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Data Warehousing Software Application - Theft of Intellectual Property

An electronic warehouse is a database containing numeric and demographic data that usually represents the business
history of an organization. It is typically built on top of a commercial relational database product such as Microsoft’s SQL
Server or Oracle Corporation’s OLAP Manager running on Oracle 9.2.1. The historical data stored in a warehouse is used for
analysis that supports business decisions at many levels, from strategic planning to performance evaluation of a discrete
organizational unit. Data in a data warehouse is structured to support analysis rather than to process real-time transactions
as in online transaction processing systems (OLTP), such as those used to process credit card transactions.
Although sometimes used interchangeably, the terms data warehousing and online analytical processing (OLAP) apply to
different components of systems often referred to as decision support systems or business intelligence systems.
Components of these types of systems include databases and applications that provide the tools analysts need to support
organizational decision-making. We will refer to such systems as “Decision Support Systems”, hence the abbreviated term
“DSS”. The FoodMart product “DSS-Anywhere” refers to a web-enabled version of a data warehouse DSS.
OLAP technology enables data warehouses to be used effectively for online analysis, providing rapid responses to iterative
complex analytical queries. OLAP's multidimensional data model and data aggregation techniques organize and
summarize large amounts of data so it can be evaluated quickly using online analysis and graphical tools. The answer to a
query into historical data often leads to subsequent queries as the analyst searches for answers or explores possibilities.
OLAP systems provide the speed and flexibility to support the analyst in real time.
In the complaint filed by FoodMart on April 2, 2003, the claim is made that Daniel Smith (“Smith”), who was an employee of
FoodMart from Jan. 2000 to July 2002, misappropriated certain proprietary technical information for use in a system that he
created called “WebHouse”. They also requested that the court issue a restraining order to close down the public web site
and prohibit any further publication of computer source code that was representative of the DSS-Anywhere product.
Although the version created by Smith using Oracle Corporation database and warehouse technology (colloquially referred
to as a “platform”) is quite different from the FoodMart implementation platform, Microsoft SQL Server, there are many
similarities. Each system appears to contain three data cubes (Marketing, Human Resources, Expense Budget), and the
descriptive material associated with Smith’s WebHouse uses many of the same terms that are embodied in the FoodMart
product.
As an expert witness retained by the defendant, I examined certain materials provided to me by both sides in order to form
an opinion on the merits of the plaintiff’s case.

Web multimedia - Patent Infringement Case

A patent issued for internet mutimedia systems is alleged to be infringed by a large number of web content providers. This
analysis of system functionality revealed that the internal architecture of most multi-media delivery ssytems use the methods
described in the patent, despite the fact that no source code is available for review.

Windows Automation Software

This case involves the alleged misappropriation of trade secrets and copyright infringement for two software components
deployed during a contract to develop software for one of FileNET’s customers. The components represent small
computer programs implemented within Microsoft’s Active-X technology using Visual Basic as the primary programming
language. The plaintiff claimed that the defendant improperly released source code for the COM objects to a third party.
It was clear that the plaintiff customarily licensed these COM components. Having established that they routinely and
willingly licensed the source code, and that they did not protect the component code in any way that was different from their
work-for-hire application code, the dispute focused  on one of valuation of the components rather than one of theft of trade
secrets.
The degree to which the components were developed under the a "Work-for-Hire" contract was is in part dependent upon
the interpretation of differences between the “Preliminary Versions”, so called, referring to the initial versions of the
Components, and the “Final Versions” that were subsequently installed at their client's facilities as part of the contract
deliverables.
I was able to estimate the replacement cost of the software components in question by re-coding some of th efunctionality
and by comparing the characterisitics of the code with industry standard metrics for development costs.
Replacement costs were computed and used as the basis of a settlement proposal. The judge in this case ruled in favor
of the defendant's motion for summary judgment.

Local Area Network Deployment - Contract Dispute

The plaintiff in this case was under contract to deploy local area networks in 300+  service centers around the USA. At
issue was the non-payment of monies owed to the plaintif for services rendered under the terms of the contract.
The defendants position was that the LAN installation workmanship at the service centers .Furthermore, testimony was
given that the standards for Local Area Networking (LAN) were violated.
I was called as testifying expert for the plaintiff to refute these claims and demonstate that the wiring did in fact satisfy the
various LAN standards.

Distributed Multi-Processor Computer Software Application - Theft of Intellectual Property

An emplyee of a company, referred to here as "FoodMart" developed software applications for the purpose of
marketing and sale by his employer.
Smith’s misappropriation of trade secrets involved in the implementation of FoodMart’s shared memory architecture.
The early incarnations of the DSS Anywhere system that Smith first contributed to employ a single software function
to create, destroy, allocate and de-allocate shared memory structures used by the server. In these early versions, the
name “manage_memory” was used for the single function. The four separate steps of creating, destroying, allocating
and de-allocating memory objects was achieved by specifying the value of an argument in the function call (e.g. 0, 1,
2, or 3 as the parameter value).
Later, during Smith’s employment with FoodMart, the engineers discovered that the system was significantly
enhanced in terms of efficiency and ease of debugging code if the four elementary steps were split into 3 separate
software functions namely, “make_shmem” to create and/or attach to shared memory, “deallocate_shmem” to
detach from a shared memory structure, and “delete_shmem” to destroy the memory object.
Contained in Kenneth Wilshire’s (FoodMart CTO) sworn declaration are the following specific statements:

1. Smith used logically similar functions in WebHouse, albeit four instead of three, and that he benefited from the
experience gained while working at FoodMart. Moreover, the names he used for his four functions were the same in
two out of the four cases. He used “deallocate_shmem” and “delete_shmem” with the same semantic meaning as
those used by FoodMart, and he used new_shmem” and “connect_shmem” for the other two functions. It is claimed
that Smith benefited from the prior insight gained when the FoodMart development team moved from a single
function to three separate functions.

2. Smith’s misappropriation of trade secrets involved in the language and data representation within FoodMart’s
application. The Smith WebHouse system appropriates the same terminology and naming conventions as
expressed in the FoodMart warehouse deign. For example, in the HR OLAP cube, the source tables salary,
employee, time_by_day, store, position are used along with a fact table named “salary” and these are used in an
identical way in the FoodMart application.


3. Smith’s misappropriation of architectural details in the DSS Anywhere application. These include, but are not
limited to the design of shared data structures (1) between the common gateway interface (“CGI”) based “scheduling
server” and the “feeder” program, which runs as a daemon (Unix background process) on the server (2) between the
file “uploader” daemon and the ETL (Extract Transform, Load”) service module. It is contended that these
architectural features would not have been obvious to a skilled software developer without the benefit of exposure to
the FoodMart proprietary design documents. </A>