Bonum Certa Men Certa

Truisms About SCO

Alcohol possesion prohibited in park sign



Summary: Caldera's GPL violations as indicators of sheer hypocrisy

GROKLAW seems to be on a mission to inform SCO lawyers, now that it knows for sure that they regularly read the Web site. We gave some examples yesterday and more parts are coming which shed light on:

Answering SCO Bit by Bit - Caldera's GPL Fingerprints All Over the Place

Remember when SCO said it never released any of its own code under the GPL? Methinks it spoke with forked tongue.

I have now had an opportunity to look at files in another Caldera Linux distribution, Caldera OpenLinux 2.3-16, and I see Caldera's GPL fingerprints all over the place, much as I discovered using emacs to open up source files in OpenLinux eServer 2.3 the other day. And Caldera did write code itself that it released under the GPL. It also tweaked GPL'd packages and distributed with its own branding under the GPL. And it can't seem to stop distributing binutils under the GPL, while claiming in the SCO v. IBM lawsuit that it never did so.

[...]

On page 23 of this PowerPoint from SCOforum 2007 about open source tools SCO provided, you will see that SCO recommended installing "GNU binutils" with OpenServer 6. And on page 26, they listed all the places you could get Skunkware. On page 30, they suggested getting source code from the Linux source RPMs, so as to get the latest patches. And on page 37, it says that in 2001, SCO "submitted UW7 changes to FSF to standardize SVR5 triplet."

In case SCO doesn't have any techies left, here's a big hint for them. Binutils includes ELF, one of the things SCO's expert Dr. Thomas Cargill, claims is infringed. And here's where they were still distributing it, in 2006, and here and here. All distributed under the GPL. I wonder if, at trial, Novell will ask SCO's technical witnesses about this. Did Ron Record, Caldera/SCO's Skunkworks maintainer, ever warn them that they were distributing binutils under the GPL, and that ELF was in there? Did anybody? If not, I'm sure IBM will, when it gets its turn at bat.


Answering SCO Bit by Bit - more a.out.h and errno.h and elf.h, this time in OpenLinux 1.3

Groklaw member valerio checked the contents of Caldera Systems OpenLinux 1.3, a CD from 1998, and you'll never guess what he found. Yes, friends, the CD contains, in the archive file col/install/RPMS/linux-kernel-include-2.0.35-1.i386.rpm, two files SCO claims are infringing if placed in Linux:
/include/linux/a.out.h

and

/ include/asm-i386/errno.h
This is the second time we've caught SCO/Caldera distributing these two files in a Caldera distribution under the GPL, despite its claim that it never authorized them to be in Linux or under the GPL. The first was copyrighted 2000, two years before this instance valerio found. What? Inadvertent twice? As you will see, they put the files there themselves. In Linux. Under the GPL. And now they want to sue people using Linux because they are in there.


Groklaw's coverage of SCO is still a lot more accurate than that of the mainstream press, which increasingly relies on Groklaw for input (documents, analysis, and other information). Today's journalists are naturally sloppy/lazy [1, 2] because news moves faster and they cut corners when investigating, if they investigate at all. Unless that changes, press releases from companies will resemble the subsequent coverage, which is recipe for disaster because PR lies [1, 2, 3]. That's its goal and there are very recent examples. The previous post says a lot more about it because stories are a lot simpler than people are led to believe (complexity discourages exploration and proper investigation).

"...Microsoft wished to promote SCO and its pending lawsuit against IBM and the Linux operating system. But Microsoft did not want to be seen as attacking IBM or Linux."

--Larry Goldfarb, Baystar, key investor in SCO

Recent Techrights' Posts

Extortion is a Crime, Even If You're Based in Another Continent and Work for Microsoft
reported to British authorities
 
