I have this gut feeling that wine for linux may be legally attacked in the future of it becomes a cheaper alternative for a windows OS. Take for instance, I want to run adobe photoshop CS5 from microsoft(tm) so I run wine and run it. meh so what right? how about downloading an internet browser for it so now it is a nice little terminal style software emulated internet station. Do you see the turbulence of issues ahead? I do. I just hope microsoft(tm) does not depreciate 32-bit support

To be frank, I am surprised MS hasn't attacked wine directly already (unless they do so with some "passive aggressive" patents and such). But then again, linux has a fairly small market share and they probably realize 99% of its users are of the "hardcore opensource nerds" that would not switch to Windows even when presented with a death threat, so its probably more hassle than worth to go after them. Maybe if Ubuntu becomes more popular and accessible in the future, cutting into the casual user market (which, right now, is not happening).

That and, if I understand MS right, dont they make more monies (overall) from their related technologies (such as .Net, DirectX, Visual Studio, Silverlight, etc) rather than windows itself? If you think of it that way, Wine is effectively good for the business as it allows MS to push on their proprietary tech on other OSes while not having to spend a dime porting it themselves.

No, wine is in great shape legally.

The teams involved have these people --- called "lawyers" --- who make sure they are fine. MS went for several years without formally acknowledging Wine. Back in 2005 they actually did take steps to recognize it, to treat it differently and specifically prevent WGA from running on it, and otherwise tacitly acknowlege it.

Since MS is on their sixth year of formally acknowledging the platform, and since the Wine legal team has been careful to ensure legality so far, any legal challenge by Microsoft would be difficult. First it would be difficult as emulators are generally permitted, second it would be difficult because of their currently six-year precedent of acknowledging but not litigating.

Back in 2005 when they first recognized it formally there was a much bigger risk. But after so many years attempting to sue would be stupid. Courts generally treat that type of long-term knowledge as implicit evidence of a waiver against infringement. If they were to sue for any type of damages, the time for those actions has past, it is many years too late.

No, wine is in great shape legally.

The teams involved have these people --- called "lawyers" --- who make sure they are fine. MS went for several years without formally acknowledging Wine. Back in 2005 they actually did take steps to recognize it, to treat it differently and specifically prevent WGA from running on it, and otherwise tacitly acknowlege it.

Since MS is on their sixth year of formally acknowledging the platform, and since the Wine legal team has been careful to ensure legality so far, any legal challenge by Microsoft would be difficult. First it would be difficult as emulators are generally permitted, second it would be difficult because of their currently six-year precedent of acknowledging but not litigating.

Back in 2005 when they first recognized it formally there was a much bigger risk. But after so many years attempting to sue would be stupid. Courts generally treat that type of long-term knowledge as implicit evidence of a waiver against infringement. If they were to sue for any type of damages, the time for those actions has past, it is many years too late.

At the core what Wine does is perfectly legal, the APIs are just a communication protocol between the applications and the OS and as such aren't protected by copyright, (This is pretty much the same as the situation with Samba), Thus the only potential issue is software patents (Which, unless they are overly broad, can be worked around while still maintaining compatibility) (Microsoft isn't the only company with large patent portfolios either so Wine could almost as easily run into issues with other companies such as Apple etc.)

[quote name='frob' timestamp='1314578147' post='4854902']
No, wine is in great shape legally.

The teams involved have these people --- called "lawyers" --- who make sure they are fine. MS went for several years without formally acknowledging Wine. Back in 2005 they actually did take steps to recognize it, to treat it differently and specifically prevent WGA from running on it, and otherwise tacitly acknowlege it.

Since MS is on their sixth year of formally acknowledging the platform, and since the Wine legal team has been careful to ensure legality so far, any legal challenge by Microsoft would be difficult. First it would be difficult as emulators are generally permitted, second it would be difficult because of their currently six-year precedent of acknowledging but not litigating.

Back in 2005 when they first recognized it formally there was a much bigger risk. But after so many years attempting to sue would be stupid. Courts generally treat that type of long-term knowledge as implicit evidence of a waiver against infringement. If they were to sue for any type of damages, the time for those actions has past, it is many years too late.

At the core what Wine does is perfectly legal, the APIs are just a communication protocol between the applications and the OS and as such aren't protected by copyright, (This is pretty much the same as the situation with Samba), Thus the only potential issue is software patents (Which, unless they are overly broad, can be worked around while still maintaining compatibility) (Microsoft isn't the only company with large patent portfolios either so Wine could almost as easily run into issues with other companies such as Apple etc.)
[/quote]

To be fair though, any piece of software running on any platform is just as vulnerable to patents lawsuits from just about anywhere, so this doesn't apply specifically to wine.

To be fair though, any piece of software running on any platform is just as vulnerable to patents lawsuits from just about anywhere, so this doesn't apply specifically to wine.

Again, the knowledge of likely infringement and timeliness of filing are important.

If they knew about the (alleged) infringement for many years and are only now filing a complaint, the courts are very likely to fail on their face.

Specifically from the appeals courts: "Courts have established the principle in patent cases that delay in filing suit longer than six years after notice of infringement creates a presumption of laches." In order to sue for infringement after that time they most demonstrate to the court that they were acting in good faith to stop the infringement during those years, and show "particularly egregious conduct" that would require a change in position.


Even if they waited four or five years, the courts could consider a laches defense (in other words, instead of acting immediately when the cost was small, they waited until it causes the maximum damage to the other side). Even if it doesn't directly dismiss the suit, it could mitigate any penalties.


That type of late lawsuit is very infrequent, generally shown when the plaintiff has clear evidence of deliberate and calculated violation.


While it is true that every project can be sued, the risk of lawsuit from those companies in Wine's case is negligible. You can spend your time worrying that the sky might fall on you, or be afraid of being struck by lightning on a sunny cloudless day, or that you might face an unexpected lawsuit out of nowhere. Or you can spend your time creating new products. Successful companies choose the latter.

Again, the knowledge of likely infringement and timeliness of filing are important.

If they knew about the (alleged) infringement for many years and are only now filing a complaint, the courts are very likely to fail on their face.

Unless they opt to sue only for infringement of a recently added new technology. Windows is a moving target and Wine has to keep up by implementing new interfaces to maintain compatibility. Technology specific to one such new interface may be patented and open the possibility of a valid infringement case.

At the core what Wine does is perfectly legal, the APIs are just a communication protocol between the applications and the OS and as such aren't protected by copyright,

I'd wait with such statements until the Oracle v. Google case is over.
Oracle now wants to argue ( or already arguing, the article I read wasn't totally clear ) that APIs are patentable / copyrightable.
Let's hope it won't be... Otherwise I can clearly see a day when we will have to pay royalties for a simple "Hello, world!" program too....

Let's hope it won't be... Otherwise I can clearly see a day when we will have to pay royalties for a simple "Hello, world!" program too....

One of these days, someone is going to say: "Screw you guys, I'm going home" and US software industry will be put into Smithsonian, next to space program.


Don't think it can happen? See cars, appliances, electric components, batteries, nuclear technology, ...


Just hope there won't be another "downturn" to kill of the remainder of the people with disposable income. Already it's only the forex that is keeping US consumer markets afloat with few realizing that their purchasing power (and salaries) dropped 40% over last 2 years. Or, vice versa, that rest of the world got a 40% raise.

Things really are bad.

pointless topic.

but a native photoshop would be cool for linu.gz