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More on IBM's Project Monterey and SCO 128

karvind writes "Groklaw has posted another interesting article about AIX/Monterey/POWER research. The primary purpose of Project Monterey was to provide a stepping stone to Linux. IBM clearly stated this in promotional and technical materials, some of which SCO participated in publishing. It was always the plan that Project Monterey would be for POWER and SCO knew about IBM using SVR4 on POWER as far back as 2001. The article asks (and answers) some interesting questions: 'Where is the monetary damage to SCO? Where is there copyright infringement? Was SCO fully aware how quickly Linux would develop, that it would replace Unix, or did it take them by surprise?'"
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More on IBM's Project Monterey and SCO

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  • Timeline (Score:5, Informative)

    by Virtual Karma ( 862416 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:18AM (#12303321) Homepage
    Here is the timeline for SCO vs IBM and Linux: Click here [dvorak.org]
    • Re:Timeline (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      For some other constantly updated information on the SCO debacle, Yahoo's SCOX message board [yahoo.com] has it. It's not all financials but is an unmoderated board where links to all the new news articles about what's happening in the case appear, be it traditional print media, SCO press releases, or the other SCO/IBM dedicated sites such as groklaw etc.
    • Re:Timeline (Score:5, Informative)

      by RealProgrammer ( 723725 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:28AM (#12303393) Homepage Journal

      Here is a more complete searchable timeline [healconsulting.com].

    • Ya I don't see why they wouldn't have seen Linux as the successor. The current SCO is different than the SCO of 2001, and at the time was known as Caldera, and made.....LINUX! So of course that's what they thought was going to be the successor.

      I wonder what the old owners and engineers over Santa Cruz are thinking. Are they thinking "Man, those assclowns are dragging my years of hard work through the trash!" or are they thinking "What's that you say? SCO is suing someone else? So what! I told you not
  • Monterey (Score:5, Funny)

    by bryan986 ( 833912 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:20AM (#12303333) Homepage Journal
    Sounds cheesy doesnt it
  • SCO and IBM (Score:5, Funny)

    by UlfGabe ( 846629 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:22AM (#12303348) Journal
    looks like ibm got the better of SCO

    data... check
    supporting information...check
    patents...gotta wait till the courts are out on this one
    copyright...check
    liscensing...check

    having lots of high priced lawyers.....priceless.
    • looks like ibm got the better of SCO

      Has anyone seen or heard a good rationale for how Caldera, which bought SCO, distributed its own Linux before buying SCO and yet is in this bizarre twist suing people for IP abuse?

      • Caldera's Linux distribution was a nice, polished distribution when Debian was still being considered modern and innovative, Redhat finally managed to get hot with Redhat 6 and Suse was finally getting rid of its Slackware roots with its version 7. CalderaLinux 2 was a good looking, very solid distro.

        On the other hand, Caldera had a very small distribution network, it was completely unknown outside US and never had the network and people to market itself and sell its (pretty good) product. At least it was a

        • Thanks for the post, very informative.

          I live in Santa Cruz, where SCO was formerly known as Santa Cruz Operation, and knew a few good people who used to work there about 7 years ago. SCO had a decent attitude and had good connections with people at my employer, so whatever we were using we received excellent support. It's all gone now, I don't know if anyone is still over there in the buildings near Harvey West.

    • Re:SCO and IBM (Score:3, Insightful)

      by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
      "patents...gotta wait till the courts are out on this one"

      Yea we have to wait but the odds are pretty good that IBM has this locked down. IBM has the patents on just about everything.
  • by NZheretic ( 23872 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:23AM (#12303352) Homepage Journal
    In August 2000, just days after Caldera purchased the Old SCO server division, the then CEO of Caldera, Ransom Love, made a keynote speech at LinuxWorld 2000. A RealPlayer8 video stream of the event [ddj.com] can be found at DrDobbs Journal's Technetcast.

    In the question and answer session at the end of the keynote (44:30 minutes into the videostream), Love was asked about the possible confict over Monterey and Linux IA-64. (A mp3 capture of the transcribed portion) [iwethey.org]

    "Q:
    What happens about Project Monterey, because that conflicts with the IA-64 Linux, 64-bit Linux?

