*BSD News Article 3083


Return to BSD News archive

Path: sserve!manuel!munnari.oz.au!hp9000.csc.cuhk.hk!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!sdd.hp.com!mips!odin!sgihub!sgitokyo!kandall
From: kandall@nsg.sgi.com (Michael Kandall)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.unix.bsd
Subject: Re: UNIGRAM's article on the USL-BSDI suit
Message-ID: <KANDALL.92Aug5175428@globalize.nsg.sgi.com>
Date: 5 Aug 92 22:54:28 GMT
References: <1992Aug3.143259.23897@crd.ge.com> <7045@skye.ed.ac.uk>
	<KANDALL.92Aug4161214@globalize.nsg.sgi.com>
	<5042.Aug412.31.0892@virtualnews.nyu.edu>
Sender: news@nsg.sgi.com (Net News)
Organization: Nihon Silicon Graphics, Japan
Lines: 31
In-Reply-To: brnstnd@nyu.edu's message of 4 Aug 92 12: 31:08 GMT

>>>>> On 4 Aug 92 12:31:08 GMT, brnstnd@nyu.edu (D. J. Bernstein) said:

}> In article <KANDALL.92Aug4161214@globalize.nsg.sgi.com> kandall@nsg.sgi.com (Michael Kandall) writes:
> It is also contrary to the spirit of Open Systems.
}> Don't be ridiculous.

One thing which has spurred, or been spurred by, the open systems
movement is the licensing of technology between vendors.  A much
larger portion of programmers today are porting and integrating
``standard'' platform tools, as opposed to creating and developing new
proprietary ones.  This has greatly enhanced application portability
and interoperability, as the same tools are widely available across
various systems (although many really creative systems programmers are
bored to death).

It may be legal to license stuff for a while, re-implement it, make
sure `diff' fails and cut the supplier out of the action, but I cannot
say I would call it moral, nor is it conducive to an industry based on
open-systems.

BDSI's intentions are clear.  Re-implement USL's UNIX System V (they
even advertised ITS-UNIX), claim it's USL-code-free, cut USL out
of their money.

}> Read prep.ai.mit.edu:pub/lpf/laf-fallacies.texi.Z. 

Will do.


Mike
----