On 7/28/2022 8:34 AM, Phillip Helbig (undress to reply) wrote:
> In article <tbm1k8$173ck$2@dont-email.me>, Simon Clubley
> <clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> writes:
>
>> It would be better if people, especially people who are generally
>> well regarded, do not start pointing other people to illegal material.

The first problem with this is the ASSUMPTION that something is illegal.

>> As well as being illegal in its own right, it also damages potential
>> future hobbyist licences.
>
> Indeed.

Bullshit!

An entity that provides a hobbyist program does not do so without reasons.
Those reasons would include benefits to the entity. In the case of VMS, the
more people that know of VMS is usually a good thing for VSI.

Perhaps a good word is MARKETING ...

--
David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: davef@tsoft-inc.com
DFE Ultralights, Inc.
170 Grimplin Road
Vanderbilt, PA 15486

In article <tbu9ls$35ebg$1@dont-email.me>, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> writes:
>On 7/28/2022 8:34 AM, Phillip Helbig (undress to reply) wrote:
>> In article <tbm1k8$173ck$2@dont-email.me>, Simon Clubley
>> <clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> writes:
>>
>>> It would be better if people, especially people who are generally
>>> well regarded, do not start pointing other people to illegal material.
>
>The first problem with this is the ASSUMPTION that something is illegal.
>
>>> As well as being illegal in its own right, it also damages potential
>>> future hobbyist licences.
>>
>> Indeed.
>
>Bullshit!
>
>An entity that provides a hobbyist program does not do so without reasons.
>Those reasons would include benefits to the entity. In the case of VMS, the
>more people that know of VMS is usually a good thing for VSI.
>
>Perhaps a good word is MARKETING ...

Marketing VMS? Can those two actually coexist in a single sentence? What
a concept though! Why VSI could hire the advertising firm that's produced
those *OBNOXIOUS* DampRid commercials!

EVERYBODY VMS! EVERYBODY VMS! EVERYBODY VMS!

On second thought, perhaps not.

--
VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)ORG

I speak to machines with the voice of humanity.

In article <tbp8s9$23mh7$1@dont-email.me>,
Simon Clubley <clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote:
>On 2022-07-26, Dan Cross <cross@spitfire.i.gajendra.net> wrote:
>>
>> But again, why should VSI care? They have nothing to do
>> with VAX. If people started doing this for Alpha, Itanium
>> or x86, I could see it since VSI has interest in those
>> platforms. But VAX is explicitly out of their domain.
>>
>
>Because how people behave in one area can be used as a proxy for
>how they might behave in other related areas in the future, especially
>when free stuff combined with a sense of entitlement is involved.

Right. So we should go and find everyone who's using
a pirated copy of MS-DOS, or MacOS 7, or some variant
of Unix, or, well, all software, because then that'll
prove to VSI that we're responsible enough to merit a
hobbyist program. After all, what someone does in one
area can be used as a proxy for how they may behave
in a related area in the future, and "operating systems"
are clearly a related area.

That seems more than a little obtuse.

I imagine that if VSI cared what happened to VAX/VMS,
they'd have licensed the rights to VAX/VMS.

- Dan C.

gah4 wrote:
> On Wednesday, July 27, 2022 at 5:06:46 PM UTC-7, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>
> (snip)
>> If someone like your employer bought a system with a valid license
>> and when it was no longer needed let you use it for personal usage
>> but legally retained ownership, then I think it is perfectly fine
>> from a license law perspective.
>
> This leaves another thing that I didn't say above.
>
> Often things like this are owned by corporations, not people.
> As far as I know, if the corporation is purchased whole, they still
> belong to the same corporation. That is, there is no need to transfer
> a license when a corporation changes ownership. (Which, technically,
> happens when stock is bought and sold.)

FWIW:

In the early 1990s, Lockheed purchased the Fort Worth division of
General Dynamics.

At the time, they had VAXen everywhere. From what I was told, when they
went to renew their licenses, DEC/Compaq (I don't remember which it was
at the time) said "What licenses?"

