Jose R. Valverde wrote:
I don't believe anybody sane would engage in deceptive action at that
level consciously with such big players as IBM. From all the history
of the cases it seems rather that this is a case of a change of
management to unknowledgeable, ambitious managers who paid too much
attention to the UNIX department on the Company and then had to put
a straight face to defend what resulted to be an untenable position.
I am not going to comment on Darl's sanity.
I think that you will find that Darl's problem was paying too little attention to the people who actually understood what was going on, not paying too much attention.
He certainly didn't appear to pay much attention to this:
http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/IBM-459-22.pdf
Try to put yourself in Darl's place: you make a decision based on the
promises of some head of department and sue IBM and the world. Then
little by little your move is proven wrong. What can you do? Yes,
say sorry, close the company, fire all workers and get punished for
admitting to a scam. Or you can put a straight face, defend that you do actually believe the unbelievable -and look as a stupid instead- and try to save the company, the workers and your skin
until you can find someone else to take the hot potato.
I think that it was more a case of suing IBM and the world based on what you (at the time) sincerely believed and hoped *must* have happened, and then spending several years and legal theories unsuccessfully trying to find any evidence for it.
Don't let your bad experience with Microsoft spread to all vendors. Some
have managed a long history of delivering on their promises, and Caldera
at the time was one such.
Personally, I think if they had stuck to Ransom Love and endured the
harsh times for a couple of years until the "boom" of Linux they would
have managed a lot better. Not to mention they could have unified UNIX
at last. But there's no way to know now.
One promise that, at the time, Caldera had never delivered on was making a profit.
Caldera did some good things in the Linux world but they were a distinctly second tier player.
Their decision to buy SCO' s UNIX business was a bad one, based largely on emotion not on good business sense (I know this, because I was one of the people that helped sell it to them).
At the time Caldera had no revenue stream but still had some cash from their IPO, SCO had a rapidly declining revenue stream, and bunch of mostly 10 to 15 year old technology which was still in reasonable shape but which wasn't going anywhere. Somehow (with SCO's help) Ransom Love convinced himself that the deal made sense and that (most important of all, because it appealed to his ego) he could succeed where everyone else had failed and somehow unite UNIX and Linux and build a successful business out of it.
Sadly none of that turned out to be true and, had Ransom Love stayed as CEO I suspect that the company would have been out of business by the end of 2003 at the latest.
md
> From: "Jose R. Valverde" <jrvalverde(a)cnb.csic.es>
>
> Following up to recent questions about whether OpenSolaris might be jeopardized
> if SCO didn't have the rights to provide the license, I see that judge Kimball
> has ruled on the case, and in discussing its ruling, he mentions the agreement
> between SCO and Sun.
>
> Particularly he mentions:
>
> > Section 10 of the 2003 Sun Agreement also sets forth SCO's obligation
> > to indemnify Sun for any claim brought against Sun asserting that the
> > Section 4 licensed technology infringes the rights of any third parties.
> > Section 10 further provides that if the intellectual property rights
> > in the technology become the subject of a claim of infringement, SCO
> > shall ensure that Sun has the right to continue to use the technology
> > or replace the technology to make it non-infringing. The provision has
> > not been implicated or applied.
>
> I have to change my opinion on SCO to consider them now UNIX zealots. As
> I read it, I guess Sun was worried by possibly non-ATT code in SVRX, and
> may be by Novell's assertions, so they shielded themselves: if I'm not
> wrong that means OpenSolaris is safe and the responsibility for that relies
> totally on SCO.
You guess Sun was worried about non-ATT code in SVRX? No quite. The SVRX
code in Solaris (if any; and certainly there is plenty) is certainly 100%
ATT-derived, and any non-ATT code in the SVRX code that The SCO Group
passed on to Sun had (by a mere matter of time) to be added to SVRX
after ATT relinquished the original SVRX code and quite after Solaris
branched out of the UNIX System V Release 4, and therefore any non-ATT
(or non-ATT-licenseable) code inside The SCO Group's SVRX certainly is
not inside Solaris, so no worries there.
You forget the The SCO Group was fully engaged in a total FUD campaign,
whose ultimate goal was to cut off Linux support in the Enterprise via
fear, uncertainty and doubt, and whose collateral goal was to make
plenty of money selling bogus Linux licenses and suing everybody in
sight (IBM and The SCO Group's own customers, of course).
