IBM seeks knockout blow in SCO case Legals experts see confidence in latest IBM filings

InfoWorld ^ | March 30, 2004 | Robert McMillan, IDG News Service

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

A recent court filing from IBM Corp. appears to indicate a growing confidence on the part of the Armonk, New York, computing giant that it will prevail in its legal dispute with The SCO Group Inc., according to lawyers following the case.

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In an amended counterclaim to SCO's lawsuit that was filed Friday, IBM asked the District Court for the District of Utah to enter a declaratory judgement in its favor. IBM asked the court to rule that it has not infringed on SCO's copyright and has not breached its contractual obligations to SCO. The filing further asks the court to rule that SCO, which was at one time a Linux vendor, cannot impose restrictions on the software that it previously distributed under Linux's open-source software license.

By seeking a declaratory judgement, which a judge could issue as soon as the discovery process is over and before the case goes to trial, IBM appears to be indicating that has conducted an internal analysis of SCO's claims and has found them to be without merit, said Jeff Norman, an intellectual property partner with the Chicago law firm Kirkland Ellis LLP.

"It just means that they didn't find any smoking gun. If they had found something really bad, they probably would have gone to SCO and talked settlement," Norman said.

It would be typical in a case like this for IBM to undergo an internal investigation to determine whether or not any of SCO's claims were true, Norman said. Such an investigation would involve interviewing and reviewing e-mail and code contributions from IBM's Linux programmers, he added.

IBM has over 7,500 employees involved in various aspects of its Linux efforts, including more than 600 developers who work in the company's Linux Technology Center.

Jeffrey Neuberger, a partner with Brown Raysman Millstein Felder & Steiner LLP, agreed that the filing appears to show growing confidence on the part of IBM. "They're saying to the judge, 'We don't know what SCO is talking about; there is no infringement,'" he said. "They must feel very comfortable that there's no infringement."

Because IBM's filing seeks the broad judgement that IBM has not infringed on "any valid or enforceable copyright owned by SCO," a declaratory judgement in its favor would prevent SCO from bringing up new copyright claims later in the trial, and would have a devastating impact on SCO's case, Neuberger said.

"If the judge comes out and says there is no copyright infringement, then essentially there is nothing else to fight over. It would be the knockout blow to SCO's case," he said.

Representatives from IBM and SCO declined to comment on Friday's court filing.

SCO sued IBM in March 2003 claiming that it had violated SCO's Unix license, which was originally granted by AT&T Corp. but later transferred to SCO, and that it had illegally contributed source code to Linux. In February this year, SCO amended its complaint to include charges that IBM had violated its Unix copyrights. The Lindon, Utah, company is seeking US$5 billion in damages in the case.

SCO claims that Linux users do not have the right to use the Linux operating system without a license from SCO because Linux violates its Unix copyrights.

"SCO's threats and its claims against IBM and other Linux users are meritless, and are simply part and parcel of SCO's illicit scheme to get Linux users to pay SCO for unneeded licenses to Linux," IBM said in its filing.

How much longer IBM and SCO will continue with the discovery stage of the case remains unclear. In a complicated case, the discovery process can last for years, Neuberger said.

[First_Salute]

If only Peachtree and Axys would run on Linux or Mac, we would dump Microsoft in a flash; overnight.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

fyi

[bobo1]

Micro$oft will allow SCO to hang out and dry.

Blessings, Bobo

[adam_az]

Expect Peachtree to work 100% soon... it already runs under WINE but with some problems.

http://appdb.winehq.org/appview.php?appId=201&versionId=327

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

What are those two packages?

[Zeroisanumber]

See Big Blue.

See Big Blue school the punks.

School, big Blue, school.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Description
Peachtree Complete® Accounting includes
the robust, network-ready accounting
features you want, and helps provide
the valuable insight you need. Better
manage your accounting and business
with such advanced features as job costing,
time and billing, the Financial Manager,
and more! Peachtree Complete helps you
get the insight behind your numbers.


That answers half of my question, thanks.

[adam_az]

Um, try scrolling down

Peachtree Complete 8.0
by tofnron on Tuesday January 15th 2002, 17:41

The program will run under wine. With a few issues; slow to load, more than a minute; the background overlays the forms; the cursor becomes transparent over the active form. These "features may have to do with Peachw.exe tight intergration with MSIE, but that's as much help as I can give right now. One other thing to use peachw over a network you must have a samba share that looks like the window share. Any other users out there.

[post new] [reply to this]




RE: Peachtree Complete 8.0
by Anonymous on Wednesday May 1st 2002, 23:27

Working on it. I'll let you know in a couple of weeks.

[post new] [reply to this]




any help yet?
by Anonymous on Wednesday October 30th 2002, 9:49

Could really use this!!

Thanks
Garret
Ruffdogs

[post new] [reply to this]




Peachtree Printing
by Anonymous on Sunday December 8th 2002, 21:39

I have Peachtree 7.0 working under Wine on Gentoo. I ahve some
similar problems to above with disappearing icons, and buttons,
but I can get by with a repaint.

