Compsci 182s, Spring 2010, Midterm

For each of the questions below you should write about two paragraphs answering the question. I'm not looking for long essays on each question, I'm looking for you to convey an understanding of the key issues and to provide evidence of that understanding. You can use the Internet, you cannot communicate with any person about these questions (except ola) --- that includes speaking, writing, humming, etc.

Please type your answers and send a .pdf file to ola AT cs DOT duke DOT edu with your responses. You must complete them before 10:00 am on Monday, March 1.

  1. Here's a link to a request to the IETF from Google (and Neustar) to change how DNS works -- that's a rough approximation for what the request asks for. If you do a Google/news search on google ietf dns you'll see some commentary on this from about three weeks or so ago.

    Using the IETF request and any other sites you reference, write a few paragraphs indicating (a) why Google made this request to the IETF (b) how long you think it might take for this request to eventually become a standard and (c) what DNS and the IETF are. Be brief, but precise. I'm looking for you to convey an understanding of what the IETF is and does, what DNS is, and what the request is about.

  2. The Jacobsen v. Katzer court case has a Wikipedia entry that is slightly out-of-date as accessed on February 22, 2010, at 2:15 pm, but has most of the information about the case. Open Source pioneer Bruce Perens comments on the case here in Datamation and the parties agreed to a settlement on Feb 19 after a US Federal District Court decision in December 2009. In the court case (see the Perens article) issues of copyright, open source, patents, and the DMCA come into play.

    Write a few paragraphs in which you provide your take on why this case is significant, referencing open source, copyright, patents, and software. You're free to use the Internet and the links above, just cite anything you read. You should specifically mention open source licensing/licenses in your writing.

  3. In this NY Times article there's a discussion on software patents and a company that acquires them. (Here's a local/Duke IP only copy of the NY Times article).

    Write two essays, each one consisting of about two paragraphs: one in which you support what Myrhvold does and the other in which you do not support it. Try to do each side justice in each of the two-paragraph essays you write.