this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2024
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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Have you noticed the the NT / Windows XP source code was leaked years ago. There's isn't much of a need to "reverse engineering", it's just about reading their implementation and providing an alternative implementation that doesn't copy code...
Lol.
Imagine shooting yourselves in the foot like this.
Guess that rule was in place because some people would look at it and proceed to copy it. The rule should be "if you copy code from Microsoft you'll be kicked from the project and the code removed". While I see why this is place and what it protect the project from this is also a very big roadblock to the project's evolution and a clear example of what's wrong with it and why we still have compatibility issues.
That's a lot of words to emphasize you don't understand copyright law
Succinctly.
If only there were ways to subvert copyright law...
Nope, because if you write code and they can prove you were influenced by leaked proprietary code in any way then they will sue the shit out of you and shut you down.
Also see Halt and Catch Fire for a show with this as a plot point. It's very real though.
Well, since it's so easy, go do it.
That sounds difficult though. Didn't companies have to set up ethics walls to protect against lawsuits for things like that?
What are you talking about? There's copyright infringement that when you copy the leaked Windows source code into something like Wine or ReactOS and then there's reading it to understand what Microsoft did and coming up with an alternative implementation that will provide a compatible API for programs to use. There's no "gray zone" or ethical BS - it's either copied or not.
Ah the term I was looking for was "clean room"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_room_design
See the bit about examples and IBM. While you could probably look, the easiest way to defend against a giant tech company's legal team is to do the clean room setup
They are legally not allowed to touch it.