NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #16/NN_1992_16.iso/spool/comp/unix/bsd/2618

Internet Message Format | 1992-07-22 | 4.8 KB

Path: sparky!uunet!mcsun!Germany.EU.net!unido!adagio!grog
From: [e-mail] (Greg Lehey)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd
Subject: Re: AT&T sues BSDI
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 22 Jul 92 13:32:36 GMT
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Organization: LEMIS, Schellnhausen 2, W-6324 Feldatal, Germany
Lines: 85

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Sean Eric Fagan) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Rob Robertson) writes:
>>i think they are suing over the use of the U-word.....
>
>I don't think so... BSDi went to great efforts to remove the word "UNIX" (a
>registered trademark of USL) from their system.

This is apparently not BSDI's first encounter with USL in court. Last
time they agreed not to use the word UNIX in any form, and to change
the phone number. Last time, USL apparently also alleged that BSDI was
claiming the *presence*, not the absence, of AT&T code in BSD/386.

>One of the interesting paragraphs is:
>
>14. Substantial portions of BSDI's BSD/386 operating system are copied from,
>based upon, or otherwise derived from, USL's proprietary software products.
> (more good stuff omitted)
>
>24. As shown in Exhibit B, BSDI's promotional materials contain
>the following representations concerning its "BSD/386" system:
>
>    BSD/386 is a "Berkeley UNIX" compatible operating system for
>    the 386 and 486 PC architectures.

Yes, I don't think this is misrepresentation. It's compatible with
Berkeley UNIX. That doesn't make it Berkeley UNIX, and it doesn't
constitute a claim to that effect. PC clones are compatible with the
IBM PC-AT. IBM hasn't sued them for saying they're PC compatible.

Personally, this whole business infuriates me. I have seen other stuff
(in other postings and also UNIGRAM-X, for example), in which an AT&T
spokesman is quoted as saying that anybody who has had access to AT&T
UNIX (tm) sources cannot develop operating system software which is
not derived from it. For an operating system software developer, this
means that AT&T has him by the short and curlies if he ever has access
to AT&T sources. Not he, but AT&T, has the choice of him working for
AT&T or effectively being out of work.

The whole business is all the more ludicrous when you consider when
the last significant influx of AT&T code into BSD occurred: according
to the diagram on page 5 of the daemon book, it was with 32V (derived
from the 7th edition) in 1978. Can AT&T seriously claim that the
deliberately primitive algorithms in such an old system can still be
of any significant value? Can they prove that somebody without access
to AT&T sources could not do something equally well, if not better?
There have been dozens of books published on the open market which
have gone into all aspects of the algorithms used. Linus Torwalds
wrote Linux, apparently unassisted, in a very short space of time.
What is so special about the original AT&T stuff that you would need a
license for it anyway?

The real issue here is, of course, not the source. AT&T must know
about Bill Jolitz; according to the text here, he's guilty of the same
`crime'. The fact is, AT&T is scared of BSDI; they're not scared of
Bill. They're just trying to kill a small startup with litigation.

What can we do about this? I don't know. The most important issues
seem to be:

Freedom of employment: if I had had exposure to AT&T sources (and I'm
damned if I'd admit it if I had), I would feel highly threatened by
any judgement which effectively meant that any company should hesitate
to hire me for this reason. I would suggest that, if AT&T want to
maintain this position, they should also declare themselves willing to
hire any programmer who has had access to their code.

Relationships: an AT&T source license is expensive - I don't know what
the object license costs, but it can't be that much, based on the
price that Consensys used to charge for its SVR4 port. If Net 2 really
is found to contain any AT&T-derived code (and AT&T has not published
a single indication of where such code might be found), it's certainly
not very much. It would be unreasonable to expect much of a license in
return for this, unless AT&T can prove that BSDI is incapable of
replacing it. In any case, fairness would demand that AT&T give BSDI
an indication of what code they consider derived from their works and
give them a chance to remove it. Law isn't fair, of course, but I
would expect that even the US legal system would find a reason to
expect this.


--
Greg Lehey                       | Tel: [phone]
LEMIS                            | Fax: [phone]
Schellnhausen 2, W-6324 Feldatal, Germany
*** NOTE ***: Headers are mangled - reply to [e-mail]