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Driver sub-system specific frameworks and further more generic services and data-structures

VMware can implement all the data structures, generic service definitions, and frameworks they want, such as having the same function names, and struct files, the "Headers", without necessarily having to copy the executable code that is defined in those frameworks.

The software program is subject to copyright. The use or re-implementation of interfaces to a software program are considered fair use, and it's an important concept behind open source, that the interfaces when different packages talk to each other allow drop-in replacement of one program for another, such as a new open source software program to control your proprietary piece of hardware.

These function prototypes, struct formats, and interface definitions, "the headers"; are either not subject to copyright, or Linux itself and many GNU projects would be in deep trouble, because in the Linux world copying structs and headers from proprietary software is a common practice, that actually is part of what allows GNU to even exist.

So if they made that argument in court that the frameworks are subject to copyright, it would also be a major setback for many open source software projects such as Wine, or even various GCC projects.

And the Linux kernel as well.... if the Linux kernel struct formats and headers were subject to copyrights, then struct formats used to control hardware would be as well, and Microsoft could sue Linux developers over making a driver for hardware device X that used a struct for control based on a Microsoft copyrighted standard.

Also, SCO probably should have won if this was the case, and since POSIX itself is copyrighted, and header files in many BSD-related OSes include fundamental interface definitions that are copyrighted with no license to use.....

However, they didn't stop there, from what I understand. They also have ESXi use Linux GPL drivers.

GPL drivers, such as?

Note.... ESXi does not ship with a large collection of drivers. They have a rather exclusive hardware compatibility list. If it's not in the list, then there is probably not a driver included.

To say this might be a GPL violation, you would need to find a driver that is GPL'd and also only available under GPL. Many of the GPL'd drivers are developed by the hardware vendors who can provide the binary code for use with VMware under other times, since it's their driver, they can license their work for other uses freely, as they will.

VMware could also get around this problem by distributing just the source code for the GPL'd driver, since these are discrete software modules that you compile, then copy the binary into ESXi, then load; VMware can distribute the driver modules which could even be the same source code as in the Linux kernel, without needing to GPL vmklinux or vmkernel itself.

For the small number of hardware drivers that they do have included, they are distributed as loadable files called .VIB files. As far as I know, these are supplied by the hardware manufacturers, for example:

~ # esxcli software vib list | grep ixg
net-ixgbe 3.21.4-1OEM.550.0.0.1331820 Intel VMwareCertified 2014-09-30
~ #

Also, what's preventing them from becoming Americans further down the road if they chose?

Their aspirations to become president of the US will be severely cut short if they lose their ability to be considered a natural born citizen.

NO, parents make decisions for their kids when they are too young to do so.

Not this decision. And not all decisions. For example, a parent cannot bind their kid to a contract or decide to have their kid borrow $1 million and enter a promise to repay on the kid's behalf that applies past age 18.

Citizenship involves rights and future responsibilities the individual has to agree to.

The selection of citizenships is decision that is considered personal to the individual. This is one of those things that is supposed to be left to the person to decide, regardless of the parent's opinion ---- it is the decision the person has to make and live with.

In most cases, the parents don't even have any right to any influence at all over citizenship.

For example: you cannot renounce the citizenship of your child that is already recognized as a US citizen, an agent or representative cannot take actions regarding your citizenship, someone who is mentally incompetent cannot have a guardian do it for them. Minors have to demonstrate to the consular that they are acting voluntarily and fully understand the consequences and implications.

It's more than just tax paperwork. There are asset declaration forms to send to Treasury Dept. Failure to file these can result in prison sentences.

Since you wouldn't be living in the US.... probably there are no assets that US law provides you any rights to control over, they fall out of the limited powers provided of the US constitution, so there are no possible lawful acts by the US government with respect to these; if you live in Belgium, for example, the home you live in is Belgium property governed by Belgium law.

Belgium law might give direction of the property to your person, since you directed what Belgium law recognizes as a transfer of one thing you are in control of for another, but the real-estate is outside of US jurisdiction, so no US law can grant or recognize you as having a right to direct the use of this property, since the land is on another country's soil.

Since no privilege or right you have under US law and no privilege or right you have under any treaty gives you the right to direct use of that property inside Belgium, it is not your asset... it is Belgium's asset that you have been afforded a right to control, a legal right valid only within their jurisdiction: so there is no sense reporting it to another country outside their jurisdiction, where your legal right to control that property would not be valid.

The same would apply to all your belongings and accounts in Belgium.... these aren't assets, since you can control them only in belgium... you don't "own" things, ultimately everything belongs to the state, except in Belgium you have a right to direct their use and disposition.

Oh yeah, and as long as you don't export anything from Belgium, there isn't a goddammed thing any other country can do about that, even to pry and try to figure out what exactly those things are, let alone attempt to gain control of some of them.

This isn't inconsistent. On the whole we do need less regulation. I would agree with that. There should be little regulation, but it should be effective regulation.

There should also be a concept of "temporary regulation".... for example: We see this widespread abuse, so for the next 5 years you all have to do X, and if you shape up, then you industry players can decide how to do it afterwards, BUT you will be fully on the hook financially, for negligence, if you do X and it causes damage to people.

