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Time for Us Programmers to Help Define APIs in "Legal Termonology"? | 438 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Corrections here
Authored by: feldegast on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 12:44 PM EDT
So they can be fixed

---
IANAL
My posts are ©2004-2012 and released under the Creative Commons License
Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0
P.J. has permission for commercial use.

[ Reply to This | # ]

News picks
Authored by: feldegast on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 12:45 PM EDT
Please make links clickable

---
IANAL
My posts are ©2004-2012 and released under the Creative Commons License
Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0
P.J. has permission for commercial use.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Off topic
Authored by: feldegast on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 12:46 PM EDT
Please make links clickable

---
IANAL
My posts are ©2004-2012 and released under the Creative Commons License
Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0
P.J. has permission for commercial use.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Comes transcribing
Authored by: feldegast on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 12:49 PM EDT
Thank you for your support, see http://ww w.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.p hp?page=ComesBooking for documents

---
IANAL
My posts are ©2004-2012 and released under the Creative Commons License Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0
P.J. has permission for commercial use.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Florian is flipping out
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 12:54 PM EDT

Jonathan Schwartz is testifying now, and Florian is flipping out and sniping at him like a middle schooler.

His Twitter feed and some examples:

Florian Mueller
Jonathan Schwartz takes positions on Java that would, if adopted as a strategy, drive almost every software company out of business.

Wikipedia isn't a business model RT @jniccolai Schwartz in school teacher mode, explaining open source to jury using Wikipedia as example.

With the exception of Red Hat, which didn't build Linux itself, no company ever made serious money on only that basis.

Chris Adamson
.@FOSSpatents Well, Schwartz already ran one company into the ground, why not take out the rest?
Retweeted by Florian Mueller

[ Reply to This | # ]

Oracle must hate this guy now
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 01:15 PM EDT
@BrandonBailey
Schartz on initial talks with Google : we probly wud have
paid them to work with us on a java phone.

@jniccolai
Google attorney: Were APIs ever sold or licensed separately
from the language? Schwartz: No, of course not.

Damn.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Former Sun CEO: We would have paid Google for Java phone
Authored by: SilverWave on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 01:44 PM EDT
Former Sun CEO: We would have paid Google for Java phone

---
RMS: The 4 Freedoms
0 run the program for any purpose
1 study the source code and change it
2 make copies and distribute them
3 publish modified versions

[ Reply to This | # ]

the chess move may be both good and bad
Authored by: hAckz0r on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 01:56 PM EDT
I'm happy if this "chess move" works for Google, but then it does nothing to affirm the non-copyrightability of API's. Apparently its not just a slam-dunk in this court district to say that an API is not copyrightable and we may have had the ruling from the bench had this not come up. I was hoping there would be a precedent set by the court which would serve to prevent this kind of case in the future. If Googles chess move works as we expect then we may still be without this important ruling.

---
DRM - As a "solution", it solves the wrong problem; As a "technology" its only 'logically' infeasible.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Could this be a real "Perry Mason" moment?
Authored by: jesse on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 02:04 PM EDT
Could this be a real "Perry Mason" moment?

:-)

[ Reply to This | # ]

Oracle: Schwartz is not a lawyer
Authored by: jbb on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 02:25 PM EDT
@BrandonBailey:
Uh-oh for goggle: oracle attorney just got schwartz to say he’s testifying based on biz strategy, implying not necessarily legal position
This is ridiculous. Sure Schwartz is not a lawyer; neither are Rubin or Lindholm. If the jury disregards statements about licenses from non-lawyers then Oracle is sunk. What is vastly more important is that, unlike the internal communications by Rubin and Lindholm, Schwartz' statements were public. Google is allowed to rely on the statements and actions of Schwartz when he was Sun's CEO even if he was wrong.

---
Our job is to remind ourselves that there are more contexts than the one we’re in now — the one that we think is reality.
-- Alan Kay

[ Reply to This | # ]

Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 02:47 PM EDT
However, even though Schwartz said that Sun wanted to get revenue from Google if a partnership could be hammered out, Schwartz said that the deal did not fall apart for money. “We probably would have paid them to work with us on a Java phone,” Schwartz admitted.

That part is hilarious. Google was willing to pay Sun lots of money to let them use Sun's Java implementation and trademarks, but with Google keeping control over the resulting mobile platform. But Sun wouldn't go for it. And Sun was willing to pay Google lots of money to develop a Java phone platform, but with Sun keeping control over the resulting mobile platform!

