MESSAGE
| DATE | 2003-09-12 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
|
| SUBJECT | Subject: [hangout] The Unix Error
|
Rajeev Srinivasan
Linux, Threatened
September 12, 2003
There is a terrific war
going on in the computer
industry today, which
has long-term
implications for giants
in the industry,
especially IBM and
Microsoft. It is
instructive to those in
India who blindly
worship Microsoft,
whereas the Linux
direction is especially
appealing for a
developing country, in
particular one that has
the technical
wherewithal to use open
source software.
Fortunately, there is
the Free Software
Foundation of India
http://fsf.org.in:
appropriately enough for
a radical egalitarian
idea, it is located in
Kerala!
It is clear that there
is tremendous momentum
behind the open source
software community, as
exemplified by Linux,
GNU, Apache, Mozilla and
other popular
applications, for which
the original program, or
source code, is
available free of charge
to all users. This is
totally contrary to the
proprietary software
approach of many
vendors, notably
Microsoft, which guard
their source code most
zealously.
The success of open
source has been due
primarily to the fact
that a large number of
expert programmers all
over the world
contribute their work
for free, in the spirit
of co-operation and
community. Their work is
shared by the 'copyleft'
concept, whereby the
improvements made by
anybody can be used by
anybody else, but in
turn, their innovations
have to be made
available to everyone
else as well.
Astonishingly, this
chaos works. A
perceptive essay by Eric
Raymond called The
Cathedral and the Bazaar
is a good introduction
to the rationale and the
practices of the open
source movement. The end
result is that Linux,
the best-known example,
has now become a
legitimate threat to
other operating systems,
especially Microsoft's
Windows.
An operating system is
the master controller
program that runs on a
computer: it is in
effect the guts of the
system, and is therefore
a critical piece of
software.
To talk about Linux, we
need to look at the AT&T
Bell Labs operating
system Unix, which was
invented in 1969 by
Dennis Ritchie and Ken
Thompson and described
in a landmark paper in
the Bell System
Technical Journal in
1974 or so in an article
entitled 'The Unix Time
Sharing System.'
It was a revolutionary
operating system, one
that was created
essentially by just two
people in one year,
Ritchie and Thompson,
whereas conventional
OS's, such as IBM's
operating systems for
mainframes, were written
by teams of hundreds of
people toiling for
years. And Unix worked
better than anything
else in the market, and
had the sterling
distinction of being
written in C, an easily
understood language, as
compared to the arcane
assembly language (much
easier for machines to
understand than for
humans) which other
operating systems used.
As Unix was easily
understood, and because
AT&T made its
source-code available
free of charge to
universities (not
because of any altruism,
but because as a
regulated monopoly at
the time, they were not
allowed to profit
commercially from the
inventions of Bell
Labs), Unix became the
basis of a most of the
interesting work in
operating systems around
the world. The work done
at the University of
California, Berkeley,
was especially
important, resulting in
the BSD stream of Unix
versions.
Linus Torvalds, a
Finnish student, set out
to rewrite the 'kernel'
or the core of the Unix
system, himself, so that
it would be free of any
licenses to AT&T.
Richard Stallman and
associates at the Free
Software Foundation
(creator of the concept
of 'copyleft') and the
GNU Project ('Gnu's Not
Unix') had already
written most of the rest
of the operating system
in AT&T-free code.
Together, their efforts
have resulted in what is
currently referred to as
Linux, which should
properly be called
GNU-Linux.
An army of volunteer
programmers around the
world contributes to the
Linux effort by picking
up and improving various
components and then
offering their versions
back to a central
repository, controlled
loosely by a few
'wizards.' The only
remuneration the
programmers get is
through the recognition
of their peers that they
are 'alpha programmers:'
all they get is bragging
rights if their code is
accepted.
Now fast forward a few
years. Microsoft is
feeling the heat from
Linux, as the free
operating system is
improving by leaps and
bounds. Unix itself,
which could, at one
time, have stopped the
Microsoft juggernaut in
its tracks, was doomed
by a schism in the
ranks, which pitted Sun
Microsystems and AT&T
against IBM, DEC, HP,
etc. I was in the thick
of that battle, and I
now see we were
irresponsible to fight
internecine battles,
trying to push our own
versions of Unix, while
Microsoft ran away with
the prize: control over
the desktop, and the
untold billions that
comes with it.
But Linux, free from the
institutional greed that
killed Unix's chances,
has thrived. And it has
found some strong
backers, such as IBM. To
a lesser extent, HP,
Dell, and so forth, have
also jumped on the Linux
bandwagon, because they
all recognize that
Microsoft has been
skimming away most of
the profits through its
monopoly on the
operating system.
The net result is that
today one can buy a
Linux-based PC for far
less money than a
Microsoft Windows-based
PC. It will, it is
pretty much guaranteed,
work much better, and be
less resource hungry:
you don't have to throw
away your computer every
couple of years just
because Microsoft's new
OS is a resource hog.
