Daily News : Mac OS

A judge in San Francisco ruled that Psystar, the Florida-based company that installs OS X on its custom Mac-clone computers, infringed on Apple's right to exclusively create derivative works of its software. Psystar's summary judgment against Apple, which argued Apple misused its copyright, was denied. The two companies are expected to go to court in January.

In addition, Psystar was found to be in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act by circumventing Apple's protection barrier that prevents installation of its operating system on third-party hardware.

Psystar, the company that sells computers that can run OS X, has announced that it is now able to install Apple's new Snow Leopard on its computers. You must have at least OS X 10.5 installed before you can upgrade, and at this time the company does not want users to upgrade unless it's a new machine due to possible loss of data. Apple isn't too pleased, and the company is already requesting that a judge grant them access to the Snow Leopard-modified source code Psystar uses.

Psystar has confirmed that it will support Snow Leopard on all new Mac clones. The controversial manufacturer explained that it had developed "new virtualization technologies" to allow its computers to interface with OS X like "never before."

As someone who has worked both in technical support and as a software developer, I know firsthand how a disconnect between those who do the work and those who dictate the work can cause serious problems. It looks like Snow Leopard's early release is causing problems for some IT departments.

Consequently, some engineers decided not to install Snow Leopard right after its release because they knew certain critical, third-party software wouldn't be able to run on it. Now they're bracing for the backlash from executives who may demand Snow Leopard on their Mac machines.