Novell has posted towards the Securites and Exchange Commission (SEC) Web internet site redacted variations of the provider;s patent, business and technology agreements with Microsoft,
Office 2010 Professional Plus Key, which it signed in November 2006.Novell officials mentioned previously this week they'd post these documents just before the end of Could. The company launched the filings late on Could possibly 25, the commence of the three-day vacation weekend inside the U.S.Did anything juicy make it previous the “marked as confidential” cuts? Groklaw has highlightsof some of the documentation specific towards the Microsoft-Novell patent arrangements:“If the final version of GPLv3 contains terms or conditions that interfere with our agreement with Microsoft or our ability to distribute GPLv3 code,
Office 2007 Ultimate, Microsoft may perhaps cease to distribute SUSE Linux coupons in order to avoid the extension of its patent covenants to a broader range of GPLv3 software recipients, we could possibly need to modify our relationship with Microsoft under less advantageous terms than our current agreement,
Microsoft Office 2010 Pro, or we may perhaps be restricted in our ability to include GPLv3 code in our products,
Windows 7 X64, any of which could adversely affect our company and our operating results. In such a case, we would likely explore alternatives to remedy the conflict,
Office 2010 License, but there is no assurance that we would be successful in these efforts.”So now it;s even more obvious why Microsoft has been throwing around the “235 patents infringed by open source” claim. Novell is confirming that Microsoft might possibly have to stop distributing SuSE Linux coupons if the Free Software Foundation;s General Public License (GPL) version 3 goes through with all the current patent language in place.Having to eliminate the SuSE distribution part of its Novell agreement would hurt Microsoft;s campaign to convince other open-source vendors to sign similar deals. It also wouldn;t make Microsoft look too good towards the handful of large corporate customers (that Microsoft touts every chance it gets) who Microsoft has convinced to go with SuSE Linux.There is a lot more legal mumbo-jumbo on the SEC site regarding the Microsoft-Novell deal. Anyone see any other interesting nonredacted info?