8 Sep
2022
8 Sep
'22
10:47 p.m.
On 9/8/22, Warner Losh <imp(a)bsdimp.com> wrote:
In addition, when Dennis would talk about Coherent and his evaluation of
the source code, he said he used the known to him, but not widely known
bugs in Unix to try to catch copying. If there was copying, those would be
copied. If it was freshly implemented, there's a high likelihood that they
wouldn't. His conclusion was that someone had access to a lot of knowledge
about the Unix system given the fidelity of the implementation, but the
lack of bugs and novel ways of doing it suggested independent
implementation.
The software equivalent of a common technique used by mapmakers to
detect copying. You sprinkle a few fake locations or other deliberate
errors into your map. If these show up in a competitor's map you know
they were copied.
-Paul W.