    "Love: OK. I don't -- if we do our job right in making Linux scale over like UnixWare to the degree that everybody, that we know we can... May I ask, some people have said, "Well, people have tried this in the past, but they haven't been that successful," may I suggest: we don't have any ulterior motives for not making it successful. Technologically has not been the reason why it hasn't done it before. There's always some other motive, right? And so to talk about Monterey, clearly we want to make sure we have the same level of Linux integration on Monterey that we would have in our Unixware product. Now, we don't control, I mean, we have a great relationship... it's a joint development relationship with IBM which we intend to preserve ... but they have similar interests and so this is really a very synergistic, uh, this transaction is great for all of the major partners as they have already wanted to embrace Linux moving forward.

    "Now, let me address one other aspect of your question, which is that the Monterey Project is in conflict with the IA-64 Linux Project. I don't believe it's in conflict at all. Now, clearly, we have tremendous vested interest in the IA-64 Linux Project and with the acquisition of SCO, they've been doing a lot, so you combine those, and we've got one of the more comprehensive offerings, I believe, on the IA-64 Linux. So that's clearly an area that we're very committed to. But like Unixware, there's elements of the Monterey kernel that are more scalable, OK? Now, on the IA-64 platform, I don't know how long of window that is, but today, it's a little bit more robust and more scalable than the IA-64 Linux is today. Now, I'm not saying that over time that won't change.

    "But, and let me address one other thing. Sorry, (laughs) you're getting all of it through one question. But clearly we are going to add components back to the Linux kernel on both IA-32 and IA-64 platforms. We'll work with Linus and everyone in order to make that available. That will take some time. And as I mentioned earlier, I don't know that over time you can have a single kernel -- in fact I know you can't -- that will scale, you know, the breadth of IT technology needs. So I think we're looking, in the Linux community, at having multiple kernels, so...

    "Q: Multiple Linux kernels? Or multiple UNIX kernels?

    "Love: Multiple Linux kernels as well, over time.

    "Q: Thank you.

    "Love: You bet.

    • ...just days after Caldera purchased the Old SCO server division...

      Excuse a really trivial nitpick, but Caldera didn't buy the "SCO Server Division". (If there ever was such a thing.) What they bought was most of the assets of Santa Cruz Operation, including the name. The only things held back were the company itself, and the Tarantella terminal server product, which became the sole product (and the new name) of the original SCO.

      As far as I can tell, the UnixWare product that SCO still sells is pretty m

  • by ites ( 600337 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:26AM (#12303380) Journal
    ...that SCO actually launched this case on their own behalf and with some merit?

    I thought it was obvious from very early on that this was a proxy attack on behalf of Microsoft against its two main enemies, IBM and Linux?

    Also, clear by now that the attack failed, with heavy losses to Microsoft.

    The actual contents of SCO's case seem pretty irrelevant.
    • What heavy losses to Microsoft?
      • by ites ( 600337 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:46AM (#12303545) Journal
        1. Loss of a potential weapon against Linux, namely the "you stole IP" accusation.

        2. Loss of face. Microsoft paid SCO, SCO turned out to be little better than shakedown artists.

        3. Kudos to the opposition as a "worth opponent". Linux survived and became much stronger.

        Basically, the SCO case sealed Microsoft's fate as the loser in the commoditization of operating systems. Their only remaining defense is software patentability and if that battle fails in Europe, they are, basically, screwed.

        Heavy losses, yes.
        • by Anonymous Coward
          SCO turned out to be little better than shakedown artists.

          In what way do you think they're better than shakedown artists?
          • SCO kept us amused for years! What stamina and tenacity. Most shakedown artists get tired after a kneecap and a broken finger or two but SCO just go the whole nine yards.

            Also, it was really enjoyable watching SCOX. Sure, all my other stocks went down as well, but when SCOX fell, I knew Microsoft were feeling the pain, and that made everything OK again.
        • Hardly, even without the "you stole IP" accusation regarding SCO IP, there is still the patent issues which have yet to be examined in much depth. You know, the 283 some patents that are used in the Linux kernel, some of which are owned by Microsoft.

