Red Hat Settles Hibernate Patent Dispute With Firestar/DataTern

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 16:01:58 GMT

I didn't pay attention to the following news item until today. After all, it is not unusual for Red Hat or other Linux companies to face intellectual property challenges. What I did not grasp is that this time, the dispute is not about Linux. It's about JBoss, and specifically, about Hibernate. You wouldn't have guessed it by reading the Red Hat press release:

Red Hat: Red Hat was sued for patent infringement by Firestar in 2006 and later by DataTern. Red Hat denied the infringement claims and in time drove a settlement that not only ended the particular claims against it, but also provided for extensive protections for its customers and the larger open source community that Red Hat relies upon.

However, a little googling showed more information about the suit:

Dennis Crouch, Patently-O: Software company FireStar has filed suit against open source seller Red Hat, alleging patent infringement. The suit, filed in the Eastern District of Texas, asserts infringement of U.S. Patent No. 6,101,502 that is directed to a method of interfacing an object oriented software application with a relational database. Red Hat recently purched JBoss maker of the specific accused product Hibernate 3.0.

and the settlement:

Dawn Kawamoto, C|Net: Under the settlement, whose financial terms were not disclosed, all software distributed under Red Hat's brands and predecessor versions are covered, as well as Red Hat customers that use the software. The software protects derivative works, or combination products, that use covered products from the patent claim.

The patent involved, U.S. Patent No. 6,101,502, reads like common sense that shouldn't be allowed to be patented. However I'm not a lawyer, so I wouldn't know for sure.

However, the way I read the articles, if you are using Hibernate and you are not a Red Hat customer, or part of the larger open source community that Red Hat relies upon, you are still at risk of being sued by Firestar/DataTern, or whoever they sell this patent to in the future, for patent infringement.

Ouch!

Spring Framework Has A Competitor Now

Wed, 05 Oct 2005 05:42:25 GMT

In the last few years, we've heard a lot about Spring Framework and Hibernate. Lots of job postings with Spring and Hibernate requirements.

With the (beta) release of JBoss Seam 15 days ago, claiming EJB3 and JSF integration, the landscape is set to change.

I understand that there are other quote-and-quote web frameworks around, RIFE, for example. But somehow Seam stands out with its emphasize on standards. It being a product of JBoss lead by Gavin King, the Hibernate guy, also helps.

And it looks like it's going to be a battle between the JBoss guys and the Spring guys. Sparks is already flying in multiple websites and blogs. Here's one that's particularly entertaining. You need to read the comments.

Cast of characters:

Gavin (King, JBoss)
Bill Burke (JBoss)
Rick Hightower (Spring?)
Rickard (Oberg, not JBoss, Spring-ish?)
Keith Donald (Spring)
Andy (Oliver, JBoss)

Not that I don't like Spring. But it being a non-standard library and framework gives me an uneasy feeling. The same feeling that JGL and BWT gave me back in the old days.

Weiqi Gao's Observations - hibernate tag

Red Hat Settles Hibernate Patent Dispute With Firestar/DataTern

Spring Framework Has A Competitor Now