TomTom Can License FAT Without Violating the GPL 261
dp619 writes "Capped per-unit royalties make FAT licensing agreements permissible under the GPL, and SD Times has found that Microsoft's public license policy caps royalties at $250k. If the royalties are capped — as they seem to be — TomTom should be able to license FAT without violating the GPL. And if that is the case ... TomTom needs some serious explaining to do as to why they aren't licensing FAT. That said, Microsoft still needs to explain why it just cannot say that folks won't violate the GPL if they license FAT under its terms."
No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works. (Score:5, Informative)
This story is nonsense.
First, to be sued you have to have someone willing to sue you. That would be the copyright holders of the GPL code that can't be distributed. They are:
Werner Almesberger
Gordon Chaffee
Wolfram Pienkoss
OGAWA Hirofumi
Those are the listed authors of the vfat code in the Linux kernel.
I don't see why those folks would want to sue TomTom. In general the kernel team isn't interested in suing to enforce the GPL, and the only person to bring such a suit, Harald Welte of gpl-violations.org, isn't involved with this code.
One of the possibilities in this case is that other companies than TomTom want to see the patents in question invalidated, and don't want to see TomTom bought by Microsoft, and will help TomTom with funds, etc. Whatever agreements go on about that will happen behind closed doors.
TomTom probably would not want to pay a capped royalty of a quarter million for something as bad as the FAT patents without at least exploring any less expensive paths to invalidate the patent. Like the Doctrine of Laches, for example. That code has been in the kernel longer than the usual Laches interval, which in general would hand MS and automatic loss.
Less expensive ways to win, in this case, may also mean "with someone else's money".
A capped royalty payment is in general NOT in compliance with the GPL version 2. What is "fixed" in GPL3 is the Novell loophole of licensing customers of the other company rather than the other company directly. Microsoft is not required to offer TomTom a license that uses the Novell loophole. Whatever they offer TomTom may still be out of compliance with GPL2. But that doesn't matter if the developers don't want to sue.
Jeremy is either being misquoted (likely) or he's a bit off-base this time.
Re:Why not? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why wouldn't they want to sue? Lots of people would love to see the Microsoft patent get invalidated, of those lots of people are confident it will be. If that number out of the original population is greater than 25%, there's a 1 in four, or real, chance one of those guys wants to sue, on principle if not on principal. I'm sure they would likewise get financial help from others to fight just like TomTom would, just different sources.
Sue TomTom and let them decide to take their chances with copyright law
Re:Why not? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why not? (Score:5, Informative)
Worse than that, they would be playing right into Microsoft's hands, scaring device developers away from Linux towards WinCE.
Re:Why not? (Score:5, Interesting)
Why would someone develop for WinCE? Not to troll, it just seems like a dead platform.
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Well WinCE supports FAT. Although I think you could just as easily license FAT on a closed embedded OS like QNX.
You could also use FreeBSD where there is no license to get in the way of licensing FAT.
Re:Why not? (Score:4, Informative)
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Why would someone develop for WinCE? Not to troll, it just seems like a dead platform.
No GPL restrictions?
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Consider MS describing the linux implementation as non-infringing - as it is distributed source-only (in the general case) for "research purposes".
No significant market infringing patents then?
Does Redhat pay a license fee for RHEL, or does it leave lfn support out altogether?
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I would suggest the Doctrine of Laches could only consider binaries being shipped by a major distributor - source code usually being recognised as a non-infringing description of the patent. Taking this into account TomTom is probably one of the few people distributing an implementation without a license commercially.
Not sure if a court would consider this as submarining anyway - MS have fairly aggressively defended this patent in the past (especially against preformatted flash drive and camera/phone vendor
Re:Why not? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Linux distributions that support vFAT are on the market for several years now, and they certainly contain binaries too. Compiling your own kernel is optional and done after installation of the pre-compiled version. Except maybe Gentoo...
So while I don't know the legal details of laches (what is a typical timeframe for it to apply?), in principle this looks like a case where it fits.
