CherryOS Mac Emulator Resurfaces

Clash writes "Following its initial announcement and subsequent controversy last October, Mac emulator CherryOS has finally been released. Its creator, Arben Kryeziu, found himself in hot water last year amid claims the software was simply stolen from the open source PearPC project. With the code now under public scrutiny, it appears that such allegations are true. According to BetaNews, CherryOS boots up in the exact same manner as PearPC, and its error messages and source files are nearly identical. The emulator also includes MacOnLinuxVideo, which is the same driver used by PearPC to speed up graphics. The CherryOS configuration file also closely mirrors that used by PearPC. Trial download without registration found here."

Free publicity. Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is this fraudster getting so much free press? It would be different if the headline read "Stolen code illegally released", but as it is you might think CherryOS is something other than someone elses stolen property.

At least this time the schmuk has taken the "trouble" of removing all references to PearPC in the binary. Sadly he's too stupid to remember to change the configuration file format, or the hard coded MAC address that PearPC uses for the emulated NIC.

Re:why would it be illegial?

[imsabbel]

but selling a program ripped of from a open source app violating the GPL should be.
Or didnt your even RTFSummary?

Re:Wondering how developers feel about this

[Nikademus]

How do you think MS services for Unix has been created? It's just a complete OpenBSD ripoff.

Re:why would it be illegial?

[bygimis]

Yes but stealing someone elses source code and releasing a commercial product based on it is illegal. You need a valid license from the copyright holder to distribute someone elses work.

Re:why would it be illegial?

[91degrees]

Which is somethign they have. PearPC is released under the GPL. This does permit redistribution. It's the main point.

Unless they're breaching the terms of the GPL without permission from the original authors of the software, this is legal. They may be breaching these terms, but that's still to be proven.

Not the only one.

[eddy]

I saw that Miranda [miranda-im.org] had been ripped off for (at least) a second time.

Going to all that trouble just to rip people off and install spyware. It's fucking sad.

Re:why would it be illegial?

[pe1rxq]

The GPL doesn't permit just distributing binaries wihtout informing the receivers what the License terms are.
They should atleast put a notice with it saying 'This contains GPL code, send your request for the source here:'

Jeroen

Re:why would it be illegial?

[Anonymous Coward]

I dont think anyone is arguing that. The problem is YOU MUST GIVE BACK. If you take GPL code and modify it, and ship it, then you MUST provide the modified source. If CherryOS does this then no one can complain.

Re:Intellectual Property?

[FidelCatsro]

OK first off
IP is broken down into three main areas comenly on slashdot

1:Patents - Mainly refering to software patents , or the ownership of an idea , most slashdoters are against this and rightly so , as it stiffels freedom

2: Trademarks - Can be both very usefull on one hand to stop cheap rip offs but also gets abused alot by companys (IE: why pentium is called pentium as intel tried to trademark a number )

3: copywright : also a two sided blade , abused alot in the DMCA which companys use to stop us enacting our rights to fair use , and used properly in the GNU GPL and Creative commens license which i hope i dont need to explain to people here

Ok i do dice over the issues , but IP is not just one thing , and in this case its totaly right to complain about people violating IP , its the copyright equivelent of identity theft( well close enough)

Wired link

[blanks]

Found a good link with info from both cherryos developers and pearlpc developers. here [wired.com]

Great quote from the developer

[blanks]

Kryeziu said he's under unfair scrutiny because people refuse to believe the product is real.

"If it isn't, it will ruin my reputation," he said. "I will end up as a bartender. I do not want to be a bartender."

I guess being a theif is better then slinging booze.

Re:It wasn't stolen

[BenjyD]

Theft means taking without permission. The GPL only grants permission to 'take' the licensed source code if you obey certain restrictions. This guy doesn't appear to have met those restrictions, so he has stolen the code.

The point of the GPL, in case you missed it, is that modifications to the source cannot be kept from the community if the modifier wants to distribute their work. If you want to benefit from GPL code, you have to give back in the form of your modifications.

Re:why would it be illegial?

[Ohreally_factor]

However, you do need to include the relevant copyright notices in the source.

Clear license violation

[Ulric]

If this is in fact based on another GPL program, which seems to be the case, and no source is provided, that is a violation of the GPL. Quoting:

2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:

a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.

b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.

c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively when run, you must cause it, when started running for such interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on the Program is not required to print an announcement.)

You must not pretend that it's the original code. You must provide source. You must tell the users their rights.

Note that there is no requirement to credit the original authors, which some people seem to believe.

Re:Not the only one.

[LiquidCoooled]

Hang on, I followed your link.

I might be a bit behind now, but the messenger in question says the following on their front main page:

Overview
Star Messenger is a multi protocol instant messenger client, based on Miranda IM client, designed to be efficient and easy to use.

Then, JUST below the download link, theres another that says Source files available here.

Now, there may be other things wrong with it, but at initial glance, that looks just like any other legitimate derivative works, and if they are complaining about something being a rip-off, then perhaps they shouldn't have used the GPL.

