Thread: IBM sues Informix over DB patents
Anyone see this little news item? It showed up in my paper copy of InfoWorld today. http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/00/02/14/000214hnpatent.xml It caught my eye, and I'm forwarding it here, since Informix's Universal DB now incorporates the old Illustra code. Since stepping on patents has always been one of the open source software nightmare scenarios, it's be nice to know which patents are involved. (BTW, I was checking out Informix's DataBlade technology: turns out it's just like pgsql's user extensible types and functions, with pretty PR and training tools - and a little better integration packaging. The basic API is so similar, I woudn't be suprised if it's a direct descendant) Ross -- Ross J. Reedstrom, Ph.D., <reedstrm@rice.edu> NSBRI Research Scientist/Programmer Computer and Information Technology Institute Rice University, 6100 S. Main St., Houston, TX 77005
"Ross J. Reedstrom" wrote: > > Anyone see this little news item? It showed up in my > paper copy of InfoWorld today. > > http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/00/02/14/000214hnpatent.xml > > It caught my eye, and I'm forwarding it here, since Informix's Universal > DB now incorporates the old Illustra code. Since stepping on patents > has always been one of the open source software nightmare scenarios, > it's be nice to know which patents are involved. > > (BTW, I was checking out Informix's DataBlade technology: turns out it's > just like pgsql's user extensible types and functions, with pretty PR > and training tools - and a little better integration packaging. The basic > API is so similar, I woudn't be suprised if it's a direct descendant) It very likely is, as Illustra (which introduced the name DataBlades) was a direct descendant of old Postgres 4.2. They moved independantly from postquel to SQL but the engine they started from was the same. ------------------ Hannu