Re: ARC patent

Tom Lane wrote:

>Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
>  
>
>>Andrew Sullivan wrote:
>>    
>>
>>>What will you do if the patent is granted, 8.0 is out there with the
>>>offending code, and you get a cease-and-desist letter from IBM
>>>demanding the removal of all offending code from the Net?
>>>      
>>>
>
>  
>
>>We can modify the code slightly to hopefully avoid the patent.  With the
>>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?
>>    
>>
>
>I think there is zero probability of being sued by IBM in the near
>future.  They would instantly destroy the credibility and good
>relationships they've worked so hard to build up with the entire
>open source community.
>
>However, I don't want to be beholden to IBM indefinitely --- in five
>years their corporate strategy might change.  I think that a reasonable
>response to this is to plan to get rid of ARC, or at least modify the
>code enough to avoid the patent, in time for 8.1.  (It's entirely likely
>that that will happen before the patent issues, anyway.)
>
>
>  
>

There's a very recent paper at 
http://carmen.cs.uiuc.edu/~zchen9/paper/TPDS-final.ps on an alternative 
to ARC which claims superior performance ...

Maybe this will give us added impetus to make the 8.1 cycle short, as 
has been suggested previously.


cheers

andrew