          #2 also is moot as Microsoft did not publicly assist SCO in their campaign, and what money they may have invested (directly or indirectly) is a drop in the bucket to them.

          It amazes me though, you claiming that Microsoft's fate is now sealed. How often do we he
          • by ites ( 600337 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @01:04PM (#12304264) Journal
            This from "ihatelinux.blogspot.com"?

            ROTFL.

            I never said Microsoft were evil or monolithic. Try thinking about what I actually said, not what you imagine are people's criticisms of your company.

            283 patents in the Linux kernel? Possibly. All complex software hits patents. The question is: are any of these patents enforceable, have they a basis that will stand up in court, and can they beat the huge patent portfolios that IBM is now making available to free software developers. Do you see what I'm saying? Each patent attack by Microsoft against Linux risks a volley of counterattacks from IBM against Windows.

            Microsoft's fate is sealed for a simple reason, nothing to do with marketing or opinion. Nothing you say, nothing I say, will change this reason.

            Linux repesents something. A sea change in the way software is made. A radical shift. It's not new in itself but the scale and efficiency has been rising exponentially. It was unstoppable in 1999, even long before that.

            Microsoft will either adopt that way, or they will be buried under it. There is no alternative.

            Think about it. Think about the stacks of CDs containing hundreds of millions of lines of high-quality, working, secure, and useful code. Think about the process that produces this software.

            Now think about the pain Microsoft has to produce comparable software. Where is Longhorn? Delayed again? You think patents are going to fix this?

            Microsoft is like a wealthy man dying of cancer. Money is no substitute for youth and health.

            Actually, it's starting to be sad, seeing people like you "defend" Microsoft when no-one is attacking. There is no hate anymore. We're just watching the old man die, even as he spits and tries to claw at us.
            • IMO your view is a little too optimistic. I am by far NOT a MS supporter and would like nothing more than to see their stranglehold on the corporate world broken, but I can't say that I have seen any numbers to support this.

              Sure Longhorn is delayed, but I don't see that affecting MS's bottom line. There are thousands (millions?) of new PC's leaving Dell/HP/IBM everyday that have a MS OS installed on them. The majority of those PC's retain that OS as well, because the vast majority of those are destined for
              • The majority of those PC's retain that OS as well, because the vast majority of those are destined for a corporate environment, where like it or not Linux has made almost no impact.

                Absolutely wrong. I work in a huge semiconductor company. In our engineering environments, we have *many* linux servers per person, and each person has exactly one Windows machine on his desk. I assure you we would not purchase a Windows license for each of those linux servers. Linux has had a profound impact at our compa
                • I don't see how my arguement is wrong. It may be wrong for your company, but your company is an exception, the vast majority of companies that buy PC's run Windows on that machine. Engineering companies, like yours, make up a very small segment of the PC market.

                  I also agree completely with your second argument, Linux does take more market share from Unix than it does from MS, becuase again where Linux is making the biggest in roads is in the data center and large processing "farms" (engineering, video pro
      • i wouldn't call it heavy, but:

        microsoft partly funded this with $10M
        linux has got media attention because of this

        also, if novel do still own unix, wouldn't the license ms bought from sco for posix be invalid, therefore novel would have one more thing to use if ms ever go litigation crazy
    • Actually... (Score:4, Informative)

      by schon ( 31600 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:48AM (#12303566)
      SCO actually launched this case on their own behalf and with some merit?

      Of course not. There was never any merit.

      this was a proxy attack on behalf of Microsoft against its two main enemies, IBM and Linux

      Actually, it started out as a way for SCO executives to bail out a dying company. They threatened IBM with a bogus suit, expecting to be bought out. When they weren't, they shopped it to MS as a way to continue to make IBM's life painful, and for MS to smear Linux.

