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SCOsource and Linux

Rumors have been circulating for a few weeks: SCO, it is said, has hired a fancy law firm and will be pursuing intellectual property claims against Linux users and distributors. The level of concern has dropped somewhat as the company has announced its short-term plans, which are relatively uncontroversial. The full picture remains cloudy at best, however; SCO's intellectual property push could yet present the Linux community with its first serious legal difficulties.

For the moment, SCO's plans can be seen in this press release from LinuxWorld. A new division (called "SCOsource") has been created for the express purpose of expanding the licensing of the company's intellectual property, "including the core UNIX source code." For now, SCOsource only has one offering: the company's System V libraries for Linux. These libraries allow users to run SCO Unix applications under Linux; nobody has ever really confused them with free software. SCO's desire to realize some revenue from use of this proprietary product is not likely to upset that many people.

SCO seemingly does not intend to stop there, however; the company clearly believes that Linux (and other systems) may contain code or techniques which infringe upon its intellectual property. We asked Chris Sontag, Vice President of SCO's Operating Systems division, about this investigation and the uncertainty it creates in the Linux community; he responded:

The only way that SCO will be able to reduce that uncertainty is to research and investigate whether any of our intellectual property currently resides within Linux, which is what the law firm of Boies, Schiller and Flexner are currently doing. We are actively taking steps to try and reduce that uncertainty and we hope to announce the results of their findings in the coming months.

So SCO thinks that the possibility of its intellectual property "residing" with Linux is enough, at least, to justify the hiring of an expensive law firm to check it out.

What sort of SCO property might be found within Linux? One possible issue, of course, is software patents; it is essentially impossible to know which patents might be infringed by any given body of code. Any patents that SCO might have picked up with its ownership of Unix are likely to be expired by now, but the SCO could have other patents up its sleeve. The patent threat is not new, of course, and SCO is far from the only company which could conceivably create patent problems for Linux.

The other possible source of trouble is SCO's ownership of the Unix System V code. That SCO takes a broad view of what it owns can be seen in the impressive "SCO Intellectual Property Pedigree" that it has posted; it is a complicated set of diagrams with lots of arrows showing how just about everything (including Linux, QNX, Mach, Minix, and more) derives from the initial Unix system. A tiny piece of this diagram appears on the right side of this page.

Linux, one would think, should not have copyright problems with regard to SCO's Unix code; it was, after all, reimplemented from the beginning. That should be true, as long as nobody who has contributed to any Linux application has borrowed from the Unix code base. Given the number of people and vast amount of code involved, it would not be entirely surprising if a bit of borrowed code showed up somewhere.

What will SCO do if it finds something? As might be expected, the company is not willing to say much:

If we found unlicensed use of our intellectual property in a product like Linux, any action we would take would have to be based on the scope, source and impact of the violation. We do not feel we can rule out any particular response without impairing our fiduciary responsibility to our stockholders to protect their property. Certainly our first choice in helping to resolve this issue would not to be heavy handed in our response.

In other words, anything could happen, though SCO would try to not upset too many people. But if SCO turns up something that, it thinks, could be turned into licensing revenue, the company is likely to pursue that path. SCO is not in the strongest financial position, currently, and could use a new revenue stream. Of course, most other Linux companies are not going to be a great source of cash for SCO at the moment. It might well be that SCO's real target - if there is a target in the end - could be somebody with deeper pockets. Apple or Sun, say.

Sooner or later, Linux is going to face a big intellectual property challenge. If it doesn't come from SCO, somebody else is certain to pick up the slack. Even if Linux and the companies working with it emerge victorious, this sort of challenge can only serve to create uncertainty and doubt around Linux and free software in general. It will be interesting to see how it all plays out.

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Two new PDA platforms

[This article was contributed by LWN reader Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier]

The long-fabled explosion of Linux-based PDAs may finally be right around the corner.