Result: after many months of unsuccessful negotiations, nobody paid anybody, Google went their own way and built their own implementation from scratch. And both companies *still* benefited from the synergy of having two platforms whose APIs were compatible: Google got access to the large developer base who were already familiar with the Java language and the Java platform APIs, and Sun got an infusion of new developers making things for Android who were all writing Java code and now had the skills to make things for Sun's desktop Java platform too.

Then Oracle came along and tried to claim "all your base are belong to us".. It's weird how things work out.

[ Reply to This | # ]

BSF & Larry Ellison - Perfect partners
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 02:55 PM EDT
Their ego's match and they both are poster children for win-
lose, not win-win negotiation (litigation). And better than
SCO, Oracle has lots more $$$$$s.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Law of unintended consequences
Authored by: BobinAlaska on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 02:59 PM EDT
I wonder if anyone at Oracle has taken a look at the number of APIs that they
are using the "belong" to someone else. If they get what they want
they may just "cut off their nose to spite their face." Way back when,
a looooong time ago, when I was writing assembler language for IBM I was using
what today would be called APIs while working on ASP and JES3. How many of you
remember those acronyms?

---
Bob Helm, North Las Vegas, NV

[ Reply to This | # ]

Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj
Authored by: IMANAL_TOO on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 03:10 PM EDT
Even if all are reading the twitters:

https://twitter.com/#!/tqft9999/googlevoracle

9m BrandonBailey ‏ @BrandonBailey
Mcneely undercutting Schwartz - sez "Jonathans blog" not official
policy; he didnt read it

18m James Niccolai James Niccolai ‏ @jniccolai
McNealy contradicting Schwartz's testimony - eg, Jonathan's blog did not
represent Sun's official corporate policy

22m Dan Levine Dan Levine ‏ @FedcourtJunkie
McNealy: Sun blog items (like the one Schwartz wrote praising Android) were
personal, not at all company policy



https://twitter.com/#!/Feldegast

17m James Niccolai ‏ @jniccolai
McNealy contradicting Schwartz's testimony - eg, Jonathan's blog did not
represent Sun's official corporate policy
Retweeted by Lee MacKinnell

20m Dan Levine Dan Levine ‏ @FedcourtJunkie
McNealy: Sun blog items (like the one Schwartz wrote praising Android) were
personal, not at all company policy
Retweeted by Lee MacKinnell

25m BrandonBailey BrandonBailey ‏ @BrandonBailey
McNeely much more low-key than Schwartz, but helping Oracle by saying APIs are
like blueprints & Java language is boards & nails
Retweeted by Lee MacKinnell



What a show!

Still, I wonder who has the most credibility to the jury here. Schwartz or
McNealy?

I mean the blog is not the official word? Hmmm. SUN was VERY aware of that blog!

---
______
IMANAL


.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Schwartz knew what he was doing, and, the remainder of SUN (including McNealy) too!
Authored by: IMANAL_TOO on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 03:23 PM EDT
Jonathan Schwartz at www.webcitation.org/5wUC3JBDO:
Monday Oct 02, 2006
One Small Step for the Blogosphere...

I've been an officer of a public company for a while, and I've had access to confidential information for a good while longer. And I'm used to holding my tongue on issues that'd be deemed material to Sun's financial performance. Like a pending acquisition or big sale, or data related to how our quarter's going. In a public company, there are very strict laws surrounding how information's disclosed.

So a couple years ago, when I first started blogging, I and our illustrious general counsel were far less worried about what I was saying, than where I was saying it. For example, I couldn't use my blog to announce our quarterly performance, or disclose a material transaction. I had to use a press release, or a conference call (with a telephone operator, no less!).

Why?

A regulation known as "Reg FD," or Regulation Fair Disclosure - which attempts to ensure no one audience gets preferential access to material non-public information. It's a great concept, designed to prevent selective disclosure, or actions that might advantage one investor over another.[...]

Our corporate website (www.sun.com) currently receives on average of nearly a million hits per day. This website includes a blog that I write as CEO of Sun Microsystems (www.blogs.sun.com/jonathan), as well as the blogs of over 4,000 of our other employees. My blog is syndicated across the Internet by use of RSS technology; thus, its content is "pushed" to subscribers. This website is a tremendous vehicle for the broad delivery of timely and robust information about our company. It is our view that proprietary news outlets are insufficiently accessible to the broad majority of Internet users and individual shareholders. It is certainly the case that the Internet represents a broader user base than those able to afford subscriptions to traditional forms of media and thus usage of this or any other freely available company blog or web site should be considered sufficient in satisfying the objectives of Regulation Fair Disclosure.


