The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Trouble has been brewing in the open source community for several months. Open source is the thought that computer code should be public property, allowing users to make changes to their software to modify it for their needs. The Linux operating system is the most well known example of open source work. Linus Torvalds is the Norwegian engineer who originally designed the operating system in his basement when he was avoiding going to his university classes and then distributed it freely. The trouble is that a company called SCO is claiming that much of the Linux system is actually its property. SCO claims that much of the original UNIX computer code used in Linux was first designed by their engineers. SCO has been arguing its case in the computer media for months, but with a product like Linux which is freely available and not an actual company, there was no one to sue. However, SCO upped the stakes last week, filing charges against both AutoZone, an online car parts dealer, and against the Daimler-Chrysler car company. SCO's lawsuit claims that both of these companies are infringing SCO's patent of UNIX computer code through their use of Linux. This sent tremors through the business community as companies using this free operating system began to wonder about the economic sense of getting the software for free, but being brought to court over it. Interestingly, the day after these lawsuits were filed, an email surfaced in the press connecting Microsoft with SCO. The email claims that Microsoft has invested millions of dollars in the SCO Group, and was also responsible for bringing in several other companies and their multi-million dollar capital investments. Rumours had been floated for months that it was actually a nervous Microsoft who was behind these lawsuits, but this email was the first proof of any kind. After the release, SCO admitted the email was genuine, but said that it has been taken out of context. Microsoft was not very worried about Linux when it started showing up on home computers over the past several years, but first a number of European governments, and now Asian and African governments are changing their entire systems over to Linux amid growing security fears. Last month, Microsoft itself almost inadvertently joined the open source movement when a portion of the computer code which makes Windows work was released onto the Internet. After code is written, it is fed through another piece of software called a compiler which changes the raw code into a working piece of software, while at the same time, concealing the actual code from users. A sub-contractor for Microsoft loaded a portion of raw Windows code onto the Internet and Microsoft has been fighting ever since to contain the leak. It will be interesting to watch this brewing court battle over the coming months as the future of a growing movement set to change the computing world faces its first legal challenge. ([email protected])
