There is also this: http://us1.samba.org/samba/ms_license.html "Some people have incorrectly assumed that Samba must implement the methods described in these patents. In fact, the methods described in these patents are quite inappropriate for a Unix/POSIX CIFS implementation such as Samba. It would not even be possible to implement the methods described in these patents in a portable POSIX application. Instead, Samba treats the SMBreadbraw and SMBwritebraw protocol elements in the same way as all other elements of the CIFS/SMB protocol. This means that as far as we are aware Samba is completely unaffected by the existence of these patents." "We would like to also point out that these patents cover an obsolete section of the CIFS/SMB protocol that Microsoft themselves have abandoned in their own products long ago. Microsoft abandoned these "raw" protocol operations in CIFS because their basic design is fatally flawed. " -----Original Message----- From: tclug-list-bounces at mn-linux.org [mailto:tclug-list-bounces at mn-linux.org]On Behalf Of Chad Walstrom Sent: Monday, March 27, 2006 12:34 PM To: tclug-list at mn-linux.org; T.J." Duchéne Subject: Re: [tclug-list] 2. our new CFO challenging my FOS advocacy (gregwm) TJ wrote: > Now that software patents are wholesale in the industry, it makes > this even more unlikely. Microsoft patented their CIFS protocol, aka > "file-sharing" in Windows, then licensed to everyone as an open > standard - BUT deliberately said you CANNOT use it for GPL or other > similar "share-alike" licenses. You can look it up, if you don't > believe me. To do so is a legal liability here in the US. I don't have the time to do the research to validate this statement. I'm interested in the links that you could provide to support it. -- Chad Walstrom <chewie at wookimus.net> http://www.wookimus.net/ assert(expired(knowledge)); /* core dump */ _______________________________________________ TCLUG Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota tclug-list at mn-linux.org http://mailman.mn-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list