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Microsoft Offers Linux-Interoperability Software For Free | |
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| Time: 15:05 EST/20:05 GMT | News Source: InformationWeek | Posted By: Byron Hinson | ||
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Microsoft has decided to drop the $99 licensing fee previously required for its Services For Unix software and plans to make a new version of the interoperability product available this week at no cost on its Web site. Services For Unix is a subsystem of Unix APIs and development and administration tools intended to help businesses migrate Unix or Linux applications to Windows computers or create heterogeneous environments where the operating systems coexist. SFU version 3.5, to be available Thursday, will come with performance improvements and new features that make it better at both of those functions, yet Microsoft officials say the price change represents a strategy shift that's equally important. | ||
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| #1 By 3339 (64.160.58.135) at 1/13/2004 7:18:22 PM |
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parker, Microsoft was never paying SCO royalties for SFU...
so why would they have to now? |
| #2 By 3339 (64.160.58.135) at 1/13/2004 8:54:07 PM |
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No we don't actually.
SFU has been available for a few years now. Most of its functionality comes from the POSIX compatibility layer and the rest comes from Softway a company that MS purchased in '99. Over the last few years, MS has not paid SCO for Unix licenses related to SFU, and conversely, SCO has shown no revenue from the licensing of Unix in SFU. Yes, MS is a licensee, but for what reason, no one knows. |
| #3 By 1845 (67.161.212.73) at 1/13/2004 9:50:31 PM |
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Not sure about royalties, but it seems they were paying license fees.
"Late Sunday, Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith said acquiring the license from SCO 'is representative of Microsoft's ongoing commitment to respecting intellectual property and the IT community's healthy exchange of IP through licensing. This helps to ensure IP compliance across Microsoft solutions and supports our efforts around existing products like services for Unix that further Unix interoperability.' The pact was first reported by the Wall Street Journal." http://news.com.com/2100-1016-1007528.html |
| #4 By 3339 (64.160.58.135) at 1/13/2004 10:02:48 PM |
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...which I fully acknowledged, but they licensed SysV in May, 2003. Windows first shipped SFU as Interix (2.2 was released in Feb 2000 for Win2000 (from the purchase of Softway circa 99) and possibly even earlier) and subsequently renamed it SFU 2.0 later that year (April).
Microsoft has never provided SCO or any other Unix copyright or patent owner any royalties as a result of SFU (or Interix). |
| #5 By 1845 (67.161.212.73) at 1/14/2004 1:24:27 AM |
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Mr. Halcyon, I'm glad to see that you know more than Brad Smith, Microsoft's general counsel.
SCO IP, quite obviously, is UNIX IP, and, as such, deals with variants of UNIX (and bastardized variants like Linux). It is for this reason that both Sun (for Solaris) and IBM for (AIX) have had agreements with SCO. The breach of the agreement with IBM of IP for AIX is where the lawsuit came from. As for Cygwin...not a clue. I don't use Cygwin or SFU and have never read how well one compares to the other. |
| #6 By 1845 (67.161.212.73) at 1/14/2004 5:49:18 AM |
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Halcyon, Microsoft charges $299 for Windows XP Pro. It also charges $79 for it. It owns alll the rights and can charge whatever it desires, in whatever amounts it desires, to whomever it desires. If it charges less for students, that's OK. Less for OEMs, that's OK.
SCO can do the same thing with its property. It can charge a company a huge flat rate and let all licensees of that company not pay additional fees. It can forgo that route, not charging the company, but charge all the licensees. It owns the property and can determine as few or as many licenses as it sees fit. More than likely, SCO, for whatever prices Microsoft has paid, has given Microsoft the right to of royalty free distribution of the SCO IP in SFU. As far as what parts of SFU are included in SCO's IP, I really couldn't say. I trust, though, that when Brad Smith says that parts of SFU rely on SCO's IP that it is true. Like I said, I've never used SFU and don't know too much about it. Even at that, though, SCO owns rights to parts (if not all?) of System V. SFU is based on System V. It's not a huge logical leap to guess that SFU has components to which SCO owns the rights. More specific than that, I have no guesses. |
| #7 By 19992 (164.214.4.61) at 1/14/2004 8:23:19 AM |
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#16
MS can certainly do what it wants in regards to pricing of it's software, however, no one is sure if SCO is allowed to do what they want with their property at this point in time. Novell is currently claiming that SCO was required to obtain approval for the agreements that they (SCO) entered into with MS and Sun. Novell is also claiming ownership of the SVR4 copyrights and has claimed that SCO is required to pay Novell a 95% royalty fee from any license agreement stemming from SVR4. The copyright issue may be a load of garbage, but the idea that SCO is required to obtain approval from Novell and the royalty fee issue seem to be fairly concrete. Either way it will be very interested to see how all of this plays out in the end. http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/legal.html |
| #8 By 135 (209.180.28.6) at 1/14/2004 12:15:28 PM |
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ClosedStandards - Hmm. make, lex, yacc, cc I know for certain are licensed under the Unix trademark. These aren't GNU tools, they are Unix tools.
The GNU versions are gmake, flex, bison, gcc, etc. Not sure on the other ones. sodajerk - The Interix stuff is a Unix compatibility layer, and includes Unix licensed code. Yes, they bought out a company to get it, but it's still from the AT&T source base, which SCO maintains the licensing rights for. Halcyon - It is similar to cygwin. I've not used Interix, but cygwin sucked pretty bad... given that Interix was a professional product, I would assume it's substantially better than cygwin. |
| #9 By 3339 (64.160.58.135) at 1/14/2004 12:57:03 PM |
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which is exactly what I said, soda, yet, it does not require licensing anything from SCO.
Jesus... I can't believe people are maintainting a ludicrous theory started by parker based on the ludicrous claims of a company going down in flames. MS was never paying ANYONE licenses or royalties for the functionality of SFU. So why are people accepting the moronic theory that MS has gone from paying royalties to a one time fee because of the SCO licensing? They never were BEFORE. They are just undercutting their own revenue (which they have done a million times before) to make their products more attractive in face of cheaper, less feature rich alternatives. No one knows why MS licensed code from SCO including MS. SFU has not changed. Actually, soda, the Unix license and name is owned by the Open Group by the way. SCO only owns a subset of devalued copyrights and who knows if they own any patent rights at all. This post was edited by sodajerk on Wednesday, January 14, 2004 at 13:34. |
| #10 By 19992 (164.214.4.61) at 1/14/2004 2:21:09 PM |
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Sodajerk - SCO may not own any of the copyrights in SVR4 (depends on how you read the contracts). They certainly do not own any patents in SVR4.
For info on the copyrights go to http://www.novell.com/licensing/indemnity/legal.html |
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