Re:Why not? (Score:5, Informative)
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Right, that's what I'm saying. Developers, being copyright owners, would sue TomTom for copyright violation. Copyright law being well established (GPL being a rather new twist, however), TomTom would probably attempt to meet the demands of the copyright owners instead of risking the loss of the code, which means following the terms of the GPL. That would force TomTom into compliance, whichever way they choose to go, and the most obvious choice is to fight back against Microsoft. As you say, Laches would
Re:Why not? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Maybe they won't, but I wonder if TomTom can really take the risk of being sued later for willful infringement?
Considering how long copyrights last nowadays, the kernel developers easily have 70+ years to discover the infringement and pursue them.
They might like to seek out the kernel developers of the code involved in the relevant modules and license their work under more permissive terms for use in TomTom's products...
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Hehehe.. anyone who wrote ANY code in that device and put it under the GPL can sue Tom Tom for placing extra restrictions on the redistribution of the software.. as the license specifically states that extra restrictions are not allowed.
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Re:No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works (Score:5, Insightful)
Certainly MS could sue anyone who they claim violated their patent and didn't buy a license. It has nothing special to do with laptops or Linux.
The question is whether they would succeed.
Re:No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works (Score:5, Informative)
You're correct Bruce, I'm off base this time. I got contacted by the writer this morning who told me that the SFLC had told him that a fixed cap would work with GPLv2. So being in the middle of coding something (ie. not paying enough attention), and remembering the fixed price we paid to get access to the EU Workgroup Server docs, I just agreed that it sounded like this would be a work-around for v2, but not for v3 where section 11 is much stricter about patent licensing (explicitly the bits about extending the license downstream), and bingo - there goes the story with the quote. You know how these things go :-(. My fault, and I'll be more careful in future.
Looking closely at the license here:
http://web.archive.org/web/20060207034921/http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/ip/tech/fat.asp [archive.org]
the devil is in the details. Someone just mailed me a comprehensive analysis and agreeing to this license, even with a royalty cap, would violate GPLv2 in several ways.
There is a field of use restriction : "Pricing for other device types can be negotiated with Microsoft."
Modification restrictions: "devices are fully compliant with certain required portions of the Microsoft FAT file system specification"
and a per-manufacturer limit: "a cap on total royalties of $250,000 per manufacturer".
So yes, I got it wrong and this license is in no way GPLv2 compatible.
Sorry for the mistake. Blame me, not the journalist who was just trying to get his story.
Jeremy.
Re:No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works (Score:5, Insightful)
Thank you, Jeremy. I suspect you may be a bit out on a limb on the GPL compliance angle, too. As you can see above, there are only a few people who are direct copyright holders of the code that exercises the patent. The rest of the kernel isn't at issue. I think those four may be the only people with standing to sue. The question then is: does suing deter Microsoft, or only deter TomTom from embedding Linux in their device?
Obviously how TomTom conducts itself will be important. If their CEO has an on-stage hug with an MS executive and actively helps Microsoft circumvent the GPL, that would probably irk some developers. If they get bought by MS, they'd probably start embedding WinCE. If they just try to go on doing business as well as they can without allowing themselves to be a mouthpiece for a Microsoft FUD initiative, the key copyright holders might not have a reason to object. I would feel better about TomTom, though, if they hadn't had to be dragged into GPL compliance. But my experience is that companies usually commit GPL incompliance out of ignorance and bad process rather than intent.
Thanks
Bruce
Re:No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works (Score:5, Interesting)
Great exhibit for why allowing the patenting of software was a bad idea. Even you experts are guessing and rethinking how these hypothetical lawsuits would play out. If such complexity was necessary, it'd be one thing, but it's not.
Working out the issues in court could cost enough to make $250K look petty. Society will bear these costs. Generous of people to already be offering to help out with donations, but I wish it wasn't necessary. Ideally, MS should have no case whatsoever, and shouldn't even be thinking of such things. But patent law has handed them an angle. Remove patenting of software, and then the issues of this particular case will be non-issues.
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Where does Apple fit in to all this? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm starting to wonder if this isn't in some way connected to Apple's counter-intuitive decision to block TomTom from selling their software for the iPhone.
