question about copyright and code, is this legal?

Patrik Stridvall ps at leissner.se
Fri Oct 3 09:06:12 CDT 2003


> On October 3, 2003 09:07 am, Patrik Stridvall wrote:
> > As far as Wine is concerned though I can't think of
> > any Windows API that:
> > 1. Returns pure facts (not having any unique expression)
> > 2. Would fulfill the requirement of needed a significant
> >    effort to collect to collect the fact.
> >
> > So no I wouldn't worry about it as far as Wine is concerned.
> 
> So, you think that:
> 
>    For all x,y in Unicode:
> 	print x,y,strcmpiA(x,y)
> 
> is OK?

Short answer:
Yes.

Long answer:
In the US, it is clearly legal. See Feist.

In the other countries meantioned (Commonwealth etc), well 
1. I can't see that any significant effort have made to
   collect these facts. Each of these facts is very easy
   to collect for anybody competent in any language that
   Unicode defines the alphabet for.
2. Unicode comparison order lies more in the area of algoritms
   and science than any facts about the world that the law have
   been designed to protected, so courts at least in Sweden would
   be very reluctant to extend to the law to this since it is
   doubtful that the lawmakers really intended this.




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