On Mon, Jan 17, 2005 at 02:37:44PM -0500, Bruce Momjian wrote: > > We can modify the code slightly to hopefully avoid the patent. With the
I guess what I'm very much worried about is that there is potentially-infringing code there, we know about it, and we may press ahead and release with it anyway. IBM would justifiably jump on us for that as a result. What I simply don't know is what they can require be done as a remedy. If merely modifying the code is good enough, fine. But given how widely the code base will be disseminated, I'm worried they might demand that we somehow track it down and get rid of it. That would be a significant distraction, I think. > US granting patents on even obvious ideas, I would think that most large > software projects, including commercial ones, already have tons of > patent violations in their code. Does anyone think otherwise? First, that's hardly a justification, and second, they're not all subject to inspection. Plus, this is a case where we _know_ about the potential violation, and have had it pointed out to us, before the code has been declared "released". > However, I will grant that ARC is not an obvious idea. Precisely, or we wouldn't be pleased with the implementation. A -- Andrew Sullivan | [EMAIL PROTECTED] I remember when computers were frustrating because they *did* exactly what you told them to. That actually seems sort of quaint now. --J.D. Baldwin ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 9: the planner will ignore your desire to choose an index scan if your joining column's datatypes do not match