TomTom announced fairly shortly after the 3G iPhone with built-in GPS appeared that they had a working port of their navigation software, but despite the obvious demand for the App, and the profits to be made from Apple's cut if it was on the App store, Apple have a very surprising clause in their development agreement that prohibits 'turn by turn naviga
Re:No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works (Score:4, Informative)
TomTom (probably) can't pay Microsoft for a license to the FAT patents without violating the GPL. The people who wrote the code that is (probably) covered by Microsoft's patent would then have the right to sue TomTom (for violating the GPL).
I'm wrong -- ignore post (Score:3)
Keep reading below and someone actually knows what they are talking about :)
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The gist of the GPL is about distribution, modifications and source availability. I searched for Open Office the other day, and the first link was something like software-openoffice.com. Out of morbid curiosity, I clicked on it and they wanted me to pay like $30-60/year subscription to download OO. For all I know, this is a patented business method or software design or something. Now, OO is LGPL, not GPL, but I've heard here on /. that in Europe these kind of pay sites for GPL stuff are around and they are legal.
Oh, it's even funnier than that in Russia. There, you get government agencies, such as police - not even BSA-type guys! - raiding offices to check for "illegal software". This is because in Russia, software piracy is a criminal matter, not civil - i.e. the state itself can and will sue you, even if the copyright holder does not want it to happen (this is what happened in Ponosov [wikipedia.org] case, where MS itself said they have no problems, but the government went ahead with the prosecution).
Now, aside from all the obvi
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The GPL restricts developers and distributors, not end users. GPLv3 adds additional restrictions.
If a business was built around exploiting "loopholes" in the GPLv2 and then the project they were relying on as a whole moves to GPLv3, then the business may have lost access to further updates.
So, even the GPL is not exempt from creating tighter restrictions. Just because some people happen to like the restrictions doesn't mean they aren't beyond those originally applied.
Re:No lawsuit likely, here's how it actually works (Score:5, Interesting)
I see another problem with this and that is that it shoots a hole in the GPS licensing. What good is open source if you still have to pay royalties to patent trolls in order to use it?
What do patent trolls have to do with anything? Let's say you are young enough to still go to school, and there is a school bully who threatens to beat up anyone who uses a computer that doesn't run Windows. So what good is GPL licensing? (I assume you meant GPL and not GPS). What good is a license to MacOS X, when Apple can't protect you from getting beaten up?
This whole GPL angle on the TomTom case is nonsense. TomTom uses Linux under the GPL license. Linux is either infringing on Microsoft's patent, or it isn't. If it is, that is not TomTom's fault. So TomTom gets blackmailed. They either pay or they don't. Whether they pay or they don't doesn't affect whether Linux is infringing on Microsoft's patent or not. Payment doesn't mean that TomTom admits Microsoft's patents are valid, it means they want to avoid a court case. Even if TomTom admits Microsoft's patents are valid, that isn't binding on anyone.
As long as TomTom puts all the code on their website, and doesn't itself add restrictions to its use, I can't see how they would be violating the GPL. Sure, they can tell you about this bully boy who forced them to pay money, and the bully boy could go after you as well. But the patent infringement, if there is one, is there in all Linux versions.
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And I still call the FAT patent a troll patent.
Almost every software patent is troll patents one way or another because they just causes trouble for software development.
As it is now one company can claim a software patent and claim thousands of man-hours for it while another can do the same development in an afternoon with the right guy.
And if you have a patent attack on Linux it's subsequently also attacking GPL.
Fuck em (Score:3, Insightful)
Just switch file systems. Seriously, why the hell are you using FAT anyway.
which? (Score:2)
Re:which? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:which? (Score:5, Informative)
Actually the lawsuit is over multiple patents, some of which are the FAT patents, all of which are dubious...
United States Patent 6,175,789
Beckert , et al. January 16, 2001
Vehicle computer system with open platform architecture
United States Patent 7,054,745
Couckuyt , et al. May 30, 2006
Method and system for generating driving directions
United States Patent 6,704,032
Falcon , et al. March 9, 2004
Methods and arrangements for interacting with controllable objects within a graphical user interface environment using various input mechanisms
United States Patent 7,117,286
Falcon October 3, 2006
Portable computing device-integrated appliance
United States Patent 6,202,008
Beckert , et al. March 13, 2001
Vehicle computer system with wireless internet connectivity
United States Patent 5,579,517
Reynolds , et al. November 26, 1996
Common name space for long and short filenames
United States Patent 5,758,352
Reynolds , et al. May 26, 1998
Common name space for long and short filenames
United States Patent 6,256,642
Krueger , et al. July 3, 2001
Method and system for file system management using a flash-erasable, programmable, read-only memory
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Personally you're right. However, they patented every car with Bluetooth enabled.
