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D4rl of the Dead!It's Day 4, Friday night, let's be lazy, stay in and watch a B movie. How about a zombie flick? No, not dead processes, you sad geeks. Dead allegations. The Dead that Live! And in true Frankenstein stylee, this post is mostly stitched together from several old posts, so apologies to anyone who's seen this movie before. First: some disclosures from Dynix, allegedly in breach of contract. These are all nominally live items currently challenged by the contract PSJ. If the PSJ is denied and these items go to trial, what will the jury think? [Sources are IBM 832-2 p.72, IBM-835 exh. 588 pp.45-7, various IBM-835 declarations, and SCO's 960-A3 p.117.] 186 "Dynix/ptx event logging techniques" IBM says: "The programmers allegedly making the disclosure" (Hien Nguyen, Jim Keniston, Larry Kessler, Haren Babu Myneni) "did not have experience in Dynix in the particular technology area cited by SCO". SCO's answer: "Undisputed". Too bad... 187 "Disclosure of Dynix/ptx networking technology" IBM: "The programmers allegedly making the disclosure" (Vivek Kashyap, Hal Porter) did not have experience in Dynix in the particular technology area cited by SCO" SCO: "Undisputed". And there's more! IBM: "In some cases the cited technology did not even exist in Dynix." SCO's answer: "Undisputed". Whoops! From the cited Linux directory names, and a bit of googling, it appears that SCO was complaining about Vivek Kashyap's SCTP activity. Hal Porter appears to be a manager, not a programmer. 188 "Dynix/ptx TCP/IP and networking file system technology" IBM's Nivedita Singhvi said: "All the material that I contributed to these subsystems was developed independently for Linux" and pointed out "The Dynix/ptx operating system did not implement the IPv6 networking technology." And so said Shirley Ma and Venkata Jagana. SCO's answer: "Undisputed". 189 "Disclosure of Dynix/ptx MPIO technology" IBM's Mike Anderson: "I have never made any contributions to these files." Whoops! 190 "Disclosure of Dynix/ptx driver implementation techniques" IBM: "The programmers" (Jay Vosburgh, Mike Anderson) "allegedly making the disclosure did not have experience in Dynix in the particular technology area cited by SCO." Jay Vosburgh: "I did not work on device driver implementation techniques in Dynix/ptx". SCO: "Undisputed". 191 "Disclosure of Dynix/ptx performance management techniques" IBM: "The programmers allegedly making the disclosure did not have experience in Dynix in the particular technology area cited by SCO". Michael Mason: "I have never made any contributions to these files." Ruth Forester: "I have never made any contributions to these files." SCO's answer: "Undisputed". Next up: six copyright items awaiting PSJ 273 - 278 (use of ELF and SVID specification documents) These items represent SCO's bizarro notion that the methods and concepts in published standards are copyright, and that unlicensed use of those published standards is infringement through non-literal copying. Sadly, the wheels came off Darl's wagon when it turned out that the published standards were just republishing someone else's material... The lawyers keep saying 273-278 are ELF, but that appears to be inaccurate précis. IBM 835 Exh 176 uses the term ELF/SVID, and from what we read in IBM 838-2 (p.71) it appears that 273-278 must refer to both the ELF specification and the SVID (System V Interface Definition). IBM: "SCO's allegations of misuse with regard to specification documents lay claim to material that is not owned by SCO. The allegedly infringed specification document material includes 239 segments of material relating to the X Windows System, which SCO neither owns nor controls. The X Windows system is currently owned by M.I.T." IBM then twists the knife by quoting the MIT license: "This software is not subject to any license of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company or of the Regents of the University of California." The old Version 3 of the SVID included a lot of X functions. SVID version 4 is publicly available on SCO's website, but all the X material has been included by reference back to x.org! Is SCO full of it, or what! Anyway, SCO's response in SCO 956-A4 p.134 is fascinating. They whimper: "SCO does not claim copyright in the material in Items 273-278", and then there's a very small redacted sentence which is most probably a formal act of surrender that they don't want the bagholders to see. IBM's comeback in 983-A2 p.222 is: "IBM acknowleges that SCO abandons all copyright in the material in Items 273-278". And finally, at the hearing on 11 Nov 06, David Marriott said: "Item 273 through 275, abandoned by SCO in its summary judgment opposition papers as material not part of its claim, not material in which it claims copyright." [*] SCO's Brent Hatch had the opportunity to respond to these words; he did not. [*] Either Mr Marriott misspoke, or perhaps 273-5 are the ELF spec and 276-8 are the SVID. The three documents are quite consistent that the abandoned items are 273-278. And now the finale, where the graves open up and out come the dead to dance again! 3, 4 and 15 "NUMA Aware locks from ptx to Linux", "Disclosure of Dynix/PTX NUMA-aware spinlocks and statement that they have been ported to Linux" and "Detailed disclosure of ptx NUMA-aware locks for adaptation and use in Linux" Yes, we all thought that Items 3, 4 and 15 were killed, once by Wells, and again by Kimball, but here they come again reanimated by a Motion for Reconsideration, covered in earth and stinking of rotten flesh! Dance! Dance again! Dance for your evil masters! The smoking guns are here and here. Wells decided SCO's specificity wasn't good enough, but apparently SCO are desperate to get these two items back. The motion's support memo is really just cover for a special plea about these three items. What's special about them? Well, nothing much really, they are contractual but they do have some Linux patches to show, and without them SCO has lost all its NUMA allegations. Kimball might even give us all a real fright by reinstating these items - and then flush their whole contract theory the very same day. And that would be a great ending for this stinker of a movie. |
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Msg # | Subject | Author | Recs | Date Posted |
27567 | Re: D4rl of the Dead! | verygoodbear | 5 | 4/13/2007 8:42:43 PM |
27640 | Re: D4rl of the Dead! | tinnytuba | 8 | 4/14/2007 6:16:05 PM |