Re:An obscure research project could accelerate innovation i...
by nottorp on Sunday January 08, 2017 @06:39AM
(#13349308)
Actually no, most open source licenses have no mention of patents.
If you're smaller than Google, dealing with Oracle might be outside your budget. Safer not to.
Re:An obscure research project could accelerate innovation i...
by jerven on Sunday January 08, 2017 @06:52AM
(#13349339)
If its patents you are worried about, not dealing with someone won't protect you from their lawyers.
Re:An obscure research project could accelerate innovation i...
by nottorp on Sunday January 08, 2017 @09:16AM
(#13349740)
It's Oracle's general attitude. While not going anywhere near their products won't protect you from a patent lawsuit, it is some protection. They can't sneak in some commercial components and bill you later, for example.
The Google lawsuit was partly because they didn't use the actual Java source code so they didn't benefit from those open source licenses. But bear in mind:
• Google won, Oracle lost, multiple times. I'm guessing they won't try that again.
• Google has since switched to the OpenJDK source code, not away from it. They are now actually working more closely with Oracle, not less.
Weird I know, but that's how it's played out.