Schwartz knew what he was doing, and, the remainder of SUN (including McNealy) too!

McNealy's complaints sound very feeble in light of this.



---
______
IMANAL


.

[ Reply to This | # ]

McNealy “Anyone who pays that much taxes .... "
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 03:53 PM EDT
Now why would McNealy say that? And how does he know about
the insides of Mr. Ellisons taxes? Thats very odd. Whats
going on wih these two Gentlemen?

How opportune of Mr. McNealy to forget totally about the
199.5 Million that the "national economic hero"
payed to settle that fraud case with the U.S. Government.

[ Reply to This | # ]

who is going to lose on the big fat manual?
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 03:54 PM EDT
compileable code concept is? source code?

Fundamental to. not a technicality ..?

list of things lost in source code after filtration for non-protected elements?

[ Reply to This | # ]

@ZDNetRachel: drinking game for the Oracle-Google trial.
Authored by: SilverWave on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 04:22 PM EDT
Rachel King ‏ @ZDNetRachel

There really should be a drinking game for the Oracle-Google trial. Something
about taking a sip every time you hear someone explain an API

---
RMS: The 4 Freedoms
0 run the program for any purpose
1 study the source code and change it
2 make copies and distribute them
3 publish modified versions

[ Reply to This | # ]

Former Sun chiefs differ on Google's use of Oracle's Java code in Android By Brandon Bailey
Authored by: SilverWave on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 04:26 PM EDT
Former Sun chiefs differ on Google's use of Oracle's Java code in Android By Brandon Bailey bbailey@mercurynews.com

---
RMS: The 4 Freedoms
0 run the program for any purpose
1 study the source code and change it
2 make copies and distribute them
3 publish modified versions

[ Reply to This | # ]

Ex-Sun Boss Defends Google’s Right To Java on Android By Caleb Garling
Authored by: SilverWave on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 04:27 PM EDT
Ex-Sun Boss Defends Google’s Right To Java on Android By Caleb Garling

---
RMS: The 4 Freedoms
0 run the program for any purpose
1 study the source code and change it
2 make copies and distribute them
3 publish modified versions

[ Reply to This | # ]

Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj - Updated 2Xs
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 04:28 PM EDT
I think you guys may want to look at this:
http://www.openoffice.org/licenses/sca.pdf

It is the Sun Contributor Agreement.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Android device activations have skyrocketed lately, and now average around 850,000 a day.
Authored by: SilverWave on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 05:26 PM EDT
Android device activations have skyrocketed lately, and now average around 850,000 a day.

---
RMS: The 4 Freedoms
0 run the program for any purpose
1 study the source code and change it
2 make copies and distribute them
3 publish modified versions

[ Reply to This | # ]

McNealy - license not just about the name
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 05:33 PM EDT
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/oracle-tries- to-rebound-with-h elp-from-sun-co-founder/75470
In an effort to null the testimony the jury heard from Schwartz less than 30 minutes prior, Boies asked if it was ever Sun’s policy to allow any company to implement an incompatible version of Java so long as they didn’t call it Java. “I don’t recall that was ever a strategy that we pursued nor allowed in the marketplace,” replied McNealy.

Interesting... So he didn't know the policies set out by the CEO at the time?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Confusion between free, proprietary and open-source
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 05:45 PM EDT
Even if the Java APIs are open-source and not proprietary, that does not mean
that
they're "free" in every sense. One Java implementation, OpenJDK is
completely open-
source under the GPL license, but Google did not want to use that because they
didn't
want the GPL.

I'm just saying that you should be more careful in the descriptions, because
sometimes
you're making implications hat aren't correct. For example, a couple days ago
you said
"Oracle seems, to me, to be trying to develop a kind of proprietary
alternative to
Linux/FOSS. If you license Java, you get extensible software. What else would
you need?
Freedom? That's not an Oracle meme, from all I've seen. So I now have come to
suspect
that this is about forcing FOSS into a very sad and limited corner, where it
actually
can't compete any more, because FOSS developers don't have the big bucks, other
than
Google, to pay for licenses and patents."

