SCO Group wins copyright appeal against Novell decision

SCO Group, whose six-year-old legal case arguing Linux infringes its Unix copyright hasn't been enough to keep it from the bankruptcy courts, nevertheless won an important victory in its case on Monday.

A federal judge earlier had ruled that Novell had retained Unix copyrights when it sold its Unix business to the Santa Cruz Operation, a company whose Unix assets SCO Group later acquired. But the appeals court overturned that decision, based in part on a close reading of the Unix asset purchase agreement, sending the matter to trial for a decision. The appeals court did uphold a ruling that SCO owed Novell royalty payments, though, according to a 55-page filing.

SCO Group chief executive Darl McBride was happy with the decision. "Today is not the end of the war but it certainly is a key battle that we've won," he said in a statement in the Salt Lake Tribune. "Now it's time to move on to the next series of battles with our victory in hand."

Original article: SCO Group wins Unix copyright appeal from CNET News.com