CRACKING SOURCE CODE PRODUCTION:
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BASICS AND BEST PRACTICES
by Jason Hetherington of Liquid Litigation
Management, Inc.
Computers, cars, smartphones, televisions…
source code is everywhere and growing by leaps
and bounds. Also on the rise: patent and copyright
infringement cases. As the court-ordered demand
for source code production increases, you should
be informed of the basics and best practices.
STARTING AT THE SOURCE
Let's begin with a basic definition. Source code is
the human-readable representation of a computer
program. It can be written in hundreds of different
scripting and programming languages. Source
code is translated into operations the computer
understands called "object code," which is not easily
readable by humans. As a result, when the review
of a program or product feature is required, object
code is isolated, collected and translated back into
its original language.
The most common types of cases where this is
necessary are patent infringement, copyright
infringement and trade secret misappropriation. The
goal of production is to examine the source code's
construction and what it does when executed. Parties
are required to produce source code to opposing
counsel to determine whether alleged infringement or
misappropriation claims are accurate.