There are some subjects or some elements in certain industries that need more regulation, because it's become the "industry standard" to abuse consumers, or people are unfairly being put at risk to save $$$ or safe face for some Mega Co, when Mega Co is essentially a local monopoly or nearly so.

You have no idea of what you talk about. I am citizen of Colombia, Spain, Panama, and the United States. When I am in any other country of the US, I lose all support of US consular services, because I am beholden to the laws of those countries. I cannot commit a crime in Colombia and scream for US help... Please stop giving bad advice on the internet.

Once you renounce citizenship, I don't think the united states will let you back in, I'm not entirely sure but I believe that is the case.

You can still get a passport from your new home country you are a citizen of and get into the US to visit. Probably need to apply for a Visa if you want to stay more than X days, and need additional paperwork if you ever want to work there or reside for a longer period.

We need regulation....

Insurers aren't mandated to comply — though most do.

They should be required to pass their audit or pass an audit by a 3rd party auditor who is approved by the OIG.

Failure to comply should result in fines and bar them from writing or acquiring any more insurance policies, until they do.

Also, in the event of a breach at this juncture, there should be a financial penalty for their negligence.

Well... a software license is a type of contract. There's a principle in contract law; that if there are multiple ways which a condition can be interpreted, then it will be interpreted for purposes at time of adjuication in the manner that most favors the parties who did not produce the contract term / present the offer.

The same contract or license text can be interpreted in different ways for different cases.

You are mistaken in thinking they use the Linux kernel in ESXi. There is no Linux kernel anywhere in ESXi.

They have written their own operating system from scratch, and they did a complete rewrite of the kernel in the update from ESXi 3.5 to 4.0.

What they have done is copied a subset the interface API from the Linux kernel. Much how like the Wine Project has copied API details from Win32 without permission from Microsoft.

This allows existing driver source code that already works in Linux to be compiled using the VMware driver development kit into a binary that can be loaded as a driver in ESXi.

This means that hardware vendors can write the driver once, and then it could be built for either Linux or ESXi, so that seems beneficial for Linux users to have more drivers still being written for Linux.

This is considered a legacy framework, and VMware is already phasing this out... see details on the new native driver framework

This will be sad, as the native driver framework is proprietary, and it will likely no longer be possible to write your own drivers for ESXi, once vmklinux is gone, without purchasing the driver development tools at high $$$.

Also, major enterprises are running ESXi on much of their hardware, so the incentive may go away for many manufacturers to release information or develop Linux drivers; they can just produce their binary ESXi drivers and be done with it.

Well, having used VMware Workstation 8 and 9, I can was able to download and modify the Linux drivers provided by VMware, necessary to fix some kernel related bugs

I don't think the lawsuit is over vmware tools. VMware provides source code to most of the VMware tools components; often they are installed by building the source code.

The VMware hypervisor includes a special management Virtual Machine run by the vmkernel which uses Busybox.

They do not include the source code for Busybox. However, there is a written offer for customers to request source code on CD for the product you purchased, valid for 3 years after you purchased the software product from VMware, by sending a request to an address given of VMware General Counsel, Attn: Open Source Files Request.

Versions of ESXi prior to 5.5 supported an architecture for drivers called vmklinux; essentially, the VMware kernel supported a framework compatible with Linux drivers ---- you could compile Linux drivers from source code and load them into the vmklinux system. ESXi5.5 introduced a new thing called Native Drivers, but they still support the Linux kernel driver SDK. There is no Linux kernel code, other than drivers themselves, however, they have only copied the Kernel driver API interfaces.

Well, I'm a copyright lawyer, so I doubt I'm "completely and totally ignorant of the law." Have you considered the possibility that your analysis is wrong?

Just thought I'd mention it, since you did make a rather broad statement suggesting that works cannot enter the public domain unless deliberately placed there by the copyright holder. While copyright holders can put works into the public domain, it's not true that that is the only way for works to enter the public domain.

"Um, no. That would not be the scenes a faire doctrine."

The scenes a faire doctrine, which I don't have to google for, thanks, permits people to copy without fear of infringement, stock elements from works, which are typical, if not indispensible, for works that have a particular setting, genre, theme, etc.

In this case, where you have a show about teenagers fighting monsters with martial arts and giant robots, it would not infringe if you had a five person team, each member of which had personalities as described above, and where the members of the team were color-coded. It's simply expected of the genre, and therefore fair game, even if you copied it from another copyrighted work.

Now if the specific thing you copied was a very detailed example, and you kept all the details, you might then have a problem. So it depends on how much Power Rangers embellished on this standard device, if they did, and if so, how much of that embellishment, if any, was used in this case.

If you disagree as to my explanation, please feel free to actually say what you think the scenes a faire doctrine is.

I didn't say Disney's Peter Pan. I was talking about JM Barrie's Peter Pan, which Disney's Peter Pan is based on.

A new version of Peter Pan, based on Barrie's, could still tarnish the character well enough (if done right, and if widely published) so as to harm Disney's Peter Pan merely by association. But it would be lawful to do this. Disney's copyright on their version of Peter Pan does not extend to stopping other people from making their own derivatives of Barrie's work, even if they're very unwholesome derivatives.

Spock in Amok Time is good Spock, just rageful and murderous. Evil Spock (with a goatee -- that's how you can tell he's evil) was from episode 33, "Mirror, Mirror."