Admittedly, Lockheed did not purchase all of General Dynamics, but..

Lawyers were involved and Lockheed and DEC/Compaq did finally come to an
"arrangement", but I don't know the details of that.

--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Chris Scheers, Applied Synergy, Inc.

Voice: 817-237-3360 Internet: chris@applied-synergy.com
Fax: 817-237-3074

On 7/28/2022 5:32 PM, Chris Scheers wrote:

> FWIW:
>
> In the early 1990s, Lockheed purchased the Fort Worth division of General Dynamics.
>
> At the time, they had VAXen everywhere.  From what I was told, when they went to renew their licenses, DEC/Compaq (I don't remember which it was at the time) said "What licenses?"
As a DEC customer, I frequently purchased licenses and renewed support contracts.

I don't know what "renew their licenses" means.

--
-- Rob

On Friday, July 29, 2022 at 9:04:40 AM UTC+12, Dan Cross wrote:
> In article <tbp8s9$23mh7$1...@dont-email.me>,
> Simon Clubley <clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote:
> >On 2022-07-26, Dan Cross <cr...@spitfire.i.gajendra.net> wrote:
> >>
> >> But again, why should VSI care? They have nothing to do
> >> with VAX. If people started doing this for Alpha, Itanium
> >> or x86, I could see it since VSI has interest in those
> >> platforms. But VAX is explicitly out of their domain.
> >>
> >
> >Because how people behave in one area can be used as a proxy for
> >how they might behave in other related areas in the future, especially
> >when free stuff combined with a sense of entitlement is involved.
>
> Right. So we should go and find everyone who's using
> a pirated copy of MS-DOS, or MacOS 7, or some variant
> of Unix, or, well, all software, because then that'll
> prove to VSI that we're responsible enough to merit a
> hobbyist program. After all, what someone does in one
> area can be used as a proxy for how they may behave
> in a related area in the future, and "operating systems"
> are clearly a related area.
>
> That seems more than a little obtuse.
>
> I imagine that if VSI cared what happened to VAX/VMS,
> they'd have licensed the rights to VAX/VMS.

IIRC its already been said here before that VSI not only has the right to
issue new VSI-branded releases of OpenVMS VAX, they even have the
necessary source code to do so. Problem is unlike for Alpha or Itanium
there is apparently no (or not enough) money to make doing so worthwhile.

Perhaps some arrangement could be made though - maybe someone
within VSI with a collection of vintage VAXen could volunteer to produce
a VSI branded release of OpenVMS VAX 7.3 in their spare time to be made
available for non-commercial use - perhaps for free, or perhaps sold for
some affordable price (like the Tru64 hobbyist licenses were).

It wouldn't solve the problem of the *history* of OpenVMS being thrown
in the trash bin by HPE (something I think is utterly deplorable) but it would
at least allow people with VAXen to run the operating system it was
designed to run. Plus it might be a worthwhile marketing foot in the door.
People who otherwise would have never paid attention to OpenVMS might
decide to give the x86 version a go after running it on their VAX.

And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
them on to someone else.

On 2022-07-28, Robert A. Brooks <FIRST.LAST@vmssoftware.com> wrote:
> On 7/28/2022 5:32 PM, Chris Scheers wrote:
>
>> FWIW:
>>
>> In the early 1990s, Lockheed purchased the Fort Worth division of General Dynamics.
>>
>> At the time, they had VAXen everywhere.  From what I was told, when they went to renew their licenses, DEC/Compaq (I don't remember which it was at the time) said "What licenses?"
> As a DEC customer, I frequently purchased licenses and renewed support contracts.
>
> I don't know what "renew their licenses" means.
>

One possibility might be the transfer process you had to undergo with
(some/all?) DEC licences when one entity was purchased by another entity.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgsoftnz@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
> them on to someone else.

Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
if that ever happens.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 2022-07-28, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>
> An entity that provides a hobbyist program does not do so without reasons.
> Those reasons would include benefits to the entity. In the case of VMS, the
> more people that know of VMS is usually a good thing for VSI.
>

What if some of those "more people" are professional security researchers
who have read VSI's marketing material ? :-)

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 7/29/2022 8:55 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-07-28, Robert A. Brooks <FIRST.LAST@vmssoftware.com> wrote:
>> On 7/28/2022 5:32 PM, Chris Scheers wrote:
>>
>>> FWIW:
>>>
>>> In the early 1990s, Lockheed purchased the Fort Worth division of General Dynamics.
>>>
>>> At the time, they had VAXen everywhere. From what I was told, when they went to renew their licenses, DEC/Compaq (I don't remember which it was at the time) said "What licenses?"
>> As a DEC customer, I frequently purchased licenses and renewed support contracts.
>>
>> I don't know what "renew their licenses" means.

I'd guess purchase software support?

> One possibility might be the transfer process you had to undergo with
> (some/all?) DEC licences when one entity was purchased by another entity.
>
> Simon.
>

Ok, I've had to deal with DEC software licenses in the past. Here is my
understanding, which may not be accurate.

When ABC Corp purchase a system, and were issues any licenses for the system,
those were perpetual licenses for ABC Corp. Should XYZ Corp purchase ABC Corp,
ABC Corp was still the license holder. No problem there.

Now, if XYZ Corp then attempted to purchase support for those licenses, as XYZ
Corp, it's quite reasonable for DEC to ask "what licenses", since they would not
have XYZ Corp for a license holder. However, ABC Corp would be able to purchase
the support.

What isn't clear to me is if XYZ Corp desolves ABC Corp and assumes ownership of
the assets. Are they still the license holder?

--
David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: davef@tsoft-inc.com
DFE Ultralights, Inc.
170 Grimplin Road
Vanderbilt, PA 15486

On 7/29/2022 8:56 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgsoftnz@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
>> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
>> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
>> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
>> them on to someone else.
>
> Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
> if that ever happens.
>
> Simon.
>

There should be no issues.

As stated, VSI has the right and capability to issue a new version of VAX/VMS,
and then issue licenses (of any type) for the new version.

As for capability, I've read multiple times of the complexity of building VMS on
VAX, and the absence of hardware to do so, and qualification testing. That
could be an issue. However, the qualification testing could be much reduced,
should they choose to do so. Anybody know of any VAX 9000 systems available for
testing? I'm betting VSI does not have any.

Now, I'm not sure just what dollar amount might entice VSI to do so. I'm
guessing the request on the back of a $100 bill might not suffice. What size
bill just might be an interesting question.

--
David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: davef@tsoft-inc.com
DFE Ultralights, Inc.
170 Grimplin Road
Vanderbilt, PA 15486

On 7/29/2022 8:59 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-07-28, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>>
>> An entity that provides a hobbyist program does not do so without reasons.
>> Those reasons would include benefits to the entity. In the case of VMS, the
>> more people that know of VMS is usually a good thing for VSI.
>>
>
> What if some of those "more people" are professional security researchers
> who have read VSI's marketing material ? :-)
>
> Simon.
>

You must be referring to "hackers" ...

Don't glorify them with some "professional" name ...

Don't tell me you're subscribing to "security by obscurity"?

Anyway, fine by me ...

--
David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: davef@tsoft-inc.com
DFE Ultralights, Inc.
170 Grimplin Road
Vanderbilt, PA 15486

On 2022-07-29, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
> On 7/29/2022 8:56 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>> On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgsoftnz@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
>>> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
>>> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
>>> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
>>> them on to someone else.
>>
>> Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
>> if that ever happens.
>>
>> Simon.
>>
>
> There should be no issues.
>
> As stated, VSI has the right and capability to issue a new version of VAX/VMS,
> and then issue licenses (of any type) for the new version.
>

Read the above again.

The suggestion above is about VSI buying out VMS completely from HPE.

