Novell Owns Copyrights To Unix Operating System

A federal court in Utah ruled that Novell Inc., not SCO Group Inc., rightfully owns the copyright on the Unix operating system.

The ruling is likely to significantly harm SCO's separate 2003 lawsuit against International Business Machines Corp. and could result in lifting a cloud of suspicion that SCO had sought to place over Linux, the free, increasingly popular operating system.

SCO had alleged that Linux was an unauthorized knockoff of Unix, which it claimed to have purchased from Novell in 1995. IBM has been a strong commercial proponent of Linux.

But SCO never bought the copyright to Unix, the court ruled, in a 102-page opinion by U.S. District Judge Dale A. Kimball. The judge also said that Novell had the authority to force SCO to waive its claims against IBM.

A spokesman for Novell said its attorneys are examining the opinion.

Novell, SCO, Unix Operating System, Unix, Operating systems, Copyright, IBM

Source:→ The Wall Street Journal