It's not just CherryOS

[Anonymous Coward]

This guy is a serial GPL abuser:

VX30 ad stats is a rip of phpadsnew [phpadsnew.com].

VX30 itself is nothing more than a wrapper for mpeg1 and Ogg, ripped from Jorbis [jcraft.com]

Some people have no shame...

Re:Enforce the GPL or it loses relevance

[mpe]

If cherryos violates GPL, is someone going to actually try to do something about it? Where's the lawsuit?

It's up to the copyright holders of the infringed works to take action.

If not, the GPL might as well not exist.

A copyright holder failing to take action does not weaken either copyright in general or the copyrights they hold. The only thing it may do is limit the damages the copyright holder can claim if they later sue. On the basis that they allowed the infringement to continue once they became aware of it.

Re:Emulators?

[fr0dicus]

PearPC is slower than a calculator rendering doom 3 and MOL only works on PowerPC.

Re:Blah Blah Blah or shuld that be halB labB lahB

[Anita Coney]

Because copyrights protect a particular code. Patents protect a process. Accordingly, copyrights enable competition. While patents destroy it.

The most egregious example in my mind of a software patent is a Japanese company's patent on linking a help file to a help icon. There is no specific code involved. ANY help icon linked to ANY help file is in violation of the patent.

Copyrights actually encourage competition, because if someone codes a great word processor, for example. Some other coder might try to make a different and better one, with his own code.

But patents stop any competition, because nearly every computer process can be patented and monopolized. Think about, right now nearly every piece of software you use is in violation of that Japanese help icon patent.

And think of all the other trivial processes your computer does that are or soon will be patented. Once you start eliminating all those processes, you end up with a pretty looking empty box under your desk. Unless of course Apple obtained a business method patent on pretty looking boxes under desks.

Re:why would it be illegial?

[Raphael]

As for the suppying the source, I never understood why people belive that they need to have a link available to the source online to comply with the GPL.

It does not have to be online. The GPL requires you to provide the source code to those who get the binaries from you (e.g., on the same CD or from the same web site) or to include a written offer to give the source code to any third part who requests it. This is stated in paragraph 3 of the GPL [gnu.org].

So the source code does not have to be available online, even if this is a convenient way for some companies to comply with the license. It can also be sent on CD-ROMs or floppy disks to those who request it. The online distribution happens to be cheaper in many cases, but this is not a requirement.

Hell if a company wanted to they could supply you the source in the form of a print out (or alphabit soup) and they would comply with the terms of the GPL license.

Wrong. In paragraph 3 b) of the GPL [gnu.org], you can see that it requires a "complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code [...] on a medium customarily used for software interchange". Furthermore, the same paragraph 3 adds: "The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it.". So distributing the software in some obfuscated form would be a violation of the GPL.

Re:why would it be illegial?

[ajs318]

This is why I believe in Source Code Escrow for closed source projects {though I'd favour a simple outright ban on Closed Source even more}. If you aren't willing to give out your source code to every user of your software, then you should be forced to place a sealed copy in the care of some trusted third party. In the event of any dispute, this copy can be unsealed, and the dispute resolved by independent experts. Likewise, the very same day your copyright expires {whether as a matter of time, or sooner if a court so orders} this copy can be unsealed to ensure its entry into the Public Domain.

The GPL also stipulates in clause 3 that the source code must be "machine-readable" and "on a medium customarily used for software interchange". So you might be expected to produce an "alphabit soup reader" in court.

Don't forget that there isn't really such a thing as "violating the GPL". The GPL is a licence to do something above and beyond your "fair dealing" rights -- determined by the courts -- applicable to copyright law. If you aren't in compliance with the GPL, and what you're doing isn't considered "fair dealing", then you're in breach of plain old copyright law.

MOD TROLL DOWN PLEASE

[macdaddy]

Apple licensed PARC's GUI and hired the PARC inventors away from Xerox. Apple certainly did not "snag" Xerox's windowing GUI or try to pass it off as their own. It was their own. Where the hell have you been for the last 2 decades, troll?

Re:why would it be illegial?

[Gerv]

No, because:

a) The GPL specifies that build scripts need to be included

b) 360K disks are no longer a medium *customarily* used for software interchange

c) while you could argue that printed text is readable by a small number of specialised machines, a judge would take into account the usual meaning of the words in the context in which they are being used... and laugh in your face.

Gerv

Insightful, my arse.

[Rufus88]

Stealing is about wrongful changing of ownership. When one steals a toaster from a department store, that toaster in effect ceases to be the property of the store and wrongfully becomes property of the theif, and there are laws to return ownership back to the rightful party.

This is a contradiction in terms. A stolen toaster does not become the property of the theif. If it did, it wouldn't be stolen, nor would the store have a right to have it returned. It's still the store's property. It's just that the thief has taken unlawful posession of the toaster. If you're going to be commenting on the subtleties and nuances of property law, you should at least use basic terminology correctly.

they get the soul ability

Let's keep religion out of this, ok?