A number of Linux-based PDA solutions have been announced, but only one has made it (so far) into mainstream retailers. The Sharp Zaurus has been out for some time now, though it hasn't made much of a dent in the handheld market. According to a report by Dataquest Palm-based devices account for 30.6 percent of the market, while Microsoft Pocket PC licensees account take up 28.8 percent of the market. Linux-based PDAs don't have an appreciable share of the market yet.

However, that might change now that AMD and IBM are getting in to the act. AMD (along with Metrowerks) and IBM both announced Linux-based PDA platforms this year at LinuxWorld Expo.

The AMD OpenPDA platform is aimed at PDAs and smart phones. The OpenPDA will run on an AMD Alchemy Solutions Au1100 processor, available at speeds of 333MHz, 400MHz and 500MHz. The The Au1100 is a system-on-a-chip (SOC) processor, and it includes the LCD controller, 10/100 Ethernet, USB device and host controller functions and is MIPS32 compatible.

On the software side, the OpenPDA includes an embedded Linux kernel, Trolltech's Qtopia interface, Insignia's Java Virtual Machine and the Opera Web browser. Qtopia is the same application environment used on Sharp's Zaurus handhelds. It includes the Hancomm Office suite, standard PIM and productivity applications like the to-do list, text editor and e-mail client. The Qtopia environment also includes a number of games like Asteroids, a media player, and an image viewer. The OpenPDA platform is scheduled to be released by Metrowerks by the end of the first quarter of this year. No devices based on the OpenPDA design have been announced yet.

IBM rolled out a reference design at LinuxWorld Expo based on a PowerPC 405LP embedded processor and MontaVista's Linux Consumer Electronics Edition (CEE). The IBM device, called the "embedded Linux application platform" or e-LAP, has support for speech and handwriting recognition, and is slated to include IBM's Websphere Micro Environment. IBM's design also makes use of Trolltech's Qtopia application environment, and Opera's Web browser. The e-LAP design shown at LinuxWorld Expo included 32 MB of SDRAM with 32 MB of flash memory, as well as a 64 MB DiskOnChip device. The 405LP has a range of 152 MHz to 380 MHz.

Users who want to get their hands on an IBM PDA running Linux will have to wait a bit, as volume production isn't expected to begin until the third quarter of this year. MontaVista's CEE is supposed to be available sometime in the first half of this year.

Obviously, Linux has quite a way to go before it catches up to the Palm OS or the Microsoft PocketPC in market share. Right now, the Linux PDA seems to be for early-adopters and Linux enthusiasts only. However, interest from major players like AMD and IBM is sure to bolster Linux's chances in this market.

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The new LWN text ad system

LWN text ads are the small advertisements that appear in the left column of most pages on the site. They are, we hope, relatively unobtrusive (no bouncing, flashing animations), but, since they tend to be relevant to our readers' interests, they have response rates that are as good as banner ads. Text ads are a small but important part of LWN's revenue stream.

Late last week, we transitioned over to a new version of the text ad system. The new code features some amazing innovations, such as being integrated into the rest of the LWN site. It is no longer necessary to create a separate account to place and manage text ads, and text ad transactions can be viewed along with the rest on the "My Account" page. The new system also allows advertisers to make more changes to ads as they are running. (Certain other desired new features, such as the ability to restrict ad delivery to specific countries, have been deferred for now).

What has not changed is the basic method by which text ads are sold. LWN uses a sort of auction system; each advertiser names his or her own price for each ad. At the beginning of each day, the available ad exposures are divided up between advertisements according to how much is being spent on each. The result is that we can accommodate small advertisers (the minimum is $5) while providing a large portion of the site to those who are willing to pay more.

See the text ad section of the LWN.net FAQ for more information on how the text ad system works. You can also head over to this page to see which advertisements are currently running on the site.

LWN text ads are a great way of supporting the site while simultaneously drawing attention to your company or some other cause that you support. They are, for example, ideal for drawing attention to a free software project that could use more users or developers. Please consider placing your ad today.

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