In that situation, issues around third-party IP most certainly do come
into play.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 2022-07-29, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
> On 7/29/2022 8:59 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>> On 2022-07-28, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> An entity that provides a hobbyist program does not do so without reasons.
>>> Those reasons would include benefits to the entity. In the case of VMS, the
>>> more people that know of VMS is usually a good thing for VSI.
>>>
>>
>> What if some of those "more people" are professional security researchers
>> who have read VSI's marketing material ? :-)
>>
>> Simon.
>>
>
> You must be referring to "hackers" ...
>

No. Professional security researchers, many of whom are highly skilled.

> Don't glorify them with some "professional" name ...
>

Just because you clearly don't encounter them in your nice little
comfy world of line-numbered Basic, doesn't mean they don't exist.

> Don't tell me you're subscribing to "security by obscurity"?
>

No, I most certainly am not. (As you should well know by now).

> Anyway, fine by me ...
>

However, you may not like the results if a bunch of highly skilled
researchers suddenly descend on an operating system that has had
relatively little probing compared to other operating systems.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 7/29/2022 1:42 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-07-29, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>> On 7/29/2022 8:56 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>> On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgsoftnz@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
>>>> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
>>>> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
>>>> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
>>>> them on to someone else.
>>>
>>> Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
>>> if that ever happens.
>>>
>>> Simon.
>>>
>>
>> There should be no issues.
>>
>> As stated, VSI has the right and capability to issue a new version of VAX/VMS,
>> and then issue licenses (of any type) for the new version.
>>
>
> Read the above again.
>
> The suggestion above is about VSI buying out VMS completely from HPE.
>
> In that situation, issues around third-party IP most certainly do come
> into play.

Possibly. Possibly not. Compaq bought DEC. HP bought Compaq. Were there any
third party IP issues there? Perhaps Compaq and HP illegally issued VMS
licenses? Fun questions.

But VSI does not need to do any "buy-out" in order to issue a VAX/VMS version.

--
David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: davef@tsoft-inc.com
DFE Ultralights, Inc.
170 Grimplin Road
Vanderbilt, PA 15486

On Friday, July 29, 2022 at 1:53:10 PM UTC-4, Dave Froble wrote:
> On 7/29/2022 1:42 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> > On 2022-07-29, Dave Froble <da...@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
> >> On 7/29/2022 8:56 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> >>> On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgso...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
> >>>> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
> >>>> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
> >>>> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
> >>>> them on to someone else.
> >>>
> >>> Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
> >>> if that ever happens.
> >>>
> >>> Simon.
> >>>
> >>
> >> There should be no issues.
> >>
> >> As stated, VSI has the right and capability to issue a new version of VAX/VMS,
> >> and then issue licenses (of any type) for the new version.
> >>
> >
> > Read the above again.
> >
> > The suggestion above is about VSI buying out VMS completely from HPE.
> >
> > In that situation, issues around third-party IP most certainly do come
> > into play.
> Possibly. Possibly not. Compaq bought DEC. HP bought Compaq. Were there any
> third party IP issues there? Perhaps Compaq and HP illegally issued VMS
> licenses? Fun questions.
>
> But VSI does not need to do any "buy-out" in order to issue a VAX/VMS version.
> --
> David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
> Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: da...@tsoft-inc.com
> DFE Ultralights, Inc.
> 170 Grimplin Road
> Vanderbilt, PA 15486
From what I recall, VSI bought the rights to Alpha and Itanium along with the rights to create the X86 variants. VSI does not have the rights to do anything with VAX versions at all. HP retains the rights to allow/disallow any licensing for VAX machines or emulated VAXes. All licensing for these are handled through HP Financial. This includes both the purchase of licenses as well as transfers.

Dan

On 2022-07-26 13:32, Dan Cross wrote:
> But again, why should VSI care? They have nothing to do
> with VAX. If people started doing this for Alpha, Itanium
> or x86, I could see it since VSI has interest in those
> platforms. But VAX is explicitly out of their domain.

I should point out that VSI have nothing to do with VAX out of choice.
They could technically make a VAX release if they wanted to. They do
have the rights, and the code.

