India announces open source policy; Big win for FOSS
On March 29, 2015, Indian government announced a policy on adoption of open source software, which makes it mandatory for all software applications and services of the government be built using open source software, so that projects under Digital India “ensure efficiency, transparency and reliability of such services at affordable costs”.
However, the new policy clearly states that “All Government Organizations, while implementing e-Governance applications and systems must include a specific requirement in Request for Proposal (RFP) for all suppliers to consider open source software (OSS) along with closed source software while responding. Suppliers shall provide justification for exclusion of OSS in their response, as the case may be.
U.S judge cancels patent on eve of Trend Micro Trial
A U.S. judge has invalidated two patents owned by Intellectual Ventures just weeks before its lawsuit against Japanese security software provider Trend Micro Inc over the same patents was set to go to trial. U.S. District Judge Leonard Stark in Delaware said on Wednesday the two patents were too abstract to deserve legal protection.
The ruling likely means Intellectual Ventures’ infringement trial with Trend Micro will not proceed.
The company, headquartered in Bellevue, Wash., has become one of the biggest patent owners in the world and only recently began suing companies in addition to its longtime strategy of licensing its wide array of intellectual property. Trend Micro senior vice president Felix Sterling said in a statement to Reuters that the company was “appreciative of today’s vindication.”
Intellectual Ventures said it was considering an appeal of the ruling. The cases are Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Symantec Corp, and v. Trend Micro, Inc, Nos. 10-1067, and 12-1581 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware.
Open source patent protection extended to popular software
Dockar, Puppet, Libreoffice, and the Go language are the latest additions to the Open Invention Network’s extensive patent nonaggression umbrella. OIN (the Open Invention Network) has announced important changes to its definition of what constitutes “the Linux system.”
Licensing community participants were advised yesterday that, as of June 25, the Linux System Definition will include more than 100 new packages and updated versions of nearly 70 existing ones. This refresh brings Docker, Puppet, Nginx, the Ceph storage system, and the full LibreOffice suite under the OIN umbrella, as well as the Debian packaging tool APT, the Java build manager Maven, the reference.
Wipro sees huge opportunities in new open source policy
Recently, the Union Ministry of Communications and IT have come up with a new policy that has made it mandatory for all government offices across the country to use open source software. Wipro, India’s third largest IT services company on Friday said it was seeing significant opportunities to participate in the Centre’s drive to encourage adoption and use of open source software.
Recently, the Union Ministry of Communications and IT have come up with a new policy that has made it mandatory for all government offices across the country to use open source software. The policy released late last said that all government organisations must include a requirement for their software suppliers to consider open-source options when implementing e-governance applications and systems.