      Both McBride and Sontag have publically stated this - they were "amazed" that IBM chose to fight, instead of taking the easy way out, and purchasing them.
      • Re:Actually... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by ites ( 600337 )
        Perhaps IBM wanted the fight. They have invested considerably in Linux. Winning this battle - which they must have known they would - has made that investment a lot more valuable.
        • Perhaps IBM wanted the fight.

          I are you implying that IBM set up SCO so that SCO would have something to sue them for? Somehow, I doubt it. And in any case, I have a hard time believing that anyone wants to be sued.

          Winning this battle - which they must have known they would - has made that investment a lot more valuable.

          But it's costing them a lot, and has the potential for damage in the short term (witness the ravings Didiot and Pretenderle.)

          I think that IBM (or any sane company, for that matter) w
          • Re:Actually... (Score:2, Interesting)

            by ites ( 600337 )
            No, not "set up". Well, maybe not.

            But look... IBM are a big, old, wise, rich company. They certainly have spies deep inside Microsoft. At the very least they knew what was happening and had a strategy in place before the first public announcements from SCO.

            Clearly their strategy was to sit tight, stay calm, provide all documents requested by the courts, and allow SCO to beat themselves into silly putty.

            They could have done so many other things... settled, bought SCO, bribed someone. But they went thr
        • This outstanding post [slashdot.org] by rimbo a few weeks back explains why IBM wanted the fight and how it went about it.
      • Re:Actually... (Score:2, Insightful)

        Perhaps IBM, decided to crush and utterly destroy a company trying to manipulate them through baseless claims.

        Maybe IBM was even smart enough to realize that tSCOg was hoping to be bought out, and decided *not* to play their little game, even though the financial cost was higher, in order to set an example for others who might think they could try something similar.

        IBM got bit in a similar way, back in the early 90s, when a gentleman by the name of Olaf Soderblom claimed he'd patented Token Ring and extra
      • I doubt SCO ever wanted to go to court. They probably expected a big payout from IBM and other deep pockets to make them go away.

        I am not amazed that IBM fought them. It's to IBM's advantage that they deal with extortionists ruthlessly, as a warning to others.

        But even so, SCO's ploy worked. The went from a penny stock (below 50 cents) to about $20 at one point. Any shareholder who sold at the right time made out like a bandit.

        So far as Microsoft backing SCO, I don't see any evidence of it until BaySta

    • I've been following the SCO case closely and it has never been obvious to me that Microsoft is involved to this extent. I'm not even sure they are all that happy about it. SCO case was incredibly weak. But the press is dumb. Because not many in the press did any research on SCO's claim and come forward and say "there is no case here" once SCO loses the perception will be that:

      1) Linux copyright / patent claims have been tested in court
      2) The GPL has been tested in court

      That's not good for Microsoft.
  • by Dav3K ( 618318 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:32AM (#12303423)
    ...but why stop beating it now? Since the conclusion is pretty obvious now, the announcement I am waiting for is the final judgement on the SCO cases.
  • by cyanics ( 168644 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:33AM (#12303430) Homepage Journal
    In the late 90's and early 00's, SCO was messing around with a product called LKP (Linux Kernel Personality) which was a method for allowing system calls from linux applications to the UNIX kernel.

    If SCO was so anti-linux, why would they make a move to incorporate linux into its own product. That step right there discounts any claims they might have regarding linux code source.
    • That was the old SCO (Santa Cruz Operation), not the new SCO...
    • More interesting are the allegations that LKP used GPL Linux kernel source code.
    • by k98sven ( 324383 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @12:07PM (#12303719) Journal
      If SCO was so anti-linux, why would they make a move to incorporate linux into its own product. That step right there discounts any claims they might have regarding linux code source.

      No it doesn't. They weren't incorporating Linux code. They were making a compatibility layer so you could run Linux apps; BSD has one too.

      But the main thing is: SCO was not at all anti-linux until Darl McBride entered the game as new CEO after Ransom Love. SCO was a Linux distributor, forchrissakes!
      (And that, however, may invalidate any claims they had on Linux code, since by distributing, they are bound to follow the GPL)

      However in reality they don't have any claims on Linux. Despite what they've been repeatedly telling the press, they haven't claimed in court that Linux infringes on their Unix copyrights. What they claimed in court was that IBM couldn't contribute to Linux since they had a Unix license. (Although the contract seems to indicate otherwise).