Sun needed desperately to find a way to stop losing money, and that
meant making themselves again desirable to the IT market. Sun mayor
rivals were (and are) Microsoft and Linux. Specially Linux, since more
Sun machines are being replaced by Linux than by Windows. So the Sun
strategy was two-fold: release an "opensource" Unix to "steal" the
grassroots support away from Linux, and give money to The SCO Group
so they could keep afloat their FUD campaign against Linux in the
Enterprise. If they could achieve these two goals with one swift move,
much better; and they did: the gave money to The SCO Group to buy a
bogus license to opensource Solaris.
> SCO thus was willing to take any risks regarding third parties with respect
> to opening up SVRX derived Solaris. That was very bold and valiant
Your ingenuity here is shocking.
> My guess is they were for opening SVRX as a way to increase market share
> of UNIX against LINUX but preferred Sun to open _their_ version instead of
> opening SCO's own. At the same time they must have thought that a combined
> attack on Linux would drive most people off Linux towards opensource UNIX
> and that corporate interests would prefer SCO's closed Unixware to Sun's
> open source solution in line with tradition.
Ridiculous. With Solaris the Enterprise has a growth path to big iron.
With UnixWare the Enterprise has a "growth" path from the PC to a bigger
PC.
> Thus SCO move benefits them twice as now they have two open source OSes,
> and should any contributor to SVRX code complain of the open sourcing
> SCO would have to take the blame and has already assumed all
> responsibility.
So, what two "opens source" OSes does The SCO Group have? "Open"-Server
and "Open"-Unix (aka Unixware)? Amazing!
> BTW, nobody seems to have complained about portions of SVRX contributed
> code being in opensolaris, so maybe nobody cared anyway
Nobody cares about OpenSolaris. If you are going to go with Solaris,
open or not, you are going to be paying much more for year-on-year
support to the vendor than the Solaris license costs, so whether it is
open o not is moot for the Enterprise.
> In any case, we
> now know SCO has assumed the defense of OpenSolaris, which is a great
> thing to know.
I do not see it like that at all. The SCO Group has afforded SUN
indemnification in the eventual case the license they sold to them gets
shot, as it is going to happen unless Novell gets its money, either from
the now-bankrupt The SCO Group or from SUN itself (second payment for
the same thing, funny deal there!).
The question here is: the indemnification The SCO Group offered SUN
weights less than smoke: What indemnification can you get from a bankrupt
company? None, that is the answer.
> Or may be they didn't want to but needed so badly Sun's money to follow
> their lawsuit against IBM that they were willing to sell their souls
> (and IP) in the hope of a big win against IBM. Who knows?
That interpretation is much closer to the truth. Except they didn't sell
"their IP", as The SCO Group had none of UNIX copyrights, none of UNIX
IP, they just bought from Novell the UNIX distribution business, but
not the UNIX IP.
> One thing is certain, Caldera/SCO should be thanked for allowing opening
> of so much ancient -and modern- UNIX source code. Their war against Linux
> OTOH is another issue.
Caldera/The SCO Group did no have just title to change the license on the
intellectual property they did not own and which they were not allowed to
re-license with different terms under the "Assets Purchase Agreement"
signed between Caldera and Novell. Therefore, any and all relicensing
done by Caldera of ancient or modern UNIX code is void and null. Unless
Novell comes after the fact and endorses such open-sourcing. Absent Novell
action, The SCO Group actions changing the UNIX license are void.
Novell action in that sense has not happened up to the day of today.
> From: "Gregg C Levine" <hansolofalcon(a)worldnet.att.net>
>
> It would not have impacted any version of Solaris, including the Open one.
> And why you are asking? I am glad you asked. It seems that according to the
> good people at the Sun offices here in the City, that by the time version 9
> was released, that the code base was completely rewritten, and contains
> absolutely nothing from BSD, and most certainly nothing from the original
> creators of UNIX.
That's not saying much. The original creators of UNIX wrote it in assembly
for the PDP-11. Nothing of that is in Solaris, that's true. And BSD is
open-source and legally close-able anytime, so no argument there either.
Now, if "the good people at the Sun offices" are trying to imply there
in no Unix System V code in Solaris, they are lying. Period.
> From: Boyd Lynn Gerber <gerberb(a)zenez.com>
>
> Caldera/SCO was trying to get everything opensourced. They released
> OpenUNIX 8.0 which was UnixWare 7.1.2.