Slopwatch: LinuxTechLab, Planet Ubuntu, Anti-Linux FUD, and Microsoft SPAM
It's not easy to altogether avoid take articles these days
Gemini Links 06/06/2025: "MBA Tear" and Slop ('AI') as Plagiarism
Links for the day
Links 06/06/2025: "Convicted Felon and MElon Trade Insults" and Europe Snubbed by US Again
Links for the day
Links 06/06/2025: Microsoft XBox Bracing For More Mass Layoffs, Climate Disaster, Fake 'Money' Tokens From US President
Links for the day
Gemini Links 06/06/2025: Vanishing Cultures and MElon Implosion
Links for the day
We're in 6/6 Now, Almost Halfway in 2025
2025 was probably the best year for us
South Americans Are Saying Goodbye to Microsoft
We're hardly even "Cherry-Picking" or conveniently singling out one South American nation
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part III: Data Protection Failures, Just Like at the European Patent Office (EPO)
Just less than a decade ago we showed that the EPO had illegally shared staff data with third parties
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, June 05, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, June 05, 2025
Pushing Microsoft's Proprietary Trash/Trap as "Open" and "Linux" (Windows is 'Linux' Now?)
Maybe it's time to just stop saying "FOSS". The people who use that term are promoting Microsoft.
Slopwatch: Comparing Linux to Vermin, Attacking BSD With LLM Slop, and Helping Microsoft Demonise Linux/OpenBSD/SSH Over Weak User Passwords
Microsoft must be laughing its arse off, seeing how a bunch of Serial Sloppers (no skills, no comprehension, no integrity, no creativity) and slopfarms use Microsoft LLM to flood the Web with anti-Linux FUD
Links 05/06/2025: US Poised for Another $2.4 Trillion to Debt, Cops Want GAFAM Kill Switches
Links for the day
Links 05/06/2025: First US Spacewalk 60 Years Ago, GNU Octave 10.2.0 is Out
Links for the day
Scandinavia Saying Goodbye to Microsoft
The Danes have had enough of Microsoft
GNU/Linux Measured at 6% in Bangladesh, According to statCounter
Windows isn't growing, it's going away
Nat Friedman Had Left Microsoft GitHub Exactly One Week Before Matthew Garrett Sent His First SLAPP (Which Was an Empty Threat, He Was Abusing the Legal System of Another Continent to Terrorise Critics Who Had Just Unearthed Major Microsoft Scandals)
And it was likely talked about by his lawyers around the exact same time Nat Friedman was packing up
Gemini Links 05/06/2025: Loop Earplugs Review and ANS Forth
Links for the day
Armenian Adoption of GNU/Linux
Russian influence in Armenian must be worrying to Microsoft
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part II: Turning a Once-Respected Patent Office Into a Circus and Laughing Stock
It's not legal, but administrators who don't care about the law and don't fear the law would just go ahead and turn things to junk
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, June 04, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, June 04, 2025
Slopwatch: Mindless Slop Pieces, Fake Images and Text, Linux FUD on the Cheap
spewed out by Microsoft-controlled LLMs
Links 04/06/2025: Workers' Strikes, Sudan Exodus
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: Linux Foundation PR Spam and Lee Jae-myung Wins Election
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Future Leaders of the World and Platforming Jordan Peterson
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: WSL Backfiring on Microsoft and "Disney, Microsoft Announce Massive Layoffs"
Links for the day
Our Case is a Very Easy Win, the SLAPPs From Microsofters Were a Grave Error, and Censoring Information Won't Work (It'll Only Ever Backfire)
Censoring is what people do when they lose the argument
Say the Truth, the Rest Will Follow
There's no guarantee that writing the truth will result in an audience (or readership), but over time - in the long run - people generally gravitate towards what they know or feel to be crude truth, not just what's comforting (albeit false or self-deluding, usually groupthink dictated from above)
How to Expose High-Level Corruption Without Getting in (Too Much) Trouble
Democracy depends on free press and freedom of the press depends on being able to safely publish (and keep available) material that bad people don't want to be known to anybody
In-Depth EPO Coverage at Techrights Turns Eleven
11 years is a very long time
Windows Measured Below 10% in Afghanistan, GNU/Linux Gaining a Lot
about 80% are Android (Linux) users, compared to only about 10% for Windows
Poland's Political Predicament and Social Control Media
Democracy and fake "tech" don't mix well; the latter tends to interfere with the former and that's why we get more "Putins" out there
EPO: Taking Away From the Staff to Give More to the Rich
The Central Staff Committee (CSC) wrote to EPO staff earlier this week
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, June 03, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, June 03, 2025
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part I: It's a Lot Like the EPO
we can commence a series soon
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Inescapable Questions and Quitting All "Oligarch Tech"
Links for the day