

Programming languages cannot be copyrighted, says senior EU court adviser - abennett
http://www.itworld.com/it-managementstrategy/228621/programming-languages-cannot-be-copyrighted-says-senior-eu-court-advise

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cheald
The headline's somewhat misleading. What the court seems to have ruled is that
the _functionality_ of a program or programming language can't be copyrighted.
The language itself (implementation, specifically) is still copyrightable, but
the concepts it implements aren't.

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marshray
_Bot also added that a programming language cannot be protected by copyright
since that is an element allowing instructions to be given to the computer._

So it sounds like programming languages are considered inherently functional,
and thus not covered by copyright.

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petegrif
No surprise. But thank god they got it right.

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lloeki
Not sure. What I read is _"source code is not protected by copyright but
algorithms can and should be protected"_ , which would actually make licenses
like GPL useless and software patents enforceable. Or did I miss something?

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dalke
You misread. The ability to do something is not covered by copyright (in this
case, the ability of a program to implement the SAS language), while "the
means for achieving these functionalities may be protected by copyright."

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docgnome
So you can copyright source code itself, but not the algo or functionality
produced by that code. Right?

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rcfox
That's what patents do.

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skore
*in the US

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altrego99
I (or my team) use SAS in my everyday work. It is not a language to be proud
about. There are many inconsistencies within, and it carries a lot of baggage
- for example PROC MEANS and PROC SUMMARY do the same thing now (although they
may have carried different meanings much earlier). PROC MEANS, PROC FREQ, PROC
SORT all have very different (read inconsistent) ways to specify output
table's name, whereas they could be the same. There are many, many other
quirks.

Then again, for a system which sells mainly by virtue of traditional monopoly
and being a legacy system, it is not surprising they would fight a case
against copying their incoherent and utterly unintuitive language.

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marshray
Keep in mind the language dates from the mid-70s.

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marshray
I always found it interesting that SAS was one of the few big companies, ever,
built primarily on a programming language.

Early on (25-30 years ago) a family member worked there, and I was a summer
intern there. I picked up a few things which seem relevant here.

There was reportedly some guy by the name of Mr. Bass who (as in this case)
began publishing a workalike product called "The Bass System".

Originally the name "SAS" was an acronym for "Statistical Analysis System". I
heard it was changed, at least in part, due to ambiguities pertaining to
trademarking acronyms. I don't know if this was related to Mr. Bass in
particular.

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zanst
I disagree. Unless you're talking about assembly it doesn't makes any sense,
and even assembly, because a human created it, it envolved thinking and
creativity. Therefore, it's totally liable to be copyrighted.

