Re: Help to understand?
Sure, I'll give it a whack....
In order for programs to be inter-operable they have to have functions named the same that take the same parameters and return the same type of result. Take this example:
There is a library called Math and in the math library there is a collection of math related functions; add, subtract, multiply, divide.
A simple function to add two numbers together;
int add(int first, int second)
This mean the function name is "add" it takes two parameters that must be integers and it returns an integer.
To use it you would call "int X = add(2, 3)" and the variable X should contain the number 5.
For example Sun/Oracle could have written the function:
int add(int first, int second){
return first + second;
}
While Google could have written the function:
int add( int begin, int other){
int num_1 = begin;
int num_2 = other;
int answer = num_1 + num_2;
return answer;
}
What Google is accused of copying ISN'T any (well there was those 9 lines) actual SOURCE CODE (the stuff between the {} ). It was accused of copying the "int add(int, int)" and the Math.add(), Math.subtract(), ... arrangement. It is EXACTLY the things that Google is accused of copying that allow one program to be inter-operable with another. Up to this point is was always believed to be not protectable by copyright.
This was widely believed to have been decided in Baker v. Selden, a US Supreme Court case from 1879 ( https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/101/99 ) that defined the idea/expression dichotomy in copyright law. Unfortunately for all of us not named Oracle, Oracle threw a patent into the lawsuit and so it was appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit which has an absolutely horrible track record twisting the law to favor patenting everything under the sun. Recently it has had a number of cases overturned by the Supreme Court.
I hope this becomes another such case where the Supreme Court overturns the Appellate Court and rules that API's are unprotectable by copyright once and for all.
I hope that helps.