Does this send shivers down anyone else's spine?

[W4GPL]

On his blog, Florian Mueller is reporting (http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2010/12/cptn-holdings-llc-acquirer-of-882.html) that CPTN Holdings LLC, which acquired the Novell patents (or will when and if the sale closes), is owned by four industry heavyweights: "Twitter user @VM_gville just pointed me to the website (http://www.bundeskartellamt.de/wDeutsch/zusammenschluesse/zusammenschluesse.php) of the German federal antitrust authority ("Bundeskartellamt"), which discloses a merger (or more precisely, joint venture) notification filed a week ago (on 09 December 2010), according to which the four companies behind CPTN Holdings LLC -- the acquirer of 882 Novell patents -- are Microsoft, Apple, EMC, and Oracle. The product market in which the newly formed company plans to operate is defined as "patents"."

I feel a disturbance in the force... http://lwn.net/Articles/420177/rss

[KC2UGV]

On his blog, Florian Mueller is reporting (http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2010/12/cptn-holdings-llc-acquirer-of-882.html) that CPTN Holdings LLC, which acquired the Novell patents (or will when and if the sale closes), is owned by four industry heavyweights: "Twitter user @VM_gville just pointed me to the website (http://www.bundeskartellamt.de/wDeutsch/zusammenschluesse/zusammenschluesse.php) of the German federal antitrust authority ("Bundeskartellamt"), which discloses a merger (or more precisely, joint venture) notification filed a week ago (on 09 December 2010), according to which the four companies behind CPTN Holdings LLC -- the acquirer of 882 Novell patents -- are Microsoft, Apple, EMC, and Oracle. The product market in which the newly formed company plans to operate is defined as "patents"."

I feel a disturbance in the force... http://lwn.net/Articles/420177/rss

Yes, especially, since much work went into many open source projects on the assumption that Novell is guarding them with a patent portfolio...

[NQ6U]

I'm not too worried about it--yet.

A lot of this sort of thing is being done by the big tech companies to protect themselves against patent trolls. Now, if CPTN Holdings starts suing people over infringement of any of these patents, then we've got a problem on our hands.

[KC2UGV]

I'm not too worried about it--yet.

A lot of this sort of thing is being done by the big tech companies to protect themselves against patent trolls. Now, if CPTN Holdings starts suing people over infringement of any of these patents, then we've got a problem on our hands.

Which seems to be the case, since CPTN Holdings primary business is "Patents"...

[NQ6U]

Which seems to be the case, since CPTN Holdings primary business is "Patents"...

Perhaps. Too soon to say, really, but I will be paying attention.

[kb2vxa]

A holding company buying and selling patents? All so common so pardon me if I'm a little dumb but all it means to me is another shark in the money pool.

[w6tmi]

Also sad to me. Novell was probably by far the best NOS on the market before losing most of the market share to the then shitty Windows NT4.

[W3WN]

Also sad to me. Novell was probably by far the best NOS on the market before losing most of the market share to the then shitty Windows NT4.
Netware at one time held over 90% of the PC server market. They had opportunities, but frankly, blew them. They could have blown Microsoft out of the water if they had just figured out how to market.

I can still recall sitting in a meeting among a lot of the USX top brass, when Microsoft came in to pitch their crap. (Note that they pitched to the brass, not to the IT guys who often knew better). At the time, they were pitching OS/2 Lan Manager, versus Netware 386/3.1. It was almost funny to sit there and listen to the MS weenies tell us all of the things that Netware couldn't do at the time (like talk to a Mac on the network), when my test network in the IT office was actually DOING those very things.

It's a shame, but it's done.

[NQ6U]

Funny--even to this day MS networks have a hard time dealing with Macs. Since Macs have used standard Unix/IP/TCP networking protocols for the past ten years, I can't quite figure that out. Could it be that Microsoft wants it that way?

[KC2UGV]

Funny--even to this day MS networks have a hard time dealing with Macs. Since Macs have used standard Unix/IP/TCP networking protocols for the past ten years, I can't quite figure that out. Could it be that Microsoft wants it that way?

Yes.

It's the same reason that every version of Windows, Samba needs a re-write done. MS changed to protocol spec at will, and purposefully. Once, they added password obfuscation, not for security reasons, but to break Samba and Netware.

And, even with the spec published, Apple would just write their own, and say everyone else's implementation was bad :lol:

[W3WN]

Funny--even to this day MS networks have a hard time dealing with Macs. Since Macs have used standard Unix/IP/TCP networking protocols for the past ten years, I can't quite figure that out. Could it be that Microsoft wants it that way?
Without a doubt.

