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    SubjectRe: Article: IBM wants to "clean up the license" of Linux
    "Albert D. Cahalan" wrote:
    >
    > > I am kind of monitoring this list until I get up to speed but could you
    > > go a little further in depth explaining some of the issues involved with
    > > the patents on these technologies? Also are the expiration dates on
    > > these patents known? I would appreciate it alot as I am sure others
    > > would.
    >
    > Well...
    >
    > >> IPv6 routing Several good algorithms are prohibited.
    >
    > Alan Cox mentioned this to me when I pointed him to a nice trie-based
    > system for keeping track of routes.
    >
    > >> compression Arithmetic encoding (bzip), MPEG, audio, GIF...
    >
    > Oringinal bzip uses arithmetic encoding for the second stage, which works
    > better than the huffman encoding currently used. The same exact problem
    > hits jpeg, with everyone forced to use the inferior compression.

    Are all arithmetic coders patented? This is evil.

    >
    > Many kinds of perceptual compression algorithms for audio and video
    > are patented. They remove the data that humans don't notice, and get
    > far better compression.
    >
    > GIF compression is an old and well known problem. Lots of people
    > violate it though. PNG can do a better job with plain images, but
    > the MNG animation format is not yet well supported. I doubt this
    > one has many years left on it.
    >
    > >> encryption Idea, RSA, some kinds of key exchange...
    >
    > PGP hit some problems here. RSA (the company) holds many.
    >
    > >> color management The gimp can't do it. Damn.
    >
    > At least 3 patents hit us here. The gimp site has a web page about it.

    Could you explain?

    >
    > >> filesystem updates We can't do delayed ordered writes.
    >
    > Old AT&T patent.
    >
    > >> OSPF The IETF is not happy with this one!
    > >> quality-of-service Multi-protocol Label Switching (MPLS) QoS
    >
    > Both IBM patents. Cisco has a few nasty ones too AFAIK.
    > These make it hard to do some networking stuff.
    >
    > >> register allocation Ever wonder why VC++ code can beat g++ code?
    >
    > Various people AFAIK. Something about graph coloring...

    ?????????


    >
    > >> PPP Can't return a useful error code to the other side.
    >
    > Use grep on the kernel source. Motorola holds this one.

    What???? Error return is obviously not a new idea! It's been around
    since...... hmmmm.... telegraph times?

    >
    > >> drivers/net/zlib.c Must use code with nonlinear time requirements.
    >
    > 2 guys hold it. Not serious. You can't do gzip with a nice time bound.
    >
    > -
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    --
    David Feuer
    feuer@his.com
    dfeuer@binx.mbhs.edu
    Open Source: Think locally; act globally.

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