My Tomtom GPS looks up the weather for me online using a bluetooth connection to my cell phone for its Internet access. That's what they're going after here.
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Yes, he could not patent the concept of a teleporter, though he could patent a particular implementation. An idea does NOT need to be implementable (at the time) to be patentable. (Except, in the case of the USPTO, for perpetual motion machines, for which they demand a working model to keep the whackos at bay).
In his seminal article about geosynchronous satellites, published in 1945, Arthur C Clarke described the need for a synchroniser for TV signals transmitted by satellite, even though neither the satell
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It's quick, it's dirty, it's easy, and developers are lazy. I have seen many embedded products that use FAT just out of convenience for the developers (many of the embedded CPUs have reference bootrom code available from the CPU manufacturers and those generally support FAT partitioning and not EXT*).
It's about interoperability, stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Or just maybe it's because people expect to be able to see some files when they plug their GPS receivers into their Windows machines. If Windows had an Ext2 driver bundled with it, I wouldn't ever format a USB drive as FAT either.
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*blink*
You'll only get instability and crashes if your FS driver code sucks. Windows is crummy for a lot of reasons, but "randomly crashes for no goddamn reason even though all the bits were being twiddled correctly" isn't one of them.
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Ext2IFS isn't very good, though, and IIRC that's the main ext* FS driver on Windows.
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Yeah, if you want to be able to use a file system from both Windows and a Linux-based system, it's much more practical to use either FAT or NTFS than Ext2. I think the real problem is that there's no device class for a virtual file system interface of some kind instead of just the low level mass storage device. Ideally, it would be up to the device how to store the files internally and it would just present a high level interface.
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I concur, I kept getting blue screens all of a sudden doing something with vmware I think it was under server 2003 (my memory fails me somewhat)... removing ext2ifs stopped this from happening.
FAT's just very simple, easy to program, easy to understand, very widely supported, metadata has a small footprint (as a % of total filesystem size) and, especially in cases of mostly WORM like access patterns, is very much sufficient for a wide range of needs.
Re:It's about interoperability, stupid (Score:5, Funny)
I concur, I kept getting blue screens all of a sudden doing something with vmware I think it was under server 2003 (my memory fails me somewhat)...
Bad memory is one of the leading causes of BSODs. You should run memtest86+ and replace any faulty units.
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Yeah, UDF would probably be the best vendor-neutral choice, but you couldn't just format your device as UDF, plug it into a Windows machine, and copy files to it, since the implementation in Windows is incomplete and buggy AFAIK.
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I had no ends of trouble trying to get a writable UDF flash volume working on Windows XP and Vista and Mac OS X. It was hard to even create a real blank UDF volume without jumping on linux and using udftools. I couldn't get OSX to make a worthwhile one with hdiutil.
The UDF spec is certainly capable of being a good interoperable filesystem, the recent additions are a little complicated. but the base standard is worth supporting in my opinion. But I don't think it will go anywhere. OS support seems mainly tar
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That, and it's pretty much universal, (almost) everything from Amiga to Windows can use FAT.
However, I'm not really sure what TomTom does, ie: what implications does the file system have on its use? and couldn't any transfering be converted into something more generic between FS and other IO?
Couldn't they just as easily use Ext2? Or make their own TTFS or whatever.
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couldn't any transfering be converted into something more generic between FS and other IO?
No, because users can copy updates directly to the SD card, then stick the card in the TomTom, without ever hooking up the TomTom device to their computer.
Re:Fuck em (Score:5, Funny)
That, and it's pretty much universal, (almost) everything from Amiga to Windows can use FAT.
Come on, you could have gone with z/OS and gotten extra points here.
The memory cards / SD cards use fat (Score:3, Informative)
The memory cards / SD cards use fat
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FAT is useful for thumb drives that you want to be able to use in Windows systems.
