llvm dev - May 2008 - [LLVMdev] Forward: Discussion about custom memory allocators for STL

On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 7:59 PM, Dominic Hamon <dom.hamon at gmail.com>
wrote:
> It has also been mentioned that it is also true for LLVM itself, and it
> is. However, the amount of code in LLVM, and the specific nature of its
> usage and what it is for lends itself to better contribution tracking
> immediately. Boost is a nebulous piece of software with a wide range of
> functionality.
>
If I were worrying about patents, though, I'd be much more worried
about LLVM than Boost.  Much of Boost is original, and could well be
prior art against patent claims, whereas LLVM could easily use a
patented register allocator or similar without anyone knowing.

Am Sonntag, den 18.05.2008, 20:39 -0400 schrieb me22:
> On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 7:59 PM, Dominic Hamon <dom.hamon at
gmail.com> wrote:
> > It has also been mentioned that it is also true for LLVM itself, and
it
> > is. However, the amount of code in LLVM, and the specific nature of
its
> > usage and what it is for lends itself to better contribution tracking
> > immediately. Boost is a nebulous piece of software with a wide range
of
> > functionality.
> 
> If I were worrying about patents, though, I'd be much more worried
> about LLVM than Boost.  Much of Boost is original, and could well be
> prior art against patent claims, whereas LLVM could easily use a
> patented register allocator or similar without anyone knowing.
Actually it's not patents (where origin of code is irrelevant) but
copyright (where it is).

I'd like to see some more specific statements about what the IP lawyers
at Dominic's company did. If they aren't too familiar with Open Source,
they simply might have looked in the wrong places.

Regards,
Jo

On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 5:52 AM, Joachim Durchholz <jo at durchholz.org>
wrote:
> Actually it's not patents (where origin of code is irrelevant) but
> copyright (where it is).
>
I'm aware of that, but he quite specifically said "patent
lawyers",
not IP or copyright lawyers.
> I'd like to see some more specific statements about what the IP lawyers
> at Dominic's company did. If they aren't too familiar with Open
Source,
> they simply might have looked in the wrong places.
>
It feels to me like having made a reasonable effort to verify
provenance would be sufficient.  For an inconclusive result, just
following the license seems fine.  It the unlikely event of a suit,
damages would be small, if any, since you were acting in good faith,
and the code could be clean-room rewritten.

I also know that there are companies that sell software that checks
for open-source-derived code in a codebase -- the company that
currently employs me uses one such product.

Of course, IANAL.