What? Care to show proof? What do you mean by the mention of "OpenUNIX"
in the same paragraph where you say "SCO was trying to get everything
opensourced"? That "OpenUNIX" is proof of the "opensourcing" done at
The SCO Group?
What??
> They had reached an agreement with
> every one and were about to release everything a the big expo in Jan/Feb
> east cost. It was to be a joint IBM/SCO announcement, when IBM suddenly
> decided against it and were addamanly now doing everything to stop it.
Those are not verifiable facts. Rumors and hearsay make no history.
> I am grateful to SCO for their attempt to make UnixWare/OpenUNIX
> opensource. I just wish it had succedded.
What attempts? Vaporware is nothing to be grateful about.
--
Pepe
pepe(a)naleco.com
hi all,
The recent flurry of activity in early pre-C UNIX for an 11 with a
small memory got me back to working on my 11/05. So far I've
identified two nasty problems with the data paths board, the M7260.
One of the 8266 MUX chips looks like the plastic boiled and bubbled
and circuit board is discolored underneath it. I'd welcome both
sources for replacement chips and techniques for replacing it.
Additionally there's a lifted and broken trace on the non-component
side of the module near the F edge connector. Any sugestions for
repairing a damaged trace would be welcome.
Lastly, I'd just as soon use a DL11W in the 11/05 rather than go to
the trouble of setting up an external clock to feed the on board UART.
I can get both 9600 baud and RS232 from the DL11W instead of 2400 baud
current loop from the built-in interface. I haven't yet found the
jumpers to remove/install that would disable the built-in console
interface. There's also the LTC.
TIA,
Milo
--
Milo Velimirović, Unix Computer Network Administrator
University of Wisconsin - La Crosse
La Crosse, Wisconsin 54601 USA 43 48 48 N 91 13 53 W
--
Unix: Where /etc/init is job #1.
Hi.
I'm reading TCP/IP Illustrated - for the first time; talk about slack! - and
noticed Stevens used BSD/386. I remember seeing in DDJ in the early '90s ads
for various software-plus-source from a Texas repackaging company, and they
had BSD/[386|i|OS] at various times for $1k.00.
That was then - this is now. Is it likely, or even possible, that BSDi the
company would be ready to consider BSD/386 and such early releases, legacy
that could be donated to TUHS? And if so, who should we contact, to ask?
Thanks
Wesley Parish
--
Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
-----
Gaul is quartered into three halves. Things which are
impossible are equal to each other. Guerrilla
warfare means up to their monkey tricks.
Extracts from "Schoolboy Howlers" - the collective wisdom
of the foolish.
-----
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui?
You ask, what is the most important thing?
Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people.
All Simh version 3.8-0 has been released by Bob Supnik. It now has all the
support that we need to run 1st Edition UNIX. In our Subversion repository,
I've updated the Readme file and the simh.cfg file to match the new simulator.
Cheers,
Warren
Hello.
Very interesting article from http://arstechnica.com here:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080501-deluded-sco-ceo-on-witness-st…
A quote from that article:
"Greg Jones, VP of Technology at Novell, was called as a witness. Jones
was asked if SCO ever told Novell that it would sue Linux users. He
said, "No, never that specific." When asked if SCO notified Novell under
the Asset Purchase Agreement Amendment 2 that it would enter into a
license with Microsoft, he said, "No."
Jones testified that SVRX code is in Solaris and that he had discovered
several cases of this. At that point, Novell entered into evidence at
least 21 examples of OpenSolaris code that had been taken from the SVRX
code base (one such example can be found on the OpenSolaris web site)
and re-licensed under Sun's open-source CDDL license.
He further testified that the agreement between SCO and Sun was
"extraordinary" in allowing a move from a proprietary license to an
open-source license, and if Novell had been asked, it would have
prevented SCO from entering into that agreement. He said the same thing
regarding the Microsoft agreement with SCO, as well as the agreement
between SCO and Computer Associates."
And then this pearl:
"SCO argues that it was not authorized to execute license agreements and
that interested third parties such as Sun and Microsoft should get their
money back, but it says that Novell is not entitled to hold the money in
the interim. If you purchased a license from SCO that was unauthorized,
the argument is that you'll need sue them to get it back. Since SCO is
currently in bankruptcy proceedings, that could be difficult."
------
Ain't it funny?
--
Pepe
pepe(a)naleco.com