I COULD use NTFS but my thumb drive is slow enough without the overhead (at least, I assume FAT is faster).
Re:Fuck em (Score:4, Informative)
Just switch file systems. Seriously, why the hell are you using FAT anyway.
PC users who want to be able to exchange data between their TomTom and their Windows XP/Vista PC.
There are essentially 5 filesystems available... FAT12, VFAT/FAT16 (Microsoft), FAT32 (Microsoft), and NTFS (Microsoft).
FAT12 has limitations that make it essentially unusable (no long filenames)
This difficulty in exchanging files with removable media is essentially a result of Microsoft's Windows monopoly.
They have patented all the filesystems they implemented in Windows, and the only modern filesystems the OS supports are filesystems they have patented.
Yeah, someone could develop a custom filesystem (ala VxFS) and sell it as an add-on application. It would probable be about as successful as Netscape Navigator was, compared to Internet Explorer, and since the OS itself couldn't be hosted on such a filesystem, such a product would have great difficulties in the marketplace.
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FAT12 has long filenames all right. You still see small SD cards formatted as FAT12 these days. FAT12/16/32 is typically chosen based on the device size.
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In traditional FAT12, filenames are limited to 8 characters, plus a . and an optional extension up to 3 characters.
LFNs in FAT12 are only possible with the VFAT extensions, or by some similar hack. MS doesn't have a patent on FAT12, but they have a patent for the extension to use long filenames on FAT12.
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Sure, but the same applies to FAT16. I just wanted to point out that FAT12 isn't inferior to FAT16 in this regard, and, in fact, is still widely used on small devices. VFAT was developed for FAT16 but also "backported" to FAT12, so FAT16 and FAT12 are essentially identical as far as filenames go. In fact, all three filesystems share the same LFN hack. The only real differences are the FAT entry size and, for FAT32, some reorganization and cleanup (for example, the root directory is a normal directory on FAT
Re:Fuck em (Score:4, Informative)
FAT12 has long filenames all right. You still see small SD cards formatted as FAT12 these days. FAT12/16/32 is typically chosen based on the device size.
All FAT "sizes" use the same directory structure. Each entry holds an 8.3 file name. VFAT uses a set of extra entries containing the long name (hidden so a non-VFAT driver doesn't see them).
Windows 95 introduced VFAT and it could write long file names to floppies (FAT12) as well as hard discs (FAT16). FAT32 was introduced later with OSR2.
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To what, though?
If they change to NTFS, they still have to pay MS. If they change to something like EXT3, then Windows users cannot use the Tom Tom without an additional driver. Plus, you'd be forcing people to format their currently very interoperable USB sticks to something that would make them worthless on most Windows computers.
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If they change to something like EXT3, then Windows users cannot use the Tom Tom without an additional driver
See this:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1159141&cid=27177423 [slashdot.org]
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That's true, but:
1. You now require your customer to install software on their PC. No using the work PC or a friend's PC to update your Tom Tom.
2. You require your potentially brain-dead customer to figure out how to re-format a USB stick.
3. Without yet another reformat, you render the USB stick useless for any other computer besides your own.
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Tom Tom Home [tomtom.com]
Since a Tom Tom owner will be installing software on their PC or Mac anyhow the addition of an ext2 driver would be innocuous.
Re:Fuck em (Score:5, Insightful)
Everyone uses it? you can plug in the SD card from the gps (or camera or whatever) straight into a card reader on _any_ computer from the last 10 years and it will read it. Moving away from it will be like moving from IPv4 to IPv6. Slow and messy. But necessary one day - those flash devices are getting bigger and bigger, and windows won't let you create a FAT fs bigger than 32G (though it is possible) as it gets horribly inefficient. MS is pushing exFAT, but being incompatible with FAT, they face the same problems as any other fs in this regard, and lawsuits like this one might end up biting them back.
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Re:Fuck em (Score:5, Funny)
Internally, very few devices would consciously choose to use FAT...
If any of my devices consciously choose what file system to use, I have a hammer that will correct such behavior.
