Friday, May 16, 2003
Friday, May 16, 2003 |
| Business | ||
|
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Entertainment |
Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | Business
By Anand Parthasarathy
Bangalore May. 15. Corporate users worldwide, of Linux, are a confused lot today: they have been told by the SCO Group, one of the companies distributing a version of the Open Source operating system software, that Linux violates its intellectual property pertaining to the earlier software, Unix, and that they may therefore be legally on weak ground if they continue using it. SCO (earlier Santa Cruz Operation) was acquired by Caldera International, a U.S.-based Linux vendor, and then resumed its original name to join a consortium called UnitedLinux. It distributed a version called "SCO Linux'' based on a consortium partner's version, "SuSELinux''. After sending individual letters to the world's top 1500 corporates a few days ago, SCO today took the unusual step of suspending distribution of its own Linux version. Its claim: Most current Linux versions include unauthorised lifts from its proprietary version — "Unix System V'' — one of the world's powerful computer operating systems for over 3 decades since it was developed by engineers at AT&T's Bell Labs in 1969. AT&T sold its rights to Novell Networks in 1993 and Caldera/SCO acquired it in turn in 1995. In March this year, SCO fired the first salvo across the bows of IBM when it filed a suit claiming over $1 billion in damages because "Big Blue'' allegedly beefed up its own Linux versions with some coding lifted from Unix. IBM is vigorously defending the suit. Linux grew out of the Free Software Foundation (FSF) initiative in the early 1990s to create a Unix-like "free-of-royalty'' software and was the creation exactly ten years ago, of Finnish student Linus Torvalds. Since the basic tenet of Linux and all such FSF efforts was the recursive mantra "GNU'' ("GNU is NOT Unix'') — and the licensing requirement that the source code would be freely available — the user community is puzzled why a major Linux distributor would now try and hamstring the software with proprietary claims. One Open Source leader has termed SCO's claim as "rabid'' and Linux's godfather Torvalds was quoted today saying "I suspect some SCO lawyer just... realised they haven't made money any other way '', and suggested that "their main cash cow could be "litigation''. The developments will be watched with more than usual interest in India for two reasons: With one of the world's largest Unix programmer communities, a smooth changeover to the new "Open'' environment of Linux is a very real possibility: Both Unix and Linux use the same programming language C and its versions like C++; hence the relearning curve for Unix programmers hoping to work with Linux is minimal. In recent weeks, major IT global players have "discovered'' the Indian potential for Linux-based software development. Just one week ago, IBM signed an MOU with the Karnataka Government to set up a Linux development facility in Hubli. This is expected by India-based IT watchers to lead other IT leaders tapping India's burgeoning "Linuxpertise''. However, they will like to wait and watch developments: Has SCO just shot itself in the foot — or set a `proprietary' cat among the Linux pigeons?
Printer friendly
page
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Entertainment |
Miscellaneous |
|
|
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | The Hindu eBooks | Home |
Copyright © 2003, The
Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu
|
