Bug 9976 - Patent violation
Summary: Patent violation
Keywords:
Status: CLOSED RAWHIDE
Alias: None
Product: Red Hat Linux
Classification: Retired
Component: gd
Version: 6.2
Hardware: All
OS: Linux
medium
low
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Nalin Dahyabhai
QA Contact:
URL: http://burnallgifs.org/
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2000-03-05 16:06 UTC by nick34
Modified: 2008-05-01 15:37 UTC (History)
1 user (show)

Fixed In Version:
Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed: 2000-05-30 15:24:41 UTC
Embargoed:

Attachments (Terms of Use)

Description nick34 2000-03-05 16:06:08 UTC 
Copies of GD that support the GIF format may no longer be used because of
a violation of Unisys's patents (http://burnallgifs.org/ |
http://www.boutell.com/gd/).

RedHat 6.1.92 still ships with version 1.3.6, I think this is a violation
of patents you should be aware of.

Keep up the good work and I hope this information is usefull to you.

Regards, Nick Maeger
Comment 1 Nalin Dahyabhai 2000-03-06 13:35:59 UTC 
As of 1.3, gd no longer supports LZW compression, which is what Unisys's patent
covers.  The actual .gif file format is owned by CompuServe.  We're still using
version 1.3 until LinuxConf can be modified to use the newer version.
Comment 2 Nigel Metheringham 2000-05-30 14:09:59 UTC 
See http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11756
for a linuxconf enhancement request
Comment 3 Nalin Dahyabhai 2000-05-30 15:24:59 UTC 
This will be fixed in the next release, which currently is slated to include
GD 1.8.2.  See Raw Hide (ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/rawhide/) for a snapshot.
Note You need to log in before you can comment on or make changes to this bug.