Re:Fuck em (Score:4, Funny)
...first machine to ever become conscious... wow this could be an amazing step forwards fo&#!%*!!BLAM!!! Oh well, good job we didn't also program it to feel pain. ...someone take that hammer off him. *sigh* right here we go again
They actually can't, most likely (Score:5, Informative)
Most likely the "cap" only applies to TomTom, not other 'licensees' of the software. For example, if TomTom sold a program to another company that relies on FAT technology, and the other company develops a different product based on the same kernel, Microsoft (if they follow common practice) would require the second company to license the FAT technology, to ship a product based on it.
Unless their standard agreement would allow TomTom to sublicense the technology, and include an unlimited royalty-free license when they distribute the Linux source code that corresponds to the software they are shipping in binary form, then the "capped" license still violates the GPL.
The GPL doesn't say you can distribute software under the GPL with capped royalties.
The only way this works is if TomTom pays the full $250,000, and gets unlimited licensing for them and all recipients of the software from them.
TomTom cannot require people who receive source code under GPL terms to report when they redistribute, in order for TomTom to pay for another license. The reporting requirement would be in violation of the GPL.
See the GPL version 2 [gnu.org] (which applies to the Linux kernel), these are some quotes from the License:
Re:They actually can't, most likely (Score:4, Insightful)
It goes further than "the software". For this to work all recipients of the software must have all the rights granted under the GPL, which means they must be able to modify and redistribute the code, even as a completely different product. If a recipient of the code wanted to use it in a blender that stores data in memory in FAT format, the recipient must have the right to do so royalty-free in order for the GPL to remain intact.
Basically, the $250,000 cap would have to effectively grant unlimited use of the patent in all GPL'd software in order to distribute any software that uses the patent under the GPL. I seriously doubt Microsoft's licensing allows for that.
tomTom has to explain nothing (Score:5, Insightful)
Several non-FAT patents involved. (Score:5, Interesting)
The Microsoft v Tom-Tom suit covers a half-dozen or so patents, only two of them FAT-related. (Besides which, the FAT patent has been thrown out in Germany.) Most if not all of them are obvious or have prior art, like the FAT patents, and may well not hold up under Bilski. What does it gain Tom-Tom to license a (potential invalidatable) patent like FAT if they're still being sued over half a dozen others? If they have to go to court anyway, might as well try to get them all overturned - they can always offer to settle later.
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> (Besides which, the FAT patent has been thrown out in Germany.)
Citation needed.
Besides, Tom Tom is Dutch, not Deutsch.
Re:Several non-FAT patents involved. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Several non-FAT patents involved. (Score:5, Informative)
These same two patents were also invalidated in the U.S. [cnet.com] for a while, but they were subsequently upheld after an appeal. [cnet.com]
Sadly, many including the poster don't get it... (Score:5, Interesting)
TomTom should be able to license FAT without violating the GPL. And if that is the case ... TomTom needs some serious explaining to do as to why they aren't licensing FAT. That said, Microsoft still needs to explain why it just cannot say that folks won't violate the GPL if they license FAT under its terms."
Ohh yes they will violate the GPL. I have lifted the comment below (in bold), from this [itbusinessedge.com] informed user who I trust on these issues. He also drives home the motivation behind Microsoft's actions. Take a read.
Samba maintainer Jeremy Allison pointed out in a recent blog posting by writer Glyn Moody that companies who sign up to Microsoft's licensing cannot continue to distribute their code under GPLv2.
Section seven of GPLv2 - called the "Liberty or Death" clause - states that you cannot distribute code if outside restrictions have been imposed.
"What people are missing about this is the either/or choice that Microsoft is giving TomTom," Alison posted.
"It isn't a case of cross-license and everything is ok. If TomTom or any other company cross licenses patents then by section 7 of GPLv2 (for the Linux kernel). they lose the rights to redistribute the kernel at all."
In other words, Microsoft is eroding Linux and open source and slowing their development. A deal with Microsoft prevents GPL'd code from returning to the ecosystem whence it came, with any improvements or updates, as companies that do patent licensing deals with Microsoft must keep it in-house.
