I believe there's no past decision on this because everyone in the industry operates with the understanding that computer languages (e.g. Perl, not perl) aren't Copyrightable.
"Everyone"? Considering the kind of lawsuits and patents we have seen in the past, I don't want to put it past some companies that assume languages are copyrightable. AFAIK, it has not been tested in a *US* court (but see the remark elsewhere about a recent European decision).
I also don't think the fact that APIs aren't copyrightable is a clear cut case. After all, many APIs aren't so much designed, as that they are the outcome of the first thing the programmer wrote down (many of my APIs certainly are). As such, they would be more expressions than ideas. I don't see an API as a "fact".
-
Are you posting in the right place? Check out Where do I post X? to know for sure.
-
Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags. Currently these include the following:
<code> <a> <b> <big>
<blockquote> <br /> <dd>
<dl> <dt> <em> <font>
<h1> <h2> <h3> <h4>
<h5> <h6> <hr /> <i>
<li> <nbsp> <ol> <p>
<small> <strike> <strong>
<sub> <sup> <table>
<td> <th> <tr> <tt>
<u> <ul>
-
Snippets of code should be wrapped in
<code> tags not
<pre> tags. In fact, <pre>
tags should generally be avoided. If they must
be used, extreme care should be
taken to ensure that their contents do not
have long lines (<70 chars), in order to prevent
horizontal scrolling (and possible janitor
intervention).
-
Want more info? How to link
or How to display code and escape characters
are good places to start.
|