Ros-general December 2003

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Microsoft wants royalties for use of FAT
by Casper Hornstrup 10 Dec '03

10 Dec '03

http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/ip/tech/fat.asp

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RE: Microsoft wants royalties for use of FAT
by Wierd Wierd 10 Dec '03

10 Dec '03

In which case, how exactly would sony's "floppy diskette" based digital camera be licensed? It uses FAT filesystem to store the image data. This means it actively utilizes the filesystem, and as such, is both 'client' and 'server'... How would such a device be licensed? __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing. http://photos.yahoo.com/

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RE: Microsoft wants royalties for use of FAT
by Wierd Wierd 10 Dec '03

10 Dec '03

On Thu, 2003-12-04 at 16:03, Casper Hornstrup wrote:> http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/ip/tech/fat.aspsigh...Looks pretty bad, actually. We're going to have to think about this. This patent really can't be licensed for use with a GPL'd operatingsystem unless the fundamental terms are changed. CDs and DVDs would still be usable, and floppy disks might be if wedon't implement any patented things (FAT existed in 1985, and all thosepatents are expired now). There is a problem with CD, and DVD as well. You may be able to implement ISO-9660 without a hitch, but microsoft's Joliet and Romeo (less known) file descriptors are the IP of Microsoft corp, and if they want to play the Filesystem IP game, they could get you there too. While most CDs on the market contain an ISO-9660 volume descriptor, as well as a Joliet one, that could change in the future as a marketing pitfall issued by microsoft. As for media exchange- The FAT/NTFS pitfall will be most apparent with media devices o! f the CompactFlash, and 'super diskette' varieties. Devices such as USB flash drives, or Zip disks. Most media these days is NOT distributed on floppy diskettes, so that would be a minimal pitfall- But, we could get tricksy with the use of FAT file system. Microsoft is licensing to hardware developers for the use of FAT-- this means that Iomega, and CompactFlash will have to take out licenses. If the hardware is licensed to use FAT, does the OS really HAVE to license it as well? IE-- if you use an internal Zip drive (property of Iomega corp for design), wouldnt Iomega have to take out a license from M$ to use the FAT file system? Is that license transferable? If it is, then it should be within reasonable argument that the use of FAT on that particular hardware device is sanctioned. This means that FAT could be supported fully on such devices, since the license has been paid by Iomega (or with CF devices, by CompactFlash) For older, legacy devices, such as the old school flop! py disk controller however, you would have to disable support. No FAT floppies.... (unless you have an LS 120, or so- might make sony happy if there is suddenly an increased interest in the product)I could of course be wrong on all this- copyright and patent laws arent my forte- It just seems to me that if microsoft is selling licenses to hardware vendors- that is the target license model. If you support FAT (only) on licensed hardware devices, what is the problem? --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing

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with regards to the drivers problem and the file management
by DANIEL hoggan 09 Dec '03

09 Dec '03

I personally know that Linux uses open source drivers and the file management system is about as dependable as your going to get. I'm pretty sure also that the K desktop enviroment people are working towards making their desktop mouse driven to make it easier to work with and a lot more like windows. I suspect if you can break the file management part of the Linux Kernel from the Linux kernel and add it to the Konquerer file management system of the KDE you will have a mouse driven file management system that is free of patent problems. Just a guess but I thought that it was worth mentioning. The konquerer system can be found at http://www.kde.org and I'm pretty sure one of you knows where to find the linux kernel. _________________________________________________________________ Get Hotmail on your mobile phone http://www.msn.co.uk/msnmobile

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Re: Explorer on reactos
by Wierd Wierd 09 Dec '03

09 Dec '03

As far as I know, the GDI subsystem is not complete enough to run a full system shell like Explorer just yet. I dont keep up with the CVS (I am a very very bad person), so if there is some form of prototypical support for a menu system, like LiteShell (basically JUST a menu- nothing more), I wouldnt know about it. Others might be more helpful. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing. http://photos.yahoo.com/

