This could be the tech world’s version of a conviction being overturned by new DNA evidence.
A forensic analysis conducted for the latest issue of IEEE Spectrum magazine appears to have answered one of the biggest mysteries of the PC era: Was the landmark MS-DOS operating system that Bill Gates and Microsoft licensed to IBM an original piece of work, or stolen goods?
Sure, it’s ancient history, but it was a pivotal moment in the rise of the personal computer industry, and perhaps the most important business deal Microsoft ever made.
Gary Kildall, the late creator of the operating system CP/M, had accused Microsoft of profiting unfairly from his work, alleging that CP/M was copied by QDOS, the operating system that Microsoft acquired from Seattle Computer Products to create MS-DOS.
Not so, writes Bob Zeidman of Software Analysis and Forensic Engineering Corp., describing his analysis of CP/M and MS-DOS in IEEE Spectrum.
He concludes. “Every lead brought me not to Bill Gates but to a dead end. QDOS was absolutely not copied from CP/M, and MS-DOS showed no signs of copying either. Kildall’s accusations about Bill Gates were totally groundless.”

full article: http://m.spectrum.ieee.org/computing/so ... t-of-dos/0

Couldn't it have just been that there was just a mistake about this, and nothing more? Sure, I can understand some people's feelings against Gary Kildall, but from what I see, he was a perfectly legitimate developer, who tried very hard to behave in a mature and responsible way, and he doesn't seem like the type to discredit others either.

However, the reason for not knowing entirely just what went on between Microsoft and Gary Kildall at this point is very simple, yet also very sad: As many people have already heard, the man has been dead for about eighteen years now (his death was also very sudden, so it hit everyone extremely hard at the time).

But anyway, it's time that these old disputes were resolved anyway, before anyone else starts any new ones.

In case no one knew, Microsoft sent out hit men to end Gary Kildall.

I don't believe that.

Of course they did. And after Microsoft hired The Hitman, Agent 47, he went after Mr.Kildall. Then, his body was transferred to Microsoft HQ with the Black Leaked Builds Van. Agent 47 was paid in 3000 caps and all of Longhorn builds, and walked away without telling anything, as a true hitman. Gary's body is preserved in a special jar under Steve Ballmer's office.

Jokes aside, I'm happy that this dispute is over. I knew MS-DOS was Microsoft's creation.

Actually, no-one's claiming Microsoft did create MS-DOS, or that MS-DOS was stolen by Microsoft.

It's widely known that Microsoft sold "MS-DOS" to IBM before they even had an Operating System. So they quickly went out and bought one. The debate was simply whether the original developer, Tim Paterson, had copied CP/M whilst developing it.

There was never any suggestion that Microsoft had stolen code, only that they had unknowingly bought potentially stolen code.

Oh....I recall that I read somewhere on the net that Microsoft had stolen MS-DOS from some Russian developer. I guess it wasn't true. My bad.

I never knew that MS-DOS was bought from a company, I thought that Microsoft made it from scratch. Good Information, since I use it everyday.

I think it is important to point out that Bob Zeidman has worked for Microsoft as an expert witness before, and likely will do in the future. http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/florida/flsdce/1:2010cv24063/368653/173/0.pdf?ts=1312892914

I haven't looked at the original source, but does anyone know which version of MS-DOS (or IBM-DOS) was compared to CP/M? It is possible the very first version delivered to IBM for the PC was tainted with CP/M code which was later removed.

Also, I remember reading the complaint (partially) revolved around copying of the API to make porting CP/M programs to MS-DOS easier, and the recent Oracle vs. Google case lends credence to the argument that APIs aren't copyrightable.