IBM vs. TurboHercules: Our Story Thus Far...

Apr 08, 2010
,

IBM sees the Hercules mainframe emulator as a source of competition. TurboHercules thinks they're simply leveling the playing field.

Earlier this week it was made public that IBM had levied patent infringement allegations against French company TurboHercules and its mainframe emulator. A letter signed by IBM VP and technology officer Mark S. Anzani and addressed to TurboHercules co-founder Roger Bowler detailed the more than 170 patents the company allegedly infringed upon. The problem: two of the patents in question were part of a 500-patent access pledge made by IBM in 2005.

Roger Bowler and other members of the open source community fear that IBM wants to break the pledge in order to maintain its choke-hold on mainframes and licensing. "Mainframes are now so deeply embedded in the infrastructure of modern society that they are too important to be left in the hands of a single company (IBM)," Bowler wrote in a blog on the TurboHercules site.

Unsurprisingly, IBM sees it differently. "TurboHercules is a member of organizations that are founded and financed by IBM competitors such as Microsoft. We severely question TurboHercules' motives," IBM submitted in their official response to Linux Magazine.

Bowler has responded by submitting an antitrust complaint to the European Commission in Brussels against IBM in March 2010. He maintains that the goal of TurboHercules is to "reestablish a free and fair competitive market for IBM mainframes. Mainframe users ought to have the right to choose what hardware they want to run their programs on."

The Linux Foundation's Jim Zemlin posted a note on the site's blog from Daniel Frye, VP, Open Systems Development at IBM that reasserted the terms of the pledge and stated that the pledge itself is not in danger of being dissolved.

Hercules is currently under the Q Public License, which recognized by the Open Source Initiative (OSI).

Related content

  • Hercules Mainframe Emulator

    Many enterprises still rely heavily on mainframes, which makes it all the more difficult to get your hands on one and install Linux on it. The Hercules emulator gives you a full-fledged alternative.

    more »
  • Microsoft Changes Licensing Conditions Following EU Verdict

    In the light of a ruling by the European Commission, Microsoft has now published revised license terms for interoperability.

    more »
  • Taking the pledge a little bit further
    more »
  • Turbo Editor: Open Source Text Editor for Android
    more »
  • Welcome

    Newsweek’s story uncovering the man they claim is the creator of BitCoin caused plenty of buzz. As this issue goes to press, the guy they fingered has announced he is filing a lawsuit, claiming that the assertions are false. But according to the story, his brother said “He’ll never admit to starting BitCoin.” So who should we believe?

    Many commentators have argued that the story is not sufficiently corroborated and shouldn’t have been printed, which might be true. But the question of the story’s treatment of facts masks another question that is receiving much less attention: Even if the allegations are true, is this really a news story?

    more »
comments powered by Disqus

Issue 171/2015

Buy this issue as a PDF

Digital Issue: Price $9.99
(incl. VAT)

News

Tag Cloud

Administration Community Events Hardware Linux Linux New Media Linux Pro Magazine Mobile Programming Software Ubuntu Web Development Windows free software open source
njobs Europe
What:
Where:
Country:
Njobs Netherlands Njobs Deutschland Njobs United Kingdom Njobs Italia Njobs France Njobs Espana Njobs Poland
Njobs Austria Njobs Denmark Njobs Belgium Njobs Czech Republic Njobs Mexico Njobs India Njobs Colombia