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RE: Microsoft wants royalties for use of FAT
by Wierd Wierd 09 Dec '03

09 Dec '03

>On Mon, 2003-12-08 at 18:55, Wierd Wierd wrote: >> There is a problem with CD, and DVD as well. You >may be able to >> implement ISO-9660 without a hitch, but microsoft's Joliet and Romeo >> (less known) file descriptors are the IP of Microsoft corp >True. For these cases, I think we have to implement the non-patented >stuff and keep an eye on the marketplace for incompatbile CDs. I think >we'll need to take the same approach wrt FAT, for what that's worth. >I thought UDF (dvd format) had LFN support built-in. >Does anyone know the patent status of ISO9660 and UDF? It sure would be >a bummer to find out that they are patented too. >Also, whence cometh El Toritio? A blurb on ISO-9660 that might have some relevance. Seems ISO 9660 is a joint project... You might look into the members of the 'high Sierra' group to find out more. http://www.tu-clausthal.de/~rzsjs/iso9660.html I can however be more helpful on the origins of the El Torito bootable ISO-9660 spec. http://www.cdpage.com/Compact_Disc_Variations/danaboot.html (ps- sorry about the problems with thread heirarchy- yahoo's poster isnt the greatest at times...) __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing. http://photos.yahoo.com/

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Re: Re: Explorer on reactos
by Wierd Wierd 09 Dec '03

09 Dec '03

Well, the current official release cannot yet handle liteshell. Perhaps when 0.1.6 is released, that might change. If it cant handle something like liteshell, the odds of it handling much more than something REALLY REALLY primative (like WinHello) are very low. When 0.1.6 is released, I intend to test it against liteshell again. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing. http://photos.yahoo.com/

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RE: Microsoft wants royalties for use of FAT
by Wierd Wierd 09 Dec '03

09 Dec '03

I suppose that is so- but that is not exactly so with CompactFlash, or other digital media devices.... This gives an idea. If you truely NEED a floppy diskette solution, is it possible to tell the difference between a normal floppy diskette, and a SmartMedia floppy diskette adaptor? __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New Yahoo! Photos - easier uploading and sharing. http://photos.yahoo.com/

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RE: [ros-general] More crazy ideas (was: Microsoft wants royaltie s for use of FAT)
by Colin Burn 05 Dec '03

05 Dec '03

>To take another example, WAV MP3 OGG etc... All audio formats. All could >have a common interface, so any program could read from and write to these >files seamlessly, and the handler would handle the >compression/decompression. I dont think this really needs to be an OS feature but it might be nice if any applications that come with ReactOS offered sort of plug in file formats. You could easily write say an MSPaint clone that used COM objects to access image files. 3rd parties would then be able to write their own COM object for their own proprietary format. As good as this would be I dont think it needs integrating with the kernel but it should maybe something to bear in mind when people start to write applications to be shipped with ReactOS.

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RE: [ros-general] Microsoft wants royalties for use of FAT
by Hey Matthew 05 Dec '03

05 Dec '03

I remember the good old days of 4DOS command interpreter. It gave you long file names by having a hidden DESCRIPT.ION file in each directory. This file contained the 8.3 filename and long file names. Simple. -----Original Message----- From: KJK::Hyperion [mailto:noog@libero.it] Sent: Friday, 5 December 2003 1:19 p.m. To: ros-general(a)reactos.com Subject: Re: [ros-general] Microsoft wants royalties for use of FAT At 23.03 04/12/2003, you wrote: >http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/ip/tech/fat.asp I bet it's not about FAT, but VFAT, i.e. long filenames on FAT. Am I right? Well, this is no news. I remember long filename support on DR-DOS was unofficial and not entirely legal, exactly because of this patent _______________________________________________ ros-general mailing list ros-general(a)reactos.com http://reactos.com/mailman/listinfo/ros-general This communication is confidential and may contain privileged material. If you are not the intended recipient you must not use, disclose, copy or retain it. If you have received it in error please immediately notify me by return email and delete the emails. Thank you.

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Ros-general December 2003