Re:Sadly, many including the poster don't get it.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sadly, many including the poster don't get it.. (Score:5, Insightful)
How... odd. Enderle is always good for a chuckle. Like this paragraph:
Heh. Enderle. All concerned for FOSS. A big believer in the honesty of FOSS developers. That's rich.
royalty free redistribution? (Score:5, Informative)
Setting aside the idiocy in assuming that the patents are valid after being rejected twice by the USPTO before finally being revalidated [cnet.com] and ... [arstechnica.com]
GPL V2 Terms and Conditions [gnu.org]
11. If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues), conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you may not distribute the Library at all. For example, if a patent license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Library by all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the Library.
Microsoft does have the presidence in their favor due to the final decision of the USPTO and forcing Lexar to pay them off for their lame patents, but only a fool would simply give in to extortion.
Just drop support for short filenames (Score:2)
All the Microsoft "FAT patents" still in force have to do with the horrible hack used to support both long and DOS-type "short" ("XXXXXXXX.XXX") filenames. Nobody uses "short" filenames any more, and under UNIX/Linux, there's not even an API to talk about short filenames. So make an implementation that's long-filename only. You give up backwards compatability with DOS and Windows 3.1. Big deal.
Re:Just drop support for short filenames (Score:5, Informative)
That would make it incompatible with all versions of Windows. At which point you might as well use another filesystem.
FAT files need the stupid short names. It's a requirement. You can't physically have a FAT filesystem without short names. The patents are about the fugly hack that long filenames on FAT are (which makes them compatible with short filenames; it doesn't add that capability to them).
How about we find a way to invalidate FAT patents? (Score:2)
Seriously. How much of what exists in FAT existed previously in things like CP/M? The long filenames translation thing? That may take some serious digging, but perhaps it could be ruled as "too obvious" since both the need and the backward compatible solutions are somewhat obvious in that it couldn't likely have been done any other way. (Yes, I am talking out of my ass a bit here.)
But seriously, what happened to the fight by invalidating patents?
It's the whole GPL they are after? (Score:3, Insightful)
Question : Don't you have to show that you've been harmed in order to bring a lawsuit? I'm not a lawyer, but I always thought that in order to sue somebody, you had to be damaged by them.
Now, let's say Tom Tom or any other company ponies up to Microsoft and distributes some piece of hardware bundled with Linux, and that's obviously a violation of the GPL. Clearly Tom Tom broke the license and they are not entitled to distribute it.
The question is, is the GPL owner harmed?
Well, one could make the argument that the answer is no, as everyone who actually had a Tom Tom device could in fact obtain the GPL code for themselves, and could update the code in the device. In fact, a person owning a Tom Tom might perhaps just state that a replacement in deed, because, if the Tom Tom GPL code is the same as the code it would be replaced with, which it has to be, then a physical act of copying the code over to make it legal is silly.
What this could be then, would be really Microsoft trolling for the ultimate legal showdown, which is thus: Microsoft makes a bunch of noise but ultimately gives Tom Tom a vfat license, rendering Tom Tom in default of the GPL. Somebody sues Tom Tom, at which point, Microsoft's pocketbooks open up and they support Tom Tom in the lawsuit, arguing that, well, because any person who is distributed the GPL by Tom Tom, can get it from somewhere else, Tom Tom's infringement is actually academic.
Thus, the attack would be, you can't be damaged by someone redistributing your GPL code against the terms of the license, because the person they are distributing it to can get it directly from you, and the GPL is actually worthless.
Even more... (Score:2)
Is the thought that a lot of these companies that are using GPL code might actually be complicit in this plan. Poor Richard Stallman... he thought up the GPL after Emacs was swiped from him. Now, a bunch of companies are signing on with the likes of Microsoft not even over the matter of patents, but, over a more coordinated strategy to essentially just take the GPL code for their own products by turning the GPL into another kind of public domain.
They should put this nonsense. (Score:2, Insightful)
I say challenge them in court and put this nonsense down once and for all. There is tones of prior art. The vfat code was written before the patent was filed. They should just challenge Microsoft in court. I mean really. Whats wrong with challenging them. I'd say this is the safest bet at this point.
