Red Hat Files for Software Patents

Marsala writes "Apparently Red Hat has filed two patent applications for stuff related to the TUX webserver. The patents are for Embedded Protocol Objects and Method and apparatus for atomic file look-up. One has to wonder (if their patents are granted) what their licensing terms will be.... free for open source, or a tool to try and screw other Linux distros?" As reported by Linux Weekly News.

Summary

[Triskaidekaphobia]

The first, "Embedded protocol objects", seems to be saying that if you have a webpage that consists of dynamic and static content then the static content can be cached for faster access. Hardly novel.

The first, "Method and apparatus for atomic file look-up", basically says that it is a good idea if you can see if something is in a cache before requesting the operation that would put it in the cache. Again, not particularly revolutionary.

Re:What about MS in this deal

[BCoates]

IANAL, but you don't need to take out a patent to stop someone else from patenting your invention--if you publish it before someone else patents it, their patent is invalid.

--
Benjamin Coates

Doesn't matter

[awptic]

The GPL requires anyone holding a patent on the software to allow others to freely use/modify it.
From the GPL license:

Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software
patents. We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free
program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect making the
program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any
patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.


The only thing this patent prevents is from others creating proprietary versions of the technology in question; which, IMO, is a Good Thing(tm). In fact, in the thread about this on the LKML someone brought up that the FSF even encourages doing this.

Re:money or principle?

[King of the World]

Patents have nothing to do with free, open or closedness licencing. They are merely to do with a system whose intention is to prove who invented what first.

If you don't apply for a patent and you use 'your technology' then someone else could more easily take legal action upon you for using 'their technology'.

In this way having a patent means that you get to decide the rules under which the technology (kill me now for using that word) is used. A good patent owner will licence it under good rules, and a bad patent owner will licence under bad rules.

So it all comes down to how we think the owners of this patent will act upon uses of their 'technology'.

I certainly trust Redhat.

Re:Doesn't matter

[MisterBlister]

In fact, in the thread about this on the LKML someone brought up that the FSF even encourages doing this.

Whoever brought that up is full of shit. RMS is against software patents, period, end of story.

Yeah RMS isn't the entire FSF, but he basically sets the policy. And you won't find any official documentation or website backing up that claim that the FSF encourages patents on Free software.

Please refrain from passing along bogus info like that in the future unless you can back it up....

Re:What's wrong with software patents anyway?

[Error27]

>>Could somebody please explain to me why software should be excluded from patenting? If it's a legitimate innovation (i.e. not Microsoft "innovation") why shouldn't it be patentable?

Software is too easy.

If you start dressing it up with fancy vocabulary you can make it seem difficult. For example method and protocol objects sounds really difficult but if you just want to build a webserver into the kernel it's under 200 lines of code. Sure that's khttp vs TUX but you could just add 100 lines of code at a time and very soon khttp would be as good as TUX. Which 100 lines of code is worth a patent?

Bio-engineering is different because each product is just one or two ideas. Software is built from combining ideas. Any large project is 1000's of little ideas. If 100 of those ideas are patented what are you going to do?

The truth is that part of the reason that software seems different is because I am involved in it. If I made medicine in my spare time then I'd probably think those type of patents were bad too.

but.. isn't this what you wanted?

[__aawavt7683]

Ok, Red Hat's going to be the next microsoft at this rate.. right? I mean.. patents.. didn't they have odd licensing and odd software in there somewhere? A big company for the whole desktop thing and such.. least, I could see it going there. That's right. Competitive upgrades from other linux distros. That was bashed a bit on the register, I believe..

But now all are complaining about how it's patenting things.. Well, that may be, but going by the title of the patents, they look like they could be actual legitimate patents. Nothing like the whole wheel thing that went on.

So.. they might be on the way to proprietary code, closed source, and all that.. Well, GNU will keep it open. and we all like open because, unlike how Micro$oft does it, it allows people to fix bugs and work with the code they're given. So.. it's not bad there, either, imo. Or at least it can't be.

So.. give Redhat a break. They have to make money some way, and this may be what works on their end. Even doing what it's doing, it seems to be being nice.

Just my few pennies. But what do I know.

-DrkShadow

Re:money or principle?

[King of the World]

You're missing the key feature of patents here. The one "proven" to invent first by virtue of a patent gets the privilege of setting arbitrary license terms for any use of the covered invention.

You know, I could have sworn I said that - oh yes, I sez:

"having a patent means that you get to decide the rules under which the technology [...] is used"

Thus, a patent has everything to do with licensing, and it may be "closed" at the whim of the patent holder at any time

I didn't say otherwise. I did say that it had nothing to do with specific types of licencing ("Patents have nothing to do with free, open or closedness licencing.") as the original post said "the only thing a patent is good for is to stop people from using an invention".

Ok, bye now!

claim1 && claim2 && ...

[_|()|\|]

how on earth can this be patented? ... Like any reporting engine ever written?

I'm not going to defend these patents, but keep in mind that the claims are ANDed together, not ORed. Don't read the first claim and exclaim that Red Hat patented reports. It patented a static HTTP server that uses an object cache in an O/S kernel and meets the characteristics of all twelve claims.

The question is, as with all patents: is this a novel, non-obvious (to one skilled in the art) leap from the existing prior art? I doubt it.

Patents, Red Hat, Free Software

[pavera]

Ok, first off, I don't see this as a big deal. I had a small lecture on patent law from my dad (IANAL, but he is!). Basically, if anyone should make us feel safe patenting things its Red Hat (or Mandrake, or Suse, or any other linux distro).

The more patents that the Open Source community can secure, the more software that can be developed open source without fear of MS, Adobe, and other proprietary software vendors saying "Hey you can't do that without paying us royalties we have the patent".

All of you with your conspiracy theories about Red Hat trying to make linux proprietary are nuts. They know very well that if they did that, it would mean +90% of their customers would instantly abandon ship in the name of Free Software.

In talking with my father, the best thing Open Source software can do is apply for patents, while this causes the "inventions" to be owned by someone instead of "the community", there is no law that says if you have a patent you have to charge royalties. Therefore, the more "free patents" we can get, the more software/ideas/code is protected from proprietary companies who, if they had the patent would charge royalties.