From comp.unix.bsd Tue Aug 4 10:16:29 1992 Path: hcshh!unido!drnhh!news.Hamburg.Germany.EU.net!news.netmbx.de!Germany.EU.net!mcsun!uunet!sdl!plts!tal From: tal@plts.uucp (Tom Limoncelli) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd,alt.suit.att-bsdi Subject: UNIGRAM's article on the USL-BSDI suit Message-ID: <1992Aug1.020513.14170@plts.uucp> Date: 1 Aug 92 02:05:13 GMT Followup-To: comp.unix.bsd Organization: Tom's Box of Ahedonia Lines: 179 Posted: Sat Aug 1 04:05:13 1992 I'm posting this without any comments. I just thought it might be good fodder (though I'm not sure for which side). (It does contain some new news.) %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% COPIED WITH PERMISSION OF UNIGRAM X COPYRIGHT (C) UNIGRAM PRODUCTS LTD. ------------------------------------------------------ London, August 3-7, 1992 Issue 396 + NOW UNIX SYSTEM LABS TURNS THE HEAT ON UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA OVER BERKELEY CODE In an unprecedented action against one of its own educational licencees, Unix System Laboratories has filed suit in the US federal courts against the University of California, Berkeley, charging the prestigious institution with breach of contract, copyright infringement, misappropriation of trade secrets and Lanham Trademark Act violations. The move makes UC Berkeley a party to USL's existing suit against software start-up Berkeley Software Design Inc (UX Nos 392, 394) for unfair competition, deceptive trade practices and false advertising. USL has now amended that suit against BSDI to include additional charges of copyright infringement, trade secret violations and inducing breach of contract. Harassment BSDI's response to the amended suit, which was served last Thursday, was to declare it "totally without merit" and "another step in [USL's] harassment campaign." BSDI, an alleged spin-off of UC Berkeley's Computer Sciences Research Group, author of the famous Berkeley code, is attempting to commercialise a 386 operating system called BSD/386 based on the university's Network Release 2. Berkeley and BSDI claim NET2 is AT&T code-free and owes no licensing fees to USL. USL says it "knows for a fact" NET2 contains proprietary AT&T code. USL also says UC Berkeley rebuffed every proposal it put forward over the last few months to resolve the dispute without recourse to litigation. According to USL, the school effectively rejected a proposal for a full comparison of Berkeley versus USL code by unbiased third parties by demanding that the evaluation be limited only to USL-specified snapshots and by selecting as arbiters for its side members of the Computer Systems Research Group whose credentials, USL claims, were already tainted. CSRG, in what appears to be a form letter over the signature of CSRG team member Marshall Kirk McKusick, made written representations to BSDI on April 30, 1991 that Berkeley software "may be freely redistributed...." and "requires no previous licence, either from AT&T or The Regents of the University of California." The university reportedly picked McKusick as one of its evaluators. Public opinion Had that proposal been acted on, McKusick, CSRG senior programmer and past president of Usenix, would have found himself in another conflict of interests since he is believed to be a secret a director of BSDI. BSDI, which the USL suit suggests is in collusion with CSRG, declines to publicly identify any of its founders or investors declaring such information "proprietary" on the basis that BSDI is a closely held company. No names appear on BSDI's papers of incorporation except the company's nominal president Rick Adams who was described to Unigram last week by Donnalyn Frey, BSDI's spokesman, as merely a figurehead, soon to be replaced when BSDI completes its current search for a chief executive. Adams, she said, is actually the president of UUNet Technologies, a long-established company currently distributing BSD/386. Donnalyn, well-known as Usenix's erstwhile spokesman, should know since she is in fact Mrs Rick Adams. Besides McKusick, there are other ties between CSRG and BSDI. According to an April filing with the Virginia Commission on Corporations, where BSDI is headquartered, CSRG senior programmer Keith Bostic and former CSRG mainstay Mike Karels, the acknowledged architect of the university's 4.3 BSD release, are also directors of BSDI. BSDI describes Karels simply as an employee, claiming he joined the company after BSD/386 was established. Another director is Don Seeley, an employee of UUNet Technologies, the supplier of UUNet. Clearly USL will argue that CSRG staff gave themselves permission to commercialise the system and will doubtless note a violation of the university's established code of ethics which requires university personnel with a financial interest in a university decision to disqualify themselves. BSDI, meanwhile, is attempting to try the case in the court of public opinion. The week before last it put the full text of the initial complaint (but not the expanded suit) on UUNet ostensibly because so many were asking to see the exact wording. More details on