Johnny

On 2022-07-29 20:04, abrsvc wrote:
> On Friday, July 29, 2022 at 1:53:10 PM UTC-4, Dave Froble wrote:
>> On 7/29/2022 1:42 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>> On 2022-07-29, Dave Froble <da...@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>>>> On 7/29/2022 8:56 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>>> On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgso...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
>>>>>> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
>>>>>> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
>>>>>> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
>>>>>> them on to someone else.
>>>>>
>>>>> Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
>>>>> if that ever happens.
>>>>>
>>>>> Simon.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> There should be no issues.
>>>>
>>>> As stated, VSI has the right and capability to issue a new version of VAX/VMS,
>>>> and then issue licenses (of any type) for the new version.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Read the above again.
>>>
>>> The suggestion above is about VSI buying out VMS completely from HPE.
>>>
>>> In that situation, issues around third-party IP most certainly do come
>>> into play.
>> Possibly. Possibly not. Compaq bought DEC. HP bought Compaq. Were there any
>> third party IP issues there? Perhaps Compaq and HP illegally issued VMS
>> licenses? Fun questions.
>>
>> But VSI does not need to do any "buy-out" in order to issue a VAX/VMS version.
>> --
>> David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
>> Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: da...@tsoft-inc.com
>> DFE Ultralights, Inc.
>> 170 Grimplin Road
>> Vanderbilt, PA 15486
> From what I recall, VSI bought the rights to Alpha and Itanium along with the rights to create the X86 variants. VSI does not have the rights to do anything with VAX versions at all. HP retains the rights to allow/disallow any licensing for VAX machines or emulated VAXes. All licensing for these are handled through HP Financial. This includes both the purchase of licenses as well as transfers.

That was the belief of a lot of people, but VSI (or people from VSI)
publicly corrected that belief in this newsgroup some time ago. They do
have the rights also to the VAX bits. But there isn't even a snowballs
chance in hell that they will build a new VAX version, it has been said.
And VSI cannot issue any licenses for HPE versions of VMS, which is why
the VAX is in such a limbo.

Johnny

Robert A. Brooks wrote:
> On 7/28/2022 5:32 PM, Chris Scheers wrote:
>
>> FWIW:
>>
>> In the early 1990s, Lockheed purchased the Fort Worth division of
>> General Dynamics.
>>
>> At the time, they had VAXen everywhere. From what I was told, when
>> they went to renew their licenses, DEC/Compaq (I don't remember which
>> it was at the time) said "What licenses?"
> As a DEC customer, I frequently purchased licenses and renewed support
> contracts.
>
> I don't know what "renew their licenses" means.

I apologize. Late night, tired, bad wording.

They paid an annual software support contract. From what I understand,
this was generally tied to machine/software specific licenses.

When they went to pay their annual renewal for the support contract,
DEC/Compaq said that the contracts were with General Dynamics and that
Lockheed had no rights to the software, much less to updates, even
though Lockheed had bought that General Dynamics division including all
assets.

This may just be standard corporate posturing and they did work it out
eventually, but it was jarring to the tech people involved.

--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Chris Scheers, Applied Synergy, Inc.

Voice: 817-237-3360 Internet: chris@applied-synergy.com
Fax: 817-237-3074

On 2022-07-28 21:44:38 +0000, Robert A. Brooks said:

> On 7/28/2022 5:32 PM, Chris Scheers wrote:
>
>> FWIW:
>>
>> In the early 1990s, Lockheed purchased the Fort Worth division of
>> General Dynamics.
>>
>> At the time, they had VAXen everywhere.  From what I was told, when
>> they went to renew their licenses, DEC/Compaq (I don't remember which
>> it was at the time) said "What licenses?"
>
> As a DEC customer, I frequently purchased licenses and renewed support
> contracts.
>
> I don't know what "renew their licenses" means.

Working for a DEC ISV that used to buy a whole lot of licenses and
servers and support for a whole lot of sites, and then later working as
somebody at DEC that saw the other side of these cases, I well
understand the reference.

DEC didn't always know its customers and their licenses—unless the
customer had an active warranty support, or an active support contract,
that is. Then DEC usually did know.

When unsnarling these, the applicable LMF software licensing
certificate was usually considered sufficient proof of licensing when
disentangling licensing issues, but not everybody kept their copies of
those documents.