Re: (Score:2)
Because $250K is a bargain compared to lawyers and courts when your a company. They have many times that tied up in inventory management for their devices, it's a relatively small amount of money for a consumer products business.
a few relavent points... (Score:5, Informative)
Way back when the whole thing about fat being patented hit slashdot there were a few articles. One in particular was about nearly every camera manufacturer ponying up the dollars after the patent was uphelp... they all paid $250k to use fat (so no, this isnt new - and this was all on slashdot by the way).
Also, people keep missing the point of the patent (i.e. whats being licensed) keep an eye on whats being licensed here, its important. This is not "oh your flash card has a fat filesystem on it, you have to pay for it". Its "your device can read and write fat"... NOT THE STORAGE CARD! its the DEVICE that can read and write FAT (specifically long-file names capable FAT). Do we get what the license is for now?
Now what filesystem exactly would they switch to? joe blogs goes and downloads the update, plugs his flash card into his windows box and (formats the flash card if required - as fat or ntfs). Then plugs that into the tomtom device. Tomtom device doesnt read fat(32) and so it doesnt work...
i.e. tom tom are essentially forced to license a patent based the fact they are forced to implement fat in their device.
I personally hope tomtom fight it. from the words of (whats is possibly) the worlds most moronic OP "TomTom needs some serious explaining to do as to why they aren't licensing FAT.". You dont think Tom-tom already knew about it? you dont think they ever read the (very very public) news about it happening to the camera makers?
But in reality, it should read more like "the patent office have some serious explaining to do in order to justify why FAT was ever allowed to be patented". Those patents should never have been allowed - there is nothing remotely inventive about fat with long file names.
Re: (Score:2)
It is to their advantage to do so, just like all the others things TomTom needs to license. TomTom, like all businesses, is motivated to maximize profits. Its FAT handling improves the product by offering its customers a pleasant FAT-compatible experience. FAT compatability is more valuable than the alternative choices.
If its valuable, then pay the damn licensing fee.
This is essentialy no different than the situation that had arrisen when the LZW
Re:a few relevant points... (Score:3, Insightful)
AFAIK, the original idea of patents was to give an inventor (read: the actual people who come up with an idea) a TEMPORARY market monopoly so that they could benefit from their invention without all & sundry copying it.
So far, so good. However, note "temporary" - the concept there was that eventually the idea would contribute to the common good. That, however, happens rarely.
Combine that with a questionable approach (I'm putting this mildly) to approving patents with plenty of prior art of falling wel
Just what we need... (Score:4, Funny)
Microsoft still needs to explain why it just cannot say that folks won't violate the GPL if they license FAT under its terms.
Just what we need... Microsoft offering legal opinions about GPL enforcement.
Get rid of FAT (Score:3, Interesting)
Is someone connected high up with VLC, GIMP or even Mozilla that can start piggy-backing the ext2fs driver installer (with the users permission of course) on installation of such programs? Heck it would go a long way to fixing such problems.
Why isn't Tom Tom countersuing? (Score:3, Insightful)
... on the basis of Anti trust?
IANAL, but it seems to me that by agressively patenting the most common file system on the planet and limiting the use of this file system, Microsoft is essentially using its monopoly on the Windows platform to gain an unfair advantage in the sat.nav market.
I'm surprised Tom Tom hasn't started an anti-trust counter suit.
And I don't for a second believe that the FAT filesystem patents would stand up if faced with a decent lawyer in a court. All the patents are describing relatively simple engineering solutions that anyone could come up with when faced with the problems Microsoft created for themselves.
Or just take the code out of the kernel (Score:4, Interesting)
Here's how TomTom can get off the GPL hook, no matter what terms they come to with Microsoft:
The engineering effort for this would be easy.
That would be the general idea (Score:3, Interesting)
deploy a file system driver ... and bundle it with flash player ... It does not have to even integrate with flash but use the distribution mechanism to beat them at their own game
Bingo. If the FAT-LFN FS (FAT filesystem with long filename support) patents can't be invalidated, and aren't going to expire anytime soon, then I believe this idea will be the only permanent solution for the problem.
Right now every company that distributes a "plug-ready" storage device that comes formatted with a FAT-LFN FS on it has to pay an expensive MS tax, or risk getting sued. If a company that pays the ransom *also* puts Linux on the device to read & write this format, then technically they co