What I really need is printing. Im too new to wine to know what
the fsck I am doing, and I really don't like cups because I don't
understand how it works yet. Its too funky, but i'll force myself
to learn it if lprng wont cut it. What I really want/need is simply
to output the invoices/forms to a postscript file. I don't need to print
it. But my print setup is not working:

Under [wine]
"Printer" = "on"

... later in spooler ...
[spooler]
"FILE:" = "tmp.ps"
"LPT1:" = "wine.ps"
"LPT2:" = "|gs -sDEVICE=bj200 -sOutputFile=/tmp/fred -q -"
"LPT3:" = "/dev/lp3"

[ports]
;"read" = "0x779,0x379,0x280-0x2a0"
;"write" = "0x779,0x379,0x280-0x2a0"


Ok, so what next? Please let me know at jax@fortuitous.com

Thanks...

I'll move to Peachtree 8.0 if you think its supported better.

Also, what is better for emulation, NT4.0 or win98 ? win95?

I'm using win95 for the filesystem emulation.

Thanks,

-pc

[First_Salute]

Axys is a portfolio management document processor.

After you have collected all kinds of information about your investments, and you need to put that into a report, use Axys.

Well, some folks use Excel and hire VBA/macro writers to polish several workbooks into one.

We use Axys.

I'd like to, or I expect that someday we will be able to, use OpenOffice, but that app. has yet to have a reasonable macro language for business.

Linux would be great, if it really were practical as a workstation for the office. It's closer, and closer, but not yet.

Do you know how much of a "special op" IBM might have, along that line of encouraging software makers to make their software --- the real software that businesses use --- over to the Linux box?

[First_Salute]

A problem with using Linux, has been that Linux developers have tended to expect business to accept the "hammer and tong" methods of Linux setup.

Such beating around the bushes to make a multitude of Linxu features work, is both cost-prohibitive and a "big waste of time."

Red Hat Linux 9.x was the first Linux "level" of OS that has, what you might say, "arrived."

Yet basic business applications are unavailable.

When OpenOffice has a reliable, refined macro language --- documented in print, books available, etc. --- then we will see a lot more interest in actually paying for setting up Linux in the office.

Otherwise, Linux is handy as a file server, for which, in our case, we are grateful. In addition, it is handy as a rescue scheme for retrieving data from Windows OS hard drive disks that are in trouble.

But as a machine tool with which to administer and produce, Linux has yet to offer something.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Do you know how much of a "special op" IBM might have,

NO!

But IBM does understand Business Applications.

[Salo]

Thanks - if you hit Groklaw today it sure likes like the Nazgul are in their element. SCO is in trouble: their fraudulent case is a dead-bang loser and it looks like IBM may be calling in the SEC.

[Bush2000]

it looks like IBM may be calling in the SEC.

Why? Is IBM going to plead guilty? http://www.nwfusion.com/news/2004/0109secprobi.html

[Bush2000]

Oh, wait. Which SEC investigation? IBM is also being investigated by the SEC for its dealings in Korea:

http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3295961

[Bush2000]

IBM seeks knockout blow in SCO case Legals experts see confidence in latest IBM filings

IBM files motion. World yawns.

[D-fendr]

Hopefully, this circus of changing claims is coming to an end:

In February this year, SCO amended its complaint to include charges that IBM had violated its Unix copyrights.

July 25, 2003:

MozillaQuest Magazine: Does SCO have registered copyrights for JFS, NUMA, and RCU?

Blake Stowell: No we don't, but this is not a copyright case. This is a contracts case. We have taken IBM to court because they are in breach of contract.

MozillaQuest Magazine: If so, is that the same JFS, NUMA, and RCU code that is in the Linux kernel?

Blake Stowell: I can't give you the exact location, but yes, it is in Linux.

MozillaQuest Magazine: Does SCO have registered copyrights for the Unix extensions developed by IBM?

Blake Stowell: No, IBM has those copyrights, but this is not about copyrights. It is about the breaking of a contract.

MozillaQuest Magazine: If not, does SCO claim that it is entitled to register copyrights for the Unix extensions developed by IBM?

Blake Stowell: SCO will not register those because they do not belong to SCO. They belong to IBM.

link

[Salo]

Unlike the MS Toadies, SCO - not you, IBM can afford to pay any SEC fines. If you go to Groklaw and read the latest, you'll see several references to SCO being a pump-and-dump stock scam in IBM's filings. It looks like SCO/MS is going to lose the case. Linux and the GPL will survive. Sorry.

Why? Is IBM going to plead guilty?

[Glenn]

Oh, wait. Which SEC investigation? IBM is also being investigated by the SEC for its dealings in Korea:

Hurts, huh? Your one man war on anything but Microsoft has turned you into this fickle, ear spittingly shrill lapdog. Who will you bleat about once this facade is torn down?

[TechJunkYard]

SEC investigates IBM. Investors yawn.

Meanwhile....