      They made some other claims, too, but in reality the SCO-IBM case has very little to do with Linux at all. IBM's counterclaims regarding SCO's public statements and GPL violations are actually the more directly Linux-related things in this whole mess.

      • They weren't incorporating Linux code. They were making a compatibility layer so you could run Linux apps; BSD has one too.

        Actually, it does incorporate Linux code. A number of the developers of it flat out said so. In fact, it may be the ONLY thing that involves linux and/or GPL code in this whole suit.

        • I'm pretty convinced it does. I had the beta versions tested on my boxes way back then and it was also built on top of Redhat initially, not Caldera Linux (which was more suprising than anything else). If only I kept a copy of the CDs before I left the company (a SCO main distributior in an EMEA country). I was in a hurry to leave the shithead bastards so I couldn't do anything about it. I just handed my notice and the next day I was gone. One of the best decisions I've made in my life. (The worst one was a
      • "Despite what they've been repeatedly telling the press, they haven't claimed in court that Linux infringes on their Unix copyrights."

        Not exactly true. Remember, tSCOg is involved in several cases. When Red Hat sued them (for, among other things, trade libel), they told that court (Delaware) that the copyright issues with respect to Linux would be sorted out in the Utah case (tSCOg v IBM). However, in the Utah courts, they told the judge that the case doesn't have anything to do with Linux copyrights.
      • However in reality they don't have any claims on Linux. Despite what they've been repeatedly telling the press, they haven't claimed in court that Linux infringes on their Unix copyrights. What they claimed in court was that IBM couldn't contribute to Linux since they had a Unix license. (Although the contract seems to indicate otherwise).

        Actually they did make claims on Linux in their original filing against IBM. The claims were extremely vague however and SCO has gone for an explination of those claim
  • by Alexander ( 8916 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:37AM (#12303469) Homepage
    To the best of my ability to recall...

    in 96-97, SCO and HP and Intel were all joined in happy hands developing what was going to become Itanium.

    HP and SCO were going to merge their flavors of UNIX, as well - a move that fell apart (rumor has it) when SCO showed up to the table with something like 1/10th of the developers HP did.

    Remember that it takes a while for Monterey-like deals to be created from a BizDev standpoint, maybe as much as 6-12 months - so it's likely that Monterey came about as a response from SCO's viewpoint as a substitute for the aborted HP collab. (A quick google for Monterey will turn up all sorts of anti-HP language circa 1998). IBM had nothing to lose, AIX was already a poor performer - heck up until 2000 or so the largest Sun reseller was IBM (one of the smartest things IBM did was embrace Linux).

    And knowing SCO circa 1998 - I really doubt they thought of Linux as much more of a fad... a predominant source of income at that point being support contracts and services (NT 4 was the major threat to platform migration away from SCO at the time).

    • by Anonymous Coward
      Shit, a broken boot-loader for a 6502 would've been a threat to 'SCO at the time'.
    • I've always felt that the SCO of the 90's is a very different organization then the SCO of today.

      Different officers, different headquarters, different staff. They kept the most of the IP, and spun off a huge chunk of their business into Tarantella. Although, I find SCO's history to be very confusing.

      It's really really sad, because if there was one company in the 90s that had the expertise to really expand in the Linux market, it was SCO. They had so many great ideas back then. Other vendors are only now j
      • Not really. Most of their EMEA people were a) Linux people came to work with them because of a steady salary (I was in this group and I needed the money b) OpenUnix people who knew almost nothing about any modern Unix system. They were constantly amazed with the features of Unixware (which was bought from Novell).

        Their sales pitch were pathetic and especially my boss was a complete dickhead and was joking about "Linux being a toy OS". I tried to explain what was going to happen for months and he would just

      • I've always felt that the SCO of the 90's is a very different organization then the SCO of today.

        Yup. Completely different. Not surprising, because it's an enitirely different company that happens to run under the same name.