Linux, with its
compelling advantages,
has put the brakes on
Microsoft's attempts to
dominate the server
market as much as it
dominates the desktop
market. It is much more
robust, it costs
essentially nothing; if
problems are found, the
army of Linux
enthusiasts will fix
them practically
overnight; and because
of its Unix foundations,
it is far more suited to
complex networks than
Windows, which had its
origins in a throw-away
system called QDOS,
Quick and Dirty
Operating System!
In addition, Linux is
making waves in the
world of consumer
electronics: see the
article 'Linux Set to
Break Through in
Consumer Electronics' in
the New York Times,
August 29, 2003. Sony,
Matsushita, Philips and
other majors in the
world of TVs, phones,
DVD players and set-top
boxes find Linux's
flexibility and low cost
irresistible, not to
mention the prospect of
not having to pay
Microsoft a 'tax.'
Furthermore, as home
networks proliferate,
the consumer will want
to have the electronic
devices interact
seamlessly with PCs, and
here Linux's facility
with networking will be
helpful.
Can nothing stop Linux
then? Well, there are
some people trying to
stop do just that. I
used to work at AT&T
Bell Labs' Unix
development group: this
was later sold off to
Novell, then to the
Santa Cruz Operation,
and finally to Caldera,
which renamed itself
SCO. Therefore Caldera
has the original Bell
Labs Unix source code
and the intellectual
property associated with
it.
Caldera, a small and
relatively unsuccessful
software maker from
Utah, has become the
dark horse in the Linux
sweepstakes. Caldera
apparently decided that
its assets, that is the
intellectual property
associated with Unix
source code, were being
violated by Linux users
because Linux developers
had 'stolen' Unix code.
Caldera went ahead and
sued IBM in March for $3
billion. In June, they
further sent out a
letter to 1,500
corporate users of Linux
suggesting that they
would be freed of legal
problems if they bought
licenses from Caldera
for every copy of Linux
they used. I think the
price was a
mouth-watering $699 a
copy, but I could be
mistaken.
The reaction from the
developer community was
predictable: they argued
that Caldera's action
was without merit, and
that it was motivated
primarily by greed. The
original thinking was
that Caldera was
probably angling for a
buyout by IBM, which
would make sense from
the giant's point of
view: this is an
annoying little
distraction. For a
comprehensive response
from Eric Raymond, see
the 'OSI Position Paper
on the the SCO-vs.-IBM
Complaint'
http://www.opensource.org/sco-vs-ibm.html
In the middle of all
this, there was
additional high drama.
Microsoft with a great
show of probity, paid
Caldera for a license
which it didn't need.
This did not surprise
observers, who believed
all along that Microsoft
may be secretly funding
SCO: for any FUD (Fear,
Uncertainty and Doubt)
about Linux would only
help Microsoft push
Windows. Microsoft is
not averse to using all
sorts of nasty
maneuvers: for example
see its interactions
with a small company,
Blast.com, according to
columnist Robert X.
Cringely in 'Stupid
Microsoft Tricks: Why
the Richest Company on
Earth Feels it Needs to
Cheat'http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20030828.html
Interestingly, IBM has
counter-sued SCO, and
some of the claims
include allegations that
their code has been used
in SCO's own offering of
Linux (oh yes, I forgot
to mention that SCO had
a rather unsuccessful
Linux offering in the
market) and that, in any
case, SCO was in
violation of the GPL (or
'copyleft'). IBM has
also said that it bought
a permanent,
non-revocable license
from AT&T in the old
days, which should
suffice.
IBM also claims that SCO
has so far not
demonstrated any of the
code that it claims has
been illegally used by
Linux, and that
therefore it is hard to
take them seriously. I
can understand SCO's
dilemma, though:
assuming there is merit
to what they are saying,
as soon as they display
the alleged violating
code, the Linux folks
will immediately rewrite
it as SCO-free code,
thus nullifying SCO's
case!
In the meantime, Novell,
an interim owner of Unix
copyright, has said that
SCO owns neither the
patents nor the
copyright associated
with Unix; the
implication is that the
SCO suit has no leg to
stand on.
Furthermore, in a
previous instance where
AT&T and Novell went to
court against Cal,
Berkeley regarding BSD
source code, the result
was in favor of the
university, since it was
fairly apparent that
significant added value
had been created by the
researchers over the
value of the original
source code.
It is probably a fair
assumption that the
original Bell Labs code
is by now relatively
obsolete, and that a lot
new innovation has been
added by the free
software people.
Therefore, it is
probable that if this
comes to a court
hearing, SCO will lose.
But in the meantime, if
enough people have been
terrified into a
wait-and-see attitude on
Linux, or into
continuing with Windows,
that may be a serious
blow to the open source
movement.
How ironic that IBM,
which originally created
the strategy of using
FUD as a sales tool, is
now being victimized by
it! The IBM of today, of
course, is not the Darth
Vader of computing that
it used to be. (The
dubious distinction must
belong to Microsoft
these days.) If through
its buccaneer tactics,
Caldera (and possibly
lurking in the
background, Microsoft)
succeeds in damaging the
momentum behind Linux,
that would be a great
shame indeed.
Comments are welcome at
rajeevs-at-rediff.co.in
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Rajeev Srinivasan
--
Ruben Safir
NYLXS
____________________________
NYLXS: New Yorker Free Software Users Scene
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