| So what took SCO so long? |
Jan. 06, 2006
The SCO Group is now trying to make more charges stick in its case against Novell. The only real question about this move is... what took them so long? Apparently they only just realized that (gasp!) Novell sells Linux (another gasp!).
I mean, come on, Novell selling Linux. Who knew??
Indeed, SCO threatened to sue Novell back when the word first came out that the venerable networking operating system company was trying to buy SUSE. Nothing came of it, but that was just the calm before the storm.
Later, Novell registered the copyrights to Unix, which are at the heart of SCO's case against IBM.
Novell has insisted that when it sold Unix in 1995 to the Santa Cruz Operation, the ancestor to today's SCO Group, that the deal did not include Unix's IP (intellectual property) rights. SCO, unamused, sued Novell, claiming that it, and not Novell, was the rightful owner of Unix's IP.
Personally, if I had bought an operating system, lock, stock, and barrel, I would have wanted to get the IP rights at the same time.
In fact, I suspect that the Santa Cruz Operation really thought it had bought Unix's IP. But, because of how the contract and its amendments were written, and the fact that the case is in federal court, it looks to me, and a lot of other people, that Novell legally still does own the Unix copyrights.
We'll have to wait and see, but if I were a betting man, I'd put money down on Novell winning the IP side of the case.
Recently, SCO has decided to try to broaden the case with four new claims. These amount to:
"Stop! That's our Unix in your Linux. Take your hands off the keyboard, and turn around slowly!"
Now part of what SCO is trying to do makes good sense. In the "Alternative Breach of Contract Claim Seeking Specific Performance" section, they say, as I understand it: OK, maybe all the documents didn't spell out that the old SCO meant to buy the IP too, but come on, any reasonable person would assume that was the case.
That might fly.
But, as for the rest -- which amounts to "You can't use Unix in SUSE Linux!" -- what can I say but this: Guys, where do you think you get SLES (SUSE Enterprise Linux Server) 9?
Well, its most direct ancestor was SUSE 8, which was based on -- drum roll please -- UnitedLinux. Which was -- say it with me, kids -- a distribution made by SUSE, Conectiva, Turbolinux -- and SCO!
Oh the humanity!
One of the things I find fascinating about the SCO cases is how they always keep coming back to their roots.
Try as it might, SCO can't avoid the simple fact that it used to be a Linux company and that before turning to the dark side of the force it was trying to bring Unix goodness into Linux itself.
Oh well, be that as it may, we can only look forward to more months (years!) of courtroom drama as the SCO vs. the Linux universe cases slowly trudge forward.
--Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
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