        They kept the most of the IP, and spun off a huge chunk of their business into Tarantella.


        Actually, no. SCO sold off the tattered remants of their Unix business to a company called Caldera, and then renamed themselves to Tarantella. Subsequently, Caldera renamed themselves
      • SCO in the early 90's was a great company. Even by the mid 90's the ideas and the people were gone. Look at what they faced in say '93. With OS/2 (and later NT) being as good as they were there were good x86 servers systems which were cheap. The x86 hardware just wasn't comparable in quality to what other Unix vendors had. People would not buy a $15k PC which made selling an OS/applications suite for more than that impossible. Worse the other Unix / hardware vendors could make the OS almost free if t
  • by Elwood P Dowd ( 16933 ) <judgmentalist@gmail.com> on Thursday April 21, 2005 @11:56AM (#12303628) Journal
    The people who are now in charge of SCO saw that their business was failing. Their only workable solution was to get bought out and quickly. They looked at all their existing contracts and decided that they could tilt at IBM and get some attention.

    This is completely unrelated to their expectations in the Monterey project, when different people were running the company with different goals.
  • by btarval ( 874919 ) on Thursday April 21, 2005 @12:09PM (#12303733)
    SCO's statment according to The Fine Article:

    "Unlike IBM, virtually none of these (Linux) software developers and hobbyists had access to enterprise-scale equipment and testing facilities for Linux development."

    This was back in 2001.

    Pardon me, but this is blatent nonsense. SGI had a significant push to put Linux on the Itanium Processor back in 2001. I don't believe that it was announced publically then, but it was a significant effort, and the NUMA stuff resulted from it (among other things). This is definitely Enterprise-class equipment, well beyond the price range for your average "hobbyist". And needless to say, this required Enterprise-class testing. I speak from direct experience, as I was involved with the project.

    So this statement alone is blatently false, and here's some more ammo for PJ to shoot down SCO's claims.

    Heck, 64-bit Linux appeared on Sun's 64-bit SPARC machines before SunSoft had completed it's 64-bitization efforts as well. This was back in the Solaris 2.7 timeframe, around 1998, IIRC. Most people would consider the 64-bit SPARCs to be Enterprise level as well.

    • Alan Cox has agreed with SCO that the core Linux team didn't have the experience to do this work by themselves in the mid 90's. A Linux distribution by the name of Caldera helped a lot and and provided the enterprise class hardware for guys like Cox. Oh and BTW this was before IBM had any involvement at all.

      Can't wait till they IBM gets to put him on the stand. "Yes I wrote that code...."
      • Yes, that's true of the core Linux team in the mid-90's. But what SCO is trying to allege is false; namely, it was mostly due to IBM's entrance into the Linux world that got Linux onto Enterprise class hardware.

        That's just blatantly false, and can be backed up by hard evidence.

        Clearly there were other efforts at the same time, and well before, IBM entered the arena.
        • I think you are missing the joke here. SCO was alleging must have had outside help (IBM). The guy who wrote the majority of the code and led the others on the the team agrees they had outside the outside help is SCO (i.e. Caldera bought SCO). So in other words IBM is going to able to provide evidence that not only didn't they do what SCO alleges they did but the part who did it was in fact SCO!

  • I would be interested in seeing something in print from IBM about Monterey being a stepping stone to Linux. The material I have states that it is a planned common UNIX for Power, IA-32 and IA-64 processors. Also nothing about Linux in the press release linked from the Groklaw article. Monterey was more to get AIX back into the mainstream then anything else. I have never heard any plan to "phase out" or transition AIX to Linux. They are both running on IBM systems quite happily now.
  • Al right, enough already. This SCO suit has become so absurd that no one is buying it anymore. It's time to drop the act, and admit the truth.
    The whole SCO fiasco was just an attempt to cover up the true origins of Linux. If we could create the rumor that Linux was a pirated version of AT&T UNIX, then we wouldn't have to admit that it was really reverse engineered from the computers aboard alien spacecraft under study by project BlueBook in Area 51 of the Nellis Airforce base in Groome Lake, NV.
    So there

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