page four. + 100,000 USERS HAVE YET ANOTHER BERKELEY VARIANT - 386BSD... by Maureen O'Gara Besides Berkeley Software Design Inc's BSD/386 operating system, there is another body of 386 code making the rounds. That code got started in conjunction with the same University of California lab that BSDI's did and traces its roots first to 4.3BSD Tahoe and ultimately to the same NET2 subset source. This code is confusingly named 386BSD after the original 386BSD project kicked off in the university's Computer Systems Research Group in 1989. The man who says he named both pieces of software is former 386BSD project leader and principal developer of BSD 2.8 and 2.9, Bill Jolitz. Jolitz reportedly mortgaged his house to start the initial 386BSD project and subsequently finished it in his own time. The code and its rationale were published over the course of a year in Dr Dobb's Journal beginning in January of 1991. It was also picked up by Dr Dobbs' sister publication Unix Magazin in Germany. The full code has been available on InterNet for the last two months and was to go on CompuServe last week, according to Dr Dobbs' editor Jonathan Erickson. He estimates that 386BSD is currently in the hands of 100,000 people. Jolitz, interviewed by Unigram.X last week, says that his 386BSD, at least in its initial versions, was encumbered. He also says that 386BSD is the basis of BSDI's BSD/386 which he worked on in 1991 at CSRG initially under the financial sponsorship of UUNet Technologies. Last summer his cheques started coming from BSDI. He claims he was never officially hired by BSDI and signed no employment contract with the firm, which he believes is the brainchild of UUNet chief Rick Adams and former CSRG staffer Mike Karels who was best man at Jolitz's wedding. However, Jolitz was apparently crucial to the project since none of BSDI's principals, alias CSRG's staffers, knew much about 386 Berkeley and couldn't maintain it. 386BSD was originally intended to be "a university curiosity," Jolitz said, a non-commercial, non-industrial strength way for students, facility and researchers to have access to Berkeley code on inexpensive machines. Increasingly through last year it became apparent that what CSRG wanted was "basically the same thing as BSDI:" an unencumbered commercial system. Ultimately, he says, he opposed it since it would mean terminating the 386BSD project, an action CSRG has taken, as well as having him renege on a published promise to produce freely accessible 386 code. He broke with BSDI in November, he says, but not before Usenix mysteriously refused to allow him to present a paper on his 386 work and BSDI offered to cut him in - in return for the title to his house. The first tack he regards as a way for CSRG/BSDI to limit competition. The second tactic he regards as an attempt to keep him in line. He says he attempted to bring what was happening to the attention of university authorities such as CSRG's faculty overseer Susan Graham and its Office of Technology Licensing but was sluffed off. He claims the university is guilty of "incompetent stewardship." He subsequently received letters from CSRG and university counsel claiming that all the work he had contributed to Berkeley since NET2 was "University proprietary," a phrase he had never heard before. In November he was asked to destroy all his own work and anything in his possession having to do with Berkeley or 386. He says he complied and rewrote the current 386BSD Release 0.0 from scratch. He says he receives no money from BSDI for his code though he alleges BSDI has told its customers that he does. Jolitz does not believe NET2 is encumbered. + ...AS BSDI PUTS THE WORD ON THE NET The week before last, BSDI put the full text of Unix System Labs' initial complaint (but not the expanded suit) on UUNet, ostensibly because so many people were asking to see the exact wording - see front page. As might be expected, the move has stirred up a hornet's nest of academic fear and loathing against USL and has created a cadre of naive tech weinees ready to form a lynch mob. For all their thousands of lines of protests, however, no one has flat out denied USL's intellectual property rights. USL's suit asks the courts to oblige UC Berkeley to abide by its license from USL. It also wants the school to recall all copies of NET2. USL is seeking an unstipulated amount of actual and compensatory damages from UC Berkeley as well as legal fees. It wants the same from BSDI plus punitive damages. BSDI is reportedly getting set to move from a beta to a gamma version of BSD/386 either this week or next. It says it has distributed over 300 copies of the beta system to an assortment of users including hackers, old DOS buffs and big brand name computer makers. BSDI is also getting ready to expand its distributor base. -- Tom Limoncelli goshicanneverthinkofwhattoputinmydotsignaturemaybeifijustwrite -- tal@plts.uucp lotsoftextnobodywillnoticethatiamnotreallysayinganythinggee -- uunet!sdl!plts!tal thatissortofusenetinamicrocosmisntitpeopletalkingonand -- tal@warren.mentorg.com onandnotreallysayinganythingwowhowutterlyironicofme