[n6hcm]

Funny--even to this day MS networks have a hard time dealing with Macs.

not true. used to be true, but apple adapted ... they weren't the 800# gorilla in the room, so they had to. you can put a mac in an ad domain as a full member, you can share files and printers (both ways), talk tcp/ip to your heart's content, ...

plus: ms doesn't want it to be too difficult for macs to play in their world--they are in contract with apple to ensure this sort of compatability (not just with networking, but with applications as well ... ).

[KC2UGV]

not true. used to be true, but apple adapted ... they weren't the 800# gorilla in the room, so they had to. you can put a mac in an ad domain as a full member, you can share files and printers (both ways), talk tcp/ip to your heart's content, ...

plus: ms doesn't want it to be too difficult for macs to play in their world--they are in contract with apple to ensure this sort of compatability (not just with networking, but with applications as well ... ).

Uh huh... And MS is trying to place nice with Linux too :snicker:

[NQ6U]

not true. used to be true, but apple adapted ... they weren't the 800# gorilla in the room, so they had to. you can put a mac in an ad domain as a full member, you can share files and printers (both ways), talk tcp/ip to your heart's content, ...

Apple managed to make it work but Mac users are still second-class citizens on a MS network. I have both Macs and Windows on my home network; I had to install Apple's Bonjour software (essentially, it's old AppleTalk protocols adapted to TCP/IP) on the Windows box out in the shack in order to get it to see my laser printer.


plus: ms doesn't want it to be too difficult for macs to play in their world--they are in contract with apple to ensure this sort of compatability (not just with networking, but with applications as well ... ).

That agreement expired in 2000.

[n6hcm]

Apple managed to make it work but Mac users are still second-class citizens on a MS network. I have both Macs and Windows on my home network; I had to install Apple's Bonjour software (essentially, it's old AppleTalk protocols adapted to TCP/IP) on the Windows box out in the shack in order to get it to see my laser printer.



That agreement expired in 2000.

my macs and pcs (windows and linux) see all my printers.

that expired agreement was replaced by another (under whcih we've gotten office 2010 and office 2008, among other things).

[ka8ncr]

Apple managed to make it work but Mac users are still second-class citizens on a MS network. I have both Macs and Windows on my home network; I had to install Apple's Bonjour software (essentially, it's old AppleTalk protocols adapted to TCP/IP) on the Windows box out in the shack in order to get it to see my laser printer.



OS X 10.6 plays really nice with Windows Active Directory. We use it at work for authentication and home directories; full roaming profiles for all the edit machines.

[n2ize]

Uh huh... And MS is trying to place nice with Linux too :snicker:

And there is a certain bridge in Brooklyn New York for sale. :-D:-D

[W2NAP]

And there is a certain bridge in Brooklyn New York for sale. :-D:-D

got several in Indiana for sale to

[W3WN]

Funny--even to this day MS networks have a hard time dealing with Macs. Since Macs have used standard Unix/IP/TCP networking protocols for the past ten years, I can't quite figure that out. Could it be that Microsoft wants it that way?

not true. used to be true, but apple adapted ... they weren't the 800# gorilla in the room, so they had to. you can put a mac in an ad domain as a full member, you can share files and printers (both ways), talk tcp/ip to your heart's content, ...

plus: ms doesn't want it to be too difficult for macs to play in their world--they are in contract with apple to ensure this sort of compatability (not just with networking, but with applications as well ... ).
Things are much better than they once were, but it is still more difficult than it should be to get a Mac to talk to a Windows based network.

Microsoft doesn't exactly go out of their way to make it any easier. But again, this isn't anything new; they've always made it difficult for other OS's to talk to their OS's. Even though they effectively swiped the roots of Active Directory from NDS -- and Banyan.

All I can tell you is this: 10 years ago, even 15 years ago, all I had to do was install the appropriate client software on the Mac, OS/2, or Windows machine, and I could have it talking to my Netware server (let alone being able to load the DOS drivers from floppy!). Can you say the same thing today about a Mac, OS/2 (if you can find one), or Linux machine trying to talk to a Windows 2003 server?

[NQ6U]

10 years ago, even 15 years ago, all I had to do was install the appropriate client software on the Mac, OS/2, or Windows machine, and I could have it talking to my Netware server (let alone being able to load the DOS drivers from floppy!). Can you say the same thing today about a Mac, OS/2 (if you can find one), or Linux machine trying to talk to a Windows 2003 server?

You can turn on "Services for Macintosh" but all that does is allow the Mac to use the file server. None of the other stuff works. And a peer-to-peer network of mixed Macs and PCs? Haven't figured that one out yet, at least not without buying some third-party software.