Randall Shimizu wrote:
I remember the AIM and PowerOpen. The key word is 'alliance'. Apple never had anything to do with the actual design of PPC. Their only role was to help specify processing requirements and to agree to purchase the chip. IBM owns most if not all the patents to PPC and Power chips.
Funny, there are quite a few of my ex-colleagues from Somerset who worked for Apple who would disagree with you. I worked on 602 and a graphics coprocessor for 602 (both of which were slated for the 3DO gaming system, remember that?) and some of 603e.
It is true that Apple did not provide much in terms of hardware VLSI engineering. However, quite a few of the Apple folks were involved in specification (as you point out), compilers, bring up (we used a Minix board as a stress test), and test.
IBM may own the majority of patents, but that is probably more of a function of having a complete division that does nothing but push patents. Patents concerning PowerPC were subject to a joint cross-ownership scheme.
This even extended to things like the CAD software used to design the chips. One employee, without permission, pulled in an IBM EDA tool that IBM was about to market and sell. Motorola noticed that it was on the computers at Somerset, and claimed it. A gigantic mess ensued.
Now, this may have changed since I worked there in 1994. Somerset dissolved, and lots of the work rolled into IBM specifically with Motorola serving more as a second source foundry than anything else.
-a -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
