4 ms·

I was trying to avoid a full dissertation into the family tree of Unix -- since 4.3BSD came out in the mid-80s, I think that the point stands that it is possibl

by Duff 14y ago

I was trying to avoid a full dissertation into the family tree of Unix -- since 4.3BSD came out in the mid-80s, I think that the point stands that it is possible to legally reproduce a clone of complex software and APIs. What the chief architect did or didn't do isn't relevant to the testimony of Jonathan Schwartz or rebuttal by McNealy. Schwartz's testimony basically said that Sun was most concerned about protecting the Java trademarks and wider ecosystem, and while he wasn't necessarily happy with what Google did, he didn't see it as actionable. (Perhaps he thought that Google & Sun would eventually reconcile?)

jimmyvanhalen 14y ago
..and yet when Oracle's lawyers noted that Schwartz "wasn't talking about Sun's legal position, but rather its business agenda." Schwartz said he was not a lawyer and therefore not an expert in copyright, patents and license agreements. Schwartz also said "I'm there to define our business strategy -- not to write our contracts." Here's the main thing about his testimony: Schwartz "endorsement" is not a license agreement or a permission to break copyright/patent laws. Edit: and if you look at Jonathan's blog post it clearly says in the header "JONATHAN'S BLOG".