Let me repeat that: the Sun/Oracle's OpenJDK is open-source. Whether or not it's
"free"
or free enough for your taste is a matter of preference. Google DID NOT WANT
Sun's
open-source Java. They didn't want their closed-sourced Java (which is basically
the
same but under a different license) either.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj - Updated 3Xs
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 06:52 PM EDT
Correction to the transcript is needed. The man referred to
is Jeet Kaul. I know him personally as he was my engineering
manager at NetObjects when I worked there, and have verified
that this is the guy they are talking about as he held the
indicated positions at Sun.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Library of Congress now says that there is no data on the disk.
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 07:08 PM EDT
Ummm? When I stop boggling I might consider
if there ever was any data on the disk, what happened to it?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj - Updated 4Xs
Authored by: charlie Turner on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 08:26 PM EDT
Jonathan Schwartz: Example of Linux, when it first arose. Suing Linux would just make Linux more popular. You can embrace it or litigate.
He understood that way back then... That's a quote to remember. Hmm..., can we extrapolate that to Android?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Comparison Of Novell and Sun Strategy
Authored by: sk43 on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 08:39 PM EDT
The Schwartz testimony regarding Sun's strategy with Java has an eerie parallel
with Ty Mattingly's testimony regarding Novell's strategy with UNIX. It was all
about competing with Microsoft.

========

Here is Mattingly from SCO/Novell, Day 5:

"... but more importantly for Novell was to try and get a common UNIX
platform out there on Intel so that there was a viable alternative to what
MICROSOFT was offering that was eroding NetWare away aggressively ... there
would have been nothing better for Novell than if SCO had been very successful
with this UNIX business that they had acquired in successfully unifying the
entire industry around their UNIX offering on X86 architecture. If they could
have done that, that would have ERODED OUR REVENUE STREAMS here from this SVRX
old royalties. But in the greater STRATEGIC contest, that would have been a
FANTASTIC TRADEOFF for Novell."

So for Novell, getting people to use UNIX was worthwhile, even if it cost Novell
money.

==========

Next, here is Jonathan Schwartz's testimony:

Jonathan Schwartz: "Yes. MICROSOFT was defining what was available, Java
was all about being able to write an app that didn't require Windows.
STRATEGICALLY very important to open market and opportunities."

........

Google: "Did you say that Android was helping Java?"

Jonathan Schwartz: "They could have picked MICROSOFT Windows, or they could
pick Java. Which would you prefer?"

For Sun, better to have Google run Java than something from Microsoft, even if
Sun wasn't actually getting revenue.

=================

Remember this article?

http://groups.google.com/group/comp.unix.sco.announce/browse_thread/thread/533bb
682f369759e/

"LINUX, OPEN SOURCE MOVEMENTS SHIFT SPOTLIGHT BACK TO UNIX SYSTEM
INNOVATION AND AWAY FROM SINGLE-VENDOR LOCK-IN"

Mar 3, 1999

"SCO Adds Linux Application Binary Support To Award-Winning UnixWare
System"

"A port to Linux is a port to UNIX"

Even Santa Cruz was delighted to have developers writing for Linux.

[ Reply to This | # ]

I would like to thank our court reporter for Groklaw
Authored by: dacii on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 09:16 PM EDT
The difference in what happened in court and reported by our Groklaw friend is
far superior to what I have been reading in the press and or tweets. While the
tweets can be fun at times, it lacks .. reality .. of what really happened. Our
reporter is AWESOME! And I thank them a million times over. The other thing
after reading some of this is that the copyright office allows redacted
production. why? I find that stunning for the copyright office to do that.
Their purpose is to record for the public an accurate record. why offer
redacted production for courts? I am sooo confused. I can understand if the
court wants a document redacted, but if you register a copyright shouldn't that
be readable by US citizens so that they have the opportunity to see and avoid
copyright litigation?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Uber-geek on the stand
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 26 2012 @ 11:23 PM EDT
> Google: When Sun bought Sabadje, Sun didn't have a full
stack?
> Craig Gering: Yes, they did not have a full stack.

Only a computer bod could talk in this way. "Normal" humans
would say "No, they did not have a full stack." :-)

[ Reply to This | # ]

Time for Us Programmers to Help Define APIs in "Legal Termonology"?
Authored by: RMAC9.5 on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 12:01 AM EDT
* API = named idea. [Idea - Not Copyrightable]
* API name and syntax = the interface between humans and computers and/or computer programs which exchange information. The name and syntax are functional and fixed because computers are absolutely literal. [Functional - Not Copyrightable]
* API Specification = a precise description of the named idea in human language. [a "method of operation" or a "merger doctrine" entity - Not Copyrightable]
* API Implementation = code to tell a computer how to do perform the activity described by the named idea. [Creative and original - Copyrightable]
The above quote, which I liked a lot, is "mostly" from Anonymous in a previous thread. The underlined parts are my contribution.
PJ and Mark seem to like it when our examples use the legal terminology that they are trying to teach us.