However when they modify it, rebrand it and repackage it they are claiming those rights that are in effect the intelectual property. They are claiming distribution rights and claiming authorship.

Yeah, but they didn't remove anything tangible from the posession of the "rightful owners", which is always the distinction that music piracy apologists use when they cry "copyright infringement is NOT theft!".

What would be equivilant is taking a good, but little known song, then putting it onto a CD and claiming that it is mine

No, that's plagiarism.

The grandparent is correct. What they did is copyright infringement, and is every bit as much a theft, nor more and no less, than music piracy.

Re:Enforce the GPL or it loses relevance

[FLAGGR]

It only emulates the hardware that runs OSX, not OSX itself, you still need the osx cd's/dvd to use this. It doesn't violate "Apple's software license" in any way.

Re:Um.

[weierstrass]

You can't just change the code around a bit, and charge 100$ for it, and not give the customer anything.

Yes you can. The GPL allows this. You just might not get too many customers.

Also note that the download of CherryOS is a *trial* download. You are supposed to be allowed to download the thing for free since it's GPL'd code.

Also wrong. The GPL says that if you redistribute, you must make source code available to your customers, and give them the same rights you have. It doesn't say you have to give anything away.

Re:Um.

[AstroDrabb]

Did you read TFA? This guy/company is trying to take GPLed software and make it proprietary and pass it as their own work. Did you read the license that comes with the donwnload? It is not a GPL license any more:

2.07 LICENSEE may not assign this Agreement or

transfer the Licensed Work.

Well, that certainly isn't valid for a GPLed work.

2.04 The license granted to LICENSEE under this Agreement is non-exclusive and shall expire on the fifteenth day following download of the Licensed Work by LICENSEE from MXS

Huh? How can this guy cancel your right to the GPLed work?

The problem here is that this guy has stole the code from PearPC and is passing it off as CherryOS and selling it as a proprietary work. Now if this guy had been selling it as CherryOS and kept it a GPLed work, there would be no problems, however that is clearly not the case.

Smoking Gun

[canadacow]

A few minutes of hex searching revealed that Arben was not diligent enough in removing the embedded images from PearPC's code. In CherryOS.exe, at address hex 0xF9140, you'll find a PearPC gif (see attached link) that is the ChangeCD image used in PearPC (in the stable build I have, at address 0xA6330) (see second attached link). Any questions?

http://66.42.197.91/FromPearPC.gif/ [66.42.197.91]

http://pearpc.sourceforge.net/screenshots/osx_inst all.png/ [sourceforge.net]

Re:Smoking Gun

[canadacow]

Fixed links:

http://66.42.197.91/FromPearPC.gif [66.42.197.91]

http://pearpc.sourceforge.net/screenshots/osx_inst all.png [sourceforge.net]

Re:why would it be illegial?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes.

No, PearPC supports Altivec

[koko775]

The "stable" version of PearPC is G3-based, but CherryOS uses the Altivec patch, which has the nice side effect of making it FAR easier to sue the crap out of them in the US. In the words of Andrew Smith (on the PearPC mailing list):

"It say's G4, the cpu id is set to 0x000c0000. You can change it but
every time you re-run the program it overwrites it again. (so you
couldn't change it back to 0x0008wxyz, or whatever the G3 is).

I've tried using it an couldn't get my old PearPC images to boot at
first. Then it finally did (although it took WAY longer to boot than
PearPC does) although I was presented with a Logon screen (which i've
never had with PearPC) and that failed to logon, crashed the emu and
then Cherry refused to respond. I then had to spend 5 mins trying to
close the damned thing since I wouldn't unlock the mouse.

Fullscreen is also very buggy, as in it takes a good 30 seconds to get
into it and then i couldn't get out of it again (F5 and F6 didn't do
anything, that's what they use for fullscreen and mouse grab). And the
refresh rate was at 60Hz so it hurt like hell to look at it for more
than 5 seconds.

There are quite a lot of other things I've found wrong with it (check
out http://www.h80571.serverkompetenz.net/comments.php ?news_id=155
right at the bottom I've posted a little of what I found to make it
crash).

When I get home I plan on playing around with it a bit more."

And in Daniel Foesch's words:

"In the strings for CherryOS: "!!! Unflushed vector register invalidated!"

This is my string, which I wrote for certain, and it is inconsistant
with the PearPC debugging output (and thus, the non-vector CherryOS
outputs) The likelihood of someone "working" on CherryOS on the
vector implementation, and producing the exact same error warning, and
in the same format that I choose to use personally, which is in
violation of the standard reporting formats of the program, is quite
impossible.

Thank you CherryOS for including my AltiVec patch so that I have a leg
to stand on against you, and it's not just "Hey, Sebastian, come sue
these dorks, in a country that you don't live in."

I'll be contacting the EFF shortly concerning legal advice."