replacing any photos, height and weight data, etc., with their own, and then not leaving, but instead proceeding to live in your house, drive your car, etc., and there's nothing you can do to convince anyone to help you, because as far as the world is concerned, they are you.
wait, they are already logged in as superuser at this point. See what I'm saying?
Yes, I know exactly what you're saying. Your imagination is too limited. This is no electronic equivalent of a purse-snatching we're talking about. Google for stories under "identity theft" and extrapolate....
The same applies for a smartcard, doesn't it ?
Heh, absolutely. :-)
Until they learn to read your mind (or find that paper where you've written them all down), at least passwords force someone to take minor electronic trouble to crack your security.
Think about this before assuming biometrics is the answer:
- then how do you get your identity back?
...is the name of a fine book, probably out of print by now, that exposed many of the fallacies behind tests that purport to measure aptitude rather than raw knowledge.
I remember one wonderful example from the book that gave 4 reading comprehension questions from a recent SAT. I got all 4 correct - it was easy. The kicker is that the book leaves out the excerpt that the test-takers were supposed to read and comprehend. The test wasn't measuring reading comprehension nearly so much as it was measuring test-takers' abilities to "smell" the phrasing of an obviously wrong answer.
Yep, I'm serious about bloated and slow. I'm using "bloated" to describe IE's code size vs. Opera's. Re: "slow," I've been running Opera for years, until very recently on dialup. At work (T1 line), IE is the official "corporate desktop" browser app. Page render times for Opera, even on dialup, compared favorably to what I saw on IE at work.
A couple of years ago at work I ran Opera "unofficially" until I was asked to remove it, and recently I was granted permission to use it again at work. Much of my work involves legal research on the Web. I find that due to page rendering times as well as various Opera UI features (MDI, mouse gestures, tabbed browsing), I am approximately 50% more productive with Opera than with IE.
It encourages web authors to make pages that don't work in other (standards-compliant) browsers. But even MS is getting a bit tired of this, because (1) there are now plenty of pages that don't work even with IE (I encounter them all the time at work), and (2) all the error correction code helps to keep IE bloated and slow.
Quicksilver seemed polymathic, almost Pynchonesque, to a degree. By the time of The System of the World, the Cycle seemed to me to have changed to a good yarn about old friends. To what extent was this pre-planned (the change in style, not the Pynchonesque business), and to what degree did it naturally evolve while writing?
I mean those of us who autohide the taskbar. It's not clear whether the notifier will pop up or not (and we may not want it to - the possibility for distraction is obvious).
You can get it to play a sound, but the FAQ says it may notify in error up to two minutes after all new mail's been cleared. Beep! Beep! BEEP! Urrgh....
...contains only gas giants and harbors intelligent - oh, wait.
SCO claims IBM didn't have a license to use SCO's SVR4 product, which it obtained during the abortive "Project Monterey," to enhance its [Linux][AIX] offerings. SCO says it will be able to prove this through IBM's own internal documentation consisting of [records of contributions to Linux][e-mails concerning AIX licensing].
...equals the joy of listening to the same 5 songs 50 times.
...the rest of the question is really unnecessary.
The same reasoning that makes insuring against this sort of thing difficult would also, it seems to me, make reinsurance difficult to get.
Reinsurance is appropriate when a risk is insurable, but more capital is needed. Here there's some question regarding whether the risk is sufficiently appealing to (re-)insurers as a business proposition, especially when part of that risk is made up of potential defense costs and SCO, as we all know, is rather litigious.
Hope you make your goal, Poul-Henning, or rather that the community makes it possible. I'm shoveling all my money into a new-house-sized hole as fast as I can or you'd have my donation already.
I noticed when Googling around about Dawes that (besides the fact that apparently he lives rather close to me) he is running a business based on X, offering stuff like automagic configuration (at least some of which has made it into the X CVS). Could dropping the latest X from the major Linux distros leave Dawes as the only game in town for enterprises seeking the most enterprise-ready solution? And he wouldn't have to take responsibility for pulling it from his competition....
So they run McDonald's systems, eh?
OK, I think we all know who it is behind that Hamburglar mask now.
I believe the OSNews review said that *exotic* hardware support, not *modern* hardware support, was a bit lacking.
Linus is correct about copyright law, but he's got to watch getting too involved in a back-and-forth with SCO. Imagine Linus on the witness stand in a year and a half (if it ever gets to that) being asked if he said that everything else in the GPL besides the expectation of some form of return is "legal fluff."
All the Kentucky Fried Geese you can shake a drumstick at!
Somewhere in Heaven the Colonel is smiling.
SCO had the gall to cite ESR's definition of 'FUD,' which at the time related the origin of the acronym as applied to IBM. When their papers were already filed with the court, ESR tacked on a little 'bonus,' which the court will read because SCO cited it:
http://catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/F/FUD.html
Yes, 1.5GHz was what I meant to say.
The 20 minute times were for -STABLE. -CURRENT takes a lot longer.