What do you guys think? Did I get it right?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Ability to stop shipping and need for a licence?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 12:48 AM EDT
Hmmm...I would guess that Oracle are claiming infringement as they presume that Google need a licence and don't have one:
Jonathan Schwartz: Yes I know it. Dynamics of Open Source community. Linux was a clone of Unix… GNU Classpath was an OSS implementation of Java. There was little that we could do to stop them; they didn't call it Java.

Google: They used the Java Programming Language?

Judge: And the APIs?

Jonathan Schwartz: Yes.

Google: Did they ever call themselves Java?

Jonathan Schwartz: Not to the best of my knowledge.

Google: As CEO of Sun, were you satisfied that what GNU Classpath was doing was fine?

Jonathan Schwartz: There was nothing that we could or did do to stop it.

Google: GNU Classpath had a license?

Jonathan Schwartz: They had no license.
...
Cross Examination of Jonathan Schwartz
...
[ JS made clear that the calling of a product Java was the nub of the problem. ]
...
Oracle: Back to TX2707, what Mr. Van Nest was asking about. He asked about page 1. Let me ask about page 2: "For independent implementations, we grant rights for implementation that satisfy compatibility requirements."

Jonathan Schwartz: It's a problem if they go out and call their independent implementation Java.
...
Oracle: If Apache wished to release Apache Harmony and not call it Java, they were wrong?

Jonathan Schwartz: Conflating brand and the specification.. No way of separating the brand from the specification.

Oracle: Did Apache just miss that?

Jonathan Schwartz: I spent a lot of time on this issue, and did a lot of interviews on this issue. They can ship their code. They cannot call it Java.
...
Harmony doesn't have a licence, nor does GNU Classpath; but then again, neither of them calls it "Java".
...
Oracle: Did you suggest a licence to Google that would make Dalvik compatible, and would require TCK? Did you have that in mind as a possible solution for Android?

Jonathan Schwartz: Yes, if they wanted to use the name "Java".
So, if Android wanted to use the name Java, it would need to have a licence, and access to the TCK to ensure compatibility.

But Anrdoid doesn't claim to be Java and use the name "Java"; it just says that Java code is compatible, just like Java code is compatible with Harmony and Gnu Classpath neither of which has a licence and neither of which Sun's CEO claims they could stop.

[ Reply to This | # ]

API analogies?
Authored by: mtew on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 01:21 AM EDT
One of the key issues is what is an Application Program Interface (API).

One of the problems is that APIs are quite large with layers and sub-layers.
Another problem is that they are more than a little esoteric. (If you don't
know anything about computer programming, the odds are that you have not run
across the term.)

I thought it might be helpful to present some analogies for discussion:

The University, bureaucracy or larger corporation analogy:

o - An API has some attributes of a department. If gathers together a bunch of
related topics or activities and teaches or performs those topics or
activities.

o - The over all structure for a given function or activity has to be very
close, personal titles need to be standard enough so a stranger can interact
effectively, and so on.

o - Take this and scale it up from hundreds of people interacting over weeks or
months to thousands to hundreds of thousands of programmers that have to get
their jobs done in hours or days and you get the need for the restrictions for
an API.

A multi-volume home improvement encyclopedia...

Dictionary, thesaurus, phrase book, and the cultural literature of a natural
language...

---
MTEW

[ Reply to This | # ]

Ya think Oracle should have just let it go?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 02:49 AM EDT
I think Oracle's cross of Johnathon Schwartz did far more damage to their case
than any testimony to date.

bkd

[ Reply to This | # ]

Thanks to the reporters thread
Authored by: Ian Al on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 05:20 AM EDT
Talk about blasé! I haven't even read the reports, yet.

Don't have to. They'll be great.

---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid!

[ Reply to This | # ]

'Oracle: Google's counsel is confusing things, accidentally.'
Authored by: Ian Al on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 05:30 AM EDT
We, on the other hand, are professionals.

We confuse, deliberately.

---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid!

