SCO no more a threat to the Unix Community

Some time back, there was a major commotion in the open-source community when SCO, now effectively a patent-holding vulture, staked claim to some prime Unix patents and filed a case against IBM for contributing Unix code to Linux, and followed suit next year by filing similar claims against Novell, claiming that Novell's claims to owning Unix were false.
Well, how things have turned. In a judgment that overturned all these claims, and instead put SCO on a path to closure, a judge ruled in the case that it was indeed Novell that owned the Unix and Unixware copyrights, and closed SCO's claims. In addition, in a judgment that will create immense trouble for SCO, the judge also ruled that after SCO's deals with Microsoft and Sun Microsystems, it is SCO which owes Novell a share of the revenue such generated. And since Novell owns the license, SCO no longer has a leg to stand on in its case against IBM and Novell can force SCO to withdraw the case.
This judgment is something that will be welcomed by most people, especially people from the open-source industry, who always had the threat of SCO's cases open, and reinforced recently with the threat from Microsoft that it also owned some patents that were at the core of Linux. Read more details of the judgment:

In the ruling, the judge said SCO must pay Novell, but the amount will be determined in a trial, said Pamela Jones, founder and editor of Groklaw, a Web site that follows open-source software legal issues.
The ruling is good news for organizations that use open-source software products, said Jim Zemlin, executive director of the Linux Foundation. "From the perspective of someone who is adopting open-source solutions to run in the enterprise, it proves to them that the industry is going to defend the platform, and that when organizations attack it from a legal perspective, that the industry collectively will defend it," he said.
The decision is "abysmal" news for SCO, according to Zemlin. "Their future is looking bleak," he said.

Now the boot is on the other foot. It is Novell that can file claim to recover revenue from SCO's earnings, something that a number of people in the open-source community will really welcome. In addition, the fact that there is no longer a threat to the Linux community is sure to be welcomed. Next to Microsoft, SCO must be the next most disliked name among these people.

Novell publishes details of Microsoft deal

Late last year, Novell had signed a deal with Microsoft that was puzzling to a number of people in terms of details. Now, under the annual 10K filings to the SEC, Novell has revealed details of 3 agreements. These are all the more important as well as controversial now that Microsoft claimed that Linux was in violation of 235 patents that it has, as well as Microsoft's denial to reveal details of these patents. It was claimed that Microsoft offered Novell patent protection for its Linux distribution, while denying this to other in the Linux community, this trying to drive a wedge in the Linux movement. Refer this article:

Novell on Friday published redacted versions of the three agreements it signed with Microsoft in its annual 10K filings to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, providing the public with its first detailed look into a deal that some see as critical to the future of Linux. The 10K filing had been delayed by an internal stock options review at Novell, which was concluded Wednesday.
Under the terms of the agreements, Microsoft will spend hundreds of millions of dollars on licensing fees and sales and marketing costs over five years, including US$240 million for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server subscription certificates. For its part, Novell has agreed to pay Microsoft a percentage of revenue from open-source products.
Linux advocates are expected to scour the documents for signs of how the agreement may affect Linux and whether anything in it will put Microsoft or Novell in potential violation of the upcoming version 3 of the GNU General Public license (GPL). The GPL is used in licensing many components of the Linux operating system.
Microsoft has claimed that Linux violates more than 235 of its patents, and because the deal offers patent protection to Novell users, it is seen as potentially driving a wedge in the Linux community. "Novell had a choice here, and Novell's choice was to be in the same boat with the rest of the free software community, or not," Perens said.

One issue that comes through the agreements is that Novell does not automatically recognize Microsoft's patents; as well as the fact that Microsoft may not have actually offered patent protection to Novell.
The nature of the deal as published by Novell was that these agreements were done in order to drive a better inter-operation of Windows and Linux and hence drive better penetration of Linux in the enterprise world, but open-source experts are pretty skeptical about the intentions of Microsoft. The deal has been good for Novell from a purely business point of view.