Prior to LMF, this all got very gnarly when something got lost /
confused / misfiled / deleted / purged.

--
Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC

On 7/29/22 17:37, Chris Scheers wrote:
> Robert A. Brooks wrote:
>> On 7/28/2022 5:32 PM, Chris Scheers wrote:
>>
>>> FWIW:
>>>
>>> In the early 1990s, Lockheed purchased the Fort Worth division of
>>> General Dynamics.
>>>
>>> At the time, they had VAXen everywhere.  From what I was told, when
>>> they went to renew their licenses, DEC/Compaq (I don't remember which
>>> it was at the time) said "What licenses?"
>>  As a DEC customer, I frequently purchased licenses and renewed
>> support contracts.
>>
>> I don't know what "renew their licenses" means.
>
> I apologize.  Late night, tired, bad wording.
>
> They paid an annual software support contract.  From what I understand,
> this was generally tied to machine/software specific licenses.
>
> When they went to pay their annual renewal for the support contract,
> DEC/Compaq said that the contracts were with General Dynamics and that
> Lockheed had no rights to the software, much less to updates, even
> though Lockheed had bought that General Dynamics division including all
> assets.
>
> This may just be standard corporate posturing and they did work it out
> eventually, but it was jarring to the tech people involved.
>

As has been stated here numerous times, transfer requires paperwork and
a fee. VMS was never General Dynamics IP and thus Lockheed may have
bought the hardware but that did not include VMS. Why do people find
this so hard to understand?

bill

On Friday, July 29, 2022 at 3:31:58 PM UTC-7, Bill Gunshannon wrote:

(snip)

> As has been stated here numerous times, transfer requires paperwork and
> a fee. VMS was never General Dynamics IP and thus Lockheed may have
> bought the hardware but that did not include VMS. Why do people find
> this so hard to understand?

IANAL, so don't ask too many questions. Technically, when someone buys
stock, they buy part of a company. I hope they don't have to relicense every
time stock is bought or sold.

If a company changes name, but not ownership, does that count?

How about if the company buys, instead of is bought. For the example,
if GD bought Lockheed, would that count?

If after that, they rename to a combined name, does that count?

If a company is bought whole, and keeps the name, but has different
stock, does that count?

A large company might have millions of contracts. If those are all void
when the company is bought, it is pretty much impossible to buy or
sell companies.

Presumably corporate lawyers know all this, though.

On Saturday, July 30, 2022 at 5:53:10 AM UTC+12, Dave Froble wrote:
> On 7/29/2022 1:42 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> > On 2022-07-29, Dave Froble <da...@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
> >> On 7/29/2022 8:56 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> >>> On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgso...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
> >>>> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
> >>>> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
> >>>> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
> >>>> them on to someone else.
> >>>
> >>> Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
> >>> if that ever happens.
> >>>
> >>> Simon.
> >>>
> >>
> >> There should be no issues.
> >>
> >> As stated, VSI has the right and capability to issue a new version of VAX/VMS,
> >> and then issue licenses (of any type) for the new version.
> >>
> >
> > Read the above again.
> >
> > The suggestion above is about VSI buying out VMS completely from HPE.
> >
> > In that situation, issues around third-party IP most certainly do come
> > into play.
> Possibly. Possibly not. Compaq bought DEC. HP bought Compaq. Were there any
> third party IP issues there? Perhaps Compaq and HP illegally issued VMS
> licenses? Fun questions.
>
> But VSI does not need to do any "buy-out" in order to issue a VAX/VMS version.

My point there was more for past releases from DEC and, to a lesser extent, Compaq.

There were a lot of version of OpenVMS for VAX and Alpha that can no longer be
licensed. What if, when I someday finish restoring my VAXstation 2000, I wanted to
run the version of VMS that originally shipped with it? The hobbyist program allowed
that but the hobbyist program is no more. How many permanent licenses for that
version of VMS are even still in existence at this point and are any of those in hobbyst
hands? And the quantity of layered product licenses for that era of software still in
existence is