Red Hat has filed a friend of the court brief with the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals complaining that the patent system is hindrance to open source and asking it to bar software patents – or at least put a leash on them.

The court is supposed to hear the so-called Bilski case – which doesn’t have anything to do with software – but the judges are supposed to address the issue of the boundaries of what can be patented.

According to Red Hat assistant general counsel Rob Tiller’s blog, “The Supreme Court has repeatedly stated that abstract ideas and algorithms (which are the core building blocks of computer programs) are not patentable. Applying this principle consistently would greatly narrow the availability of software patents.”

The American Civil Liberties Union and ESP, the End Software Patents Free Software Foundation front, also filed amicus briefs.

It is assumed the case will wind up in the lap of the Supreme Court.