SAS clone maker World Programming "wins" decision in copyright case against SAS

SAS tried to claim that SAS was not a programming language, because the PROC steps are not Turing complete. They knew that a programming language was not copyrightable.

The judge called BS, ruling that the ability of a programming language to call out to external procedures doesn't make it NOT a programming language:

>55. Based on this evidence, counsel for SAS Institute accepted that the DATA steps were a programming language, but submitted that the PROCS were not since the procedures were complex programs. In my view this submission confuses the PROC steps in the SAS Language with the programs in the C language which are invoked by them. The PROC steps are commands issued by the user to the computer expressed in a particular language which is parsed by the SAS System. Accordingly, the SAS Language as a whole, including the PROC steps, satisfies the IEEE definition of a programming language.

Awesome judge.

It's important to note that the decision while encouraging defers the questions of whether or not programming languages, interfaces and software functionality are copyrightable to the European Court of Justice for guidance.

great news!! Thanks for posting this, I never heard of WP before.