OT: Two ways Microsoft sabotages Linux desktop adoption

[Henry Hartley]

On Wed, Feb 15, 2006 1:01 PM Ralf Corsepius said:
>> On Wed, 2006-02-15 at 12:16 -0500, Henry Hartley wrote:
>> > On Wed, Feb 15, 2006 11:35 AM Ralf Corsepius said:
>> > >> Here we go: http://www.jbb.de/html/?page=news&id=32
>> > 
>> > The defendant in the case was in trouble for distributing
>> > object code without making available the source code to
>> > netfilter/iptables and for failing to properly attribute that
>> > code.  It has nothing whatsoever, as far as I can see, to do
>> > with his own code.
>> 
>> Well, the court had to decide on "if the defendant was legitimated
>> to use the GPL'ed code in their product". The court decided "no"
>> and disallowed them to to sell their product without making their
>> sources available to the public.

Note: My German is a bit rusty so I read the English translation
provided.  There was NOTHING in that document about the defendant being
required to make "THEIR sources available to the public" (emphasis
added).  The problem, according to the court, was that the defendant
redistributed GPL'd code without including the source of that GPL'd
code.  Furthermore, the court decision had nothing to do with their USE
of GPL'd code.  It rested on their redistribution of said code in a
manner not in compliance with the GPL.

>> AFAIK, the defendant withdrew his product from the German market.

That's their right and is a business decision.  As far as I can tell,
including a copy of the GPL license and source code for
netfilter/iptables would have satisfied the court and brought them into
compliance with the GPL.  

Nothing to see here.  Please move along.

-- 
Henry