[ Reply to This | # ]

Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj - Updated 6Xs
Authored by: kuroshima on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 07:16 AM EDT
<blockquote>[PJ: In case anyone is new, impeachment is the
legal term for when you are presenting information as
evidence that demonstrates the witness isn't being truthful
in his testimony. If you think of APIs as analogous to all
the possible types of objections a lawyer can use, i.e.,
lack of foundation, assumes facts not in evidence,
argumentative, leading, hearsay, etc., impeachment is one
type of objection on the list. To actually use these "APIs",
or objections on the list, the lawyer has to decide during
testimony which type of objection he wants to use when he
hears the other side ask the witness a question, then
actually stand up and say the name of the type of objection,
and then he has to respond to any questions the judge may
ask or to any reasons the other side presents why the
objection is not right. That list is the APIs in my analogy.
The list doesn't do anything. The items on the list don't do
anything. They are ideas. You can think, Impeachment. All
the lawyers and the judge know what that means if you say it
out loud. Saying impeachment isn't the definition of that
objection, although in books you can find the menaing and a
description of it, but everyone knows and has the idea in
their minds when you stand up and just say the name of the
objection, Impeachment. The implementation of impeachment
objections is to stand up and start the process going and
follow through on the steps. If you choose the wrong one
from the list, it doesn't work. There you go: An API
definition for lawyers. You are welcome.]</blockquote>

PJ, you have definitively grokked what an API is. That would
be the objection API. It's a very good analogy. An API is
basically something that you use to access the underlying
infrastructure to obtain a result. It's an interface, and it
usually includes codified calls. A NAL would not know the
API to access the court infrastructure (including the judge,
and please I'm not trying to be rude to judges, but from the
PoV of the API, the judges, clerks, etc are infrastructure).
In this case, it's the Objection API, that must be invoked
by using the correct code words. Codified for a computer, in
Java, it would be:

public interface receivesObjections{ //

public enum objectionType{ FOUNDATION, HEARSAY /*temporary
list, should be have more things in it, consult legal*/}

public bool objection(objectionType reason); //for use when
the state of the object includes all the necessary
information

public bool objection(objectionType reason, String
explanation); //for use when the state of the object does
not contain enough information to fully evaluate the
objecton

}

Of course, this would be a draft, because the comments as
documented would not be caught by javadoc.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Professor Astrachan: A declaration and a signature are synonymous
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 07:25 AM EDT
Not entirely correct: a declaration can give (technically unnamed) parameters
names and can contain comments. Those are only of interest to human readers. A
signature, in contrast, is boiled down to the actual information required by the
compiler.

You can make a declaration contain copyrightable prose not relevant to the
function/compiler. The signature is bare bones, in contrast.

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Google buddy?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 07:25 AM EDT
"I was with my Google buddy over the weekend. They hate GPL, like Apache
Harmony."

I'd take a guess that his "Google Buddy" doesn't actually work for
Google.

Anyone else finding this suspisious?

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Scott McNealy just *takes* Groklaw IP without a licence
Authored by: Ian Al on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 07:55 AM EDT
That brake pedal auto analogy, that's ours to this day.

It might not be registered, but it is fixated in an html document on the
interweb.

I'm shocked, shocked that such a key industry figure would be so cavalier and
yet still want licence revenue from Google for 'something they didn't want'.

---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid!

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Good API Analogy...
Authored by: gus_goose on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 08:32 AM EDT
For the past few days 'everyone' has been trying to come up with a good analogy
for 'API'. I have just had an 'inspiration'.

Air Traffic Control.....

You have big planes, helicopters, small planes, military planes, etc. You have
big airports, small airports, ones with lots of runways, ones with just one.

But, for any pilot, the air-traffic-control API is always consistent. For all
international airports, the language is always English. Runways are named by
their orientation (runway 18 is always at 180 degrees). Altitudes and headings
are always consistent... etc.

In this analogy, The Java API represents the means for communicating with the
'air traffic control' system. The Java 'Language' in this analogy is 'English'.
The API Has methods like "clear to take off", or "turn right
heading 275", or "ascend to flight level 30", or "Mayday!
Mayday!".

Java happens to have implemented that API using, for example, a 'Union of Air
Traffic Controllers', with a specific set of pre-authorized/tested hardware
(radios, computers, etc.).

Android has designed a different set of computers in the background, and it's
'Air Traffic Controllers' are in a different 'Union', but, most importantly, the
Android-run 'Airports' do not claim to be 'Java' Airports, only that, for all
the 'core' airport API, they will do mostly the same as the 'Java' API, and
there are some things Java airports support which Androi airports can't do, and
Android have extended or added some API's for doing other things.

