[TUHS] V8 - V10?

[pepe@naleco.com (Pepe)]

> Date: Thu, 22 May 2008 18:10:33 +0200
> From: "Jose R. Valverde" <jrvalverde at acm.org>
> Subject: Re: [TUHS] V8 - V10
> 
> 	Solaris has been open sourced and is heavily System V based. Novell 
> argues now SCO was not entitled to, and so the Sun-SCO agreement that made it
> possible is probably void.
> 
> [...]
> 	There remains the issue of the flow of SystemV licenses money to Novell
> after and if it is open sourced... I don't know how much that is, nor how much
> it might be 4-10 years from now when the SCO appeals are heard. So my evaluation
> is probably faulty.

I concur with your opinion.

If Novell could not get paid from The SCO Group of the percentage (about
90%) they are entitled to of the SVRX License Payment SUN made to The SCO
Group, and of the SVRX License Payment Microsoft made to The SCO Group
(because, you know, The SCO Group has filled for bankruptcy), then they are
probably going to action on the basis of said Licenses being void, or at
least in being void the part of such Licenses that allows to Sub-license
the material changing the terms of the License, or changing the License
altogether. According to this hypothesis on the future, in case The SCO
Group cannot find the money to pay Novell, Novell will probably try to
renegotiate such Licenses directly with SUN and Microsoft. Microsoft
will probably just return the material instead of paying for it (as they
don't need it), but SUN is in a totally different position.

SUN has now OpenSolaris, which was made possible by that License they got
from The SCO Group. So SUN will renegotiate and pay Novell to legalize
the SVRX License they got from The SCO Group which allowed them to
"open-source" Solaris.

Only after Novell gets that payment(s), either from The SCO Group or
SUN, will they consider "open-sourcing" the historical SVRX and
classical UNIX code. Otherwise, they could hardly monetize on it, as
they currently have the opportunity to do.

Regards,

-- 
Pepe
pepe at naleco.com