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 ----