Android says there is a particular type of airport where their implementation of
the API is better than Java (and the market place - the pilots - agree).

Everyone using these 'different' airports knows that there are
extensions/omissions from the Air Traffic API, but that's OK too.

Java is now suing saying that Android needs a license to use the API.... Android
is saying "the API is not something you can own". Java says you need a
license if you want to say your airport is a 'Java' Airport. Android says 'It's
an Android Airport, not a Java airport, so it needs no license'.

Anyway, just another concept of what an API is ....

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  • Compilable code - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 08:58 AM EDT
    • Compilable code - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 12:11 PM EDT
  • Good API Analogy... - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 09:07 AM EDT
API, package, class, declaration, etc: Do you think that it's unclear what the difference is?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 09:05 AM EDT
I'm really not sure why the judge seems to be having so much
difficulty with the idea of implementation, methods,
declarations, classes, packages and APIs.

Do you guys think it's confusing?

I mean, why are they trying to use analogy at all? Why not
just use the real thing?

Have the parties not demonstrated the basics of Java?

Where is the space for confusion? Is it just that the judge,
and presumably jury are not well versed in the ideas, so it
needs re-iteration? Or is there some deeper legal idea
behind the judges questioning, that I've missed?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Scott McNealy
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 09:31 AM EDT
Scott McNealy's testimony makes him look like he didn't know what was going on
in Sun at all.

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McNealy's sour blog gr(a/i)pes
Authored by: IMANAL_TOO on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 09:38 AM EDT
Scott McNealy said he didn't read Schwartz' blog. I believe him, especially after reading an article from Jan 2005 that McNealy was recommended not to try the new trend - blogging. The recommendation apparently came from Forbes after they had read some of his texts:
It's also possible that readers will misconstrue personal Weblogs written by employees as a company's official position. "Regardless of how many disclaimers you put on your Weblog that your content is private and not related to your employer, people will treat your statements as representing your company," writes Werner Vogels in a Jan. 6 posting on his All Things Distributed Weblog. A few days later, Vogels, an employee of Amazon.com Inc. who had begun his Weblog while a researcher at Cornell University, disclosed that he had been promoted to chief technology officer at the company.

Amazon's communications department didn't publicly disclose Vogels appointment as CTO. That Vogels did so himself speaks to the potential for professionals to reveal new and relevant information that would otherwise have no outlet other than word of mouth. Yet his high-profile position also means Vogels will be more circumspect in what he says on his Weblog. "It is obvious that in that role, I have to be more thoughtful in how I use this medium," he writes. The vetting can reach the highest levels inside a company: According to a recent article in Fortune, Sun Microsystems' opinionated CEO, Scott McNealy, was urged not to blog after showing insiders some of his writing samples.

Forrester Research advises companies to provide guidelines not only for company-sanctioned Weblogs, but also for employees who do them on their own time. The IT research firm even recommends that managers occasionally view the personal Weblogs of subordinates to see what they're saying. "Respecting existing confidentiality agreements and companies' secrets is a no-brainer--and not doing so should clearly be grounds for firing," Li wrote.
However, I fully believe McNealy was aware of blogs. Here in an interview by Shankland from June 24, 2005:
McNealy: I'll start with the vision. We believe we're moving out of the Ice Age, the Iron Age, the Industrial Age, the Information Age, to the participation age. You get on the Net and you do stuff. You IM (instant message), you blog, you take pictures, you publish, you podcast, you transact, you distance learn, you telemedicine. You are participating on the Internet, not just viewing stuff. We build the infrastructure that goes in the data center that facilitates the participation age. We build that big friggin' Webtone switch. It has security, directory, identity, privacy, storage, compute, the whole Web services stack. We build that infrastructure piece. We have a mission, and that's make money and grow.
A few months later, Schwartz has hyped the upcoming revelation by McNealy and Schmidt:
"There's going to be a lot of money flowing both ways if we do this thing right," said Scott McNealy yesterday, in the much-publicized press conference he held with Eric Schmidt in Mountain View's Computer History Museum. But are Sun and Google teaming up just to make money, or are they hoping in partnership that they can out-Microsoft Microsoft? Prior to the news conference yesterday, expectations were high that perhaps computer history would be made at 10:30AM PT in the Computer History Museum. Even though the advance notice given to the press was low-key ("Sun CEO Scott McNealy and Google CEO Dr. Eric Schmidt take the stage at the Computer History Museum today at 10:30 AM PT to discuss joint activities"), speculation was rife that the announcement might be something truly game-changing. One clue, it was felt, lay in the last blog entry prior to the announcement published by Jonathan Schwartz, Sun's president, COO, and Blogger Extraordinary.
Do we smell some foul wordings here from McNealy? Not necessarily. Maybe he didn't read the blog, but he was aware of it and in all circumstances approved of Schwartz' blogging. Otherwise Schwartz wouldn't have been promoted just some months later...



