[svlug] Network Appliance sues open source project ZFS. Sun defends.

[Warren Turkal]

While I hate to be a buzzkill, why are you posting about something
that happened in October of last year?

wt

On Mon, Mar 10, 2008 at 9:56 AM, Debian Intermediate <jj1234ff at lycos.com> wrote:
> Network Appliance sues open source project ZFS. Sun defends.
>
> http://ianmurdock.com/
> ARTICLE: Fighting the good fight
> October 25th, 2007
> Ian Murdock, founder of Debian operating system (and
> now working on open sourcing Solaris at Sun), says "Bravo."
> to Suns fighting to open up features such as snapshots, etc
> that Network Appliance is sueing about.
>
> Timeline:
> 1. Sun licenses NFS to Network Appliance.
> 2. Net Appliance gets some patents regarding snapshots and
> other filesystem tricks that are in hardware patents and/or software
> patents.
> 3. Sun open sources ZFS, and advanced filesystem software.
> 4. Net App sues ZFS project.
> 5. Sun tries to negotiate with Net App to drop lawsuit,
> but Net App wants Sun to remove ZFS project.
> 6. Sun counter-sues on NFS license agreement and agrees to
> share half the proceeds with open source projects if it wins.
>
> I would assume that Net App will also sue other open source projects
> that have snapshots, etc for patent infringment
>
> So Sun is helping get rid of patents and funding open source.
> Sun = good, friendly company, in my opinion.
> Net App = bad company for open source community.
>
> http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/entry/harvesting_from_a_troll say:
> Sun says: "Second, Sun protects the communities using our technologies under
> free software
> licenses. As an example, Apple is including ZFS is in their upcoming
> "Leopard"
> OS X release. This is happening without any payment to Sun (that's how truly
> free software works). Under the license, we've waived all rights to sue them
> for any of the patents or copyright associated with ZFS. We've let Apple
> know
> we will use our patent portfolio to protect them and the Mac ZFS community
> from Net App. With or without a commercial relationship to Sun.
>
> That's true for any licensee - in fact, Net App could adopt ZFS today and
> receive the same protection."
>
>
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