Whether you are interested in real-time Linux or not, the RTLinux patent issue is both interesting and important. As open source (“free”) software grows in importance, considerations of patents and mixed copyrights will become increasingly significant to individuals and companies engaged in software development. Clearly, the solution is not to avoid the use of open source software — the open source movement appears to be as unstoppable a trend as was the replacement of assembly language by high-level languages.

This thoughtful and excellently written editorial at Linux Weekly News briefly reviews some important issues which the software development community needs to work out, brought to the fore at this time by the recent unveiling of the RTLinux patent. The Linux Weekly News editorial asks — and offers an opinion on — these three questions . . .

• What are the implications of the RTLinux patent and its license?
  
• What does this patent mean for RTAI [a competing real-time linux add-on, derived from RTLinux]?
  
• What does this whole situation imply for the free software industry?

 
This article was originally published on LinuxDevices.com and has been donated to the open source community by QuinStreet Inc. Please visit LinuxToday.com for up-to-date news and articles about Linux and open source.