---
______
IMANAL


.

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APIs Are The New “Muskrat Love” IANAL
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 12:40 PM EDT
Decades ago, some cool people talked about muskrat love. I have no idea what
muskrat love really is, if anything but an insider joke. Obviously, muskrat love
is important to teenagers, and the cool people would whisper things like “Billy
and Sue have muskrat love.” I am not sure but that might be taken as either good
or bad like thumbs up or down in the Roman coliseum.

I have never been one of the cool people, so I have ignored muskrat love all
these years. However, once a non-cool person mentioned “all this talk of muskrat
love” and paused. Even though, I knew this was an implied request for a
definition, I coolly remained silent. They pursued with a disinterested
statement that one does not know whether muskrat love is a good or bad thing. I
thought the cool thing would be to hide my total ignorance and naiveté. I never
learned about muskrat love or socially motivated tricks.

APIs are like muskrat love in many ways.

1) My uncool perception is that no one knows or agrees what “APIs” means. Is
“API” that same as “APIs”? Are “API” and “APIs” legally defined or technically
defined? Are APIs like porn (some is and some isn’t)?
2) I am out of the loop like I was with the cool ones, but I suspect that the
judge, jury, and lawyers do not know about APIs. They avoid all the API legal
issues like muskrat love. Undo caution in public is a clear signal of muskrat
love.
3) I considered this inconsistency for a while now. I considered and rejected
the emporer’s new clothes analogy because APIs exist in the sense of epithelium
in the body (but APIs do not exist without the body). I considered Charles
Lutwidge Dodgson’s Alice in Wonderland’s quotation:
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone,
"it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean
so many different things."
But basing my discussion on that is as crazy as muskrat love, or suing for a
cool billion for APIs.
4) APIs mean different things to different people, and different things to the
same people in different contexts.
5) APIs can help programmers communicate just the necessary and sufficient
language syntax to implement function calls, including arguments and returned
values, as well as custom data types used as arguments and returned values, as
well as system limits (e.,g., longest supported vector length or character
string).
6) APIs can be features that sales people cast before customers to reel them
in.
7) APIs can be muskrat love to trick people too cool to question what are you
talking about. I doubt Ellison and McNealy talk about APIs at the club.

Is Boise Shiller Flexner doing muskrat love. Hopefully, the judge will get to
the bottom of APIs. Hopefully, the judge has not set for himself the task of
cutting the Gordian knot.

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  • Not really... - Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, May 01 2012 @ 06:08 PM EDT
Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj - Updated 7Xs
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 04:52 PM EDT
I am definitely not a lawyer (IADNAL?) but when I read the witness testimony, I
got the feeling that while Oracle might not be able to FORCE Google to pay
licensing fees, they might be able to force Google to GPL the Android OS. (That
seemed to be the only place where McNeely and Schwarts agreed.(Sorry, I'm
terrible with names and spelling. I have been told that I spell "Like an
Engineer".)

Given that set of choices, Google might just pay for a license anyway.

So, is this a possibility???

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What???
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 08:40 PM EDT
"Google: You made a lot of money when Sun bought Oracle?"

That's news to me. That would change the case somewhat would
it not?

:-)

[ Reply to This | # ]

  • What??? - Authored by: PJ on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 08:51 PM EDT
    • What??? - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 11:16 PM EDT
Day 9 at the Oracle v. Google Trial ~ pj - Updated 8Xs
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, April 29 2012 @ 08:36 PM EDT
Re: Update 8 - the (long version of) link referred to:

http://web.archive.org/web/20080416195557/http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/entry

Appears to have been removed from the Internet Archive. Oracle strikes
(evidence) again (maybe)?

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Throwing code over the wall vs. really open sourcing it
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, April 30 2012 @ 07:22 PM EDT

"Throwing code over the wall" is the standard way of describing the act of releasing your current code under a FOSS license and then providing no help, discussion, support, meaningful feedback opportunities etc.

The phrase is contrasted with a continuing contribution where someone releases code and then engages openly in working with those who try to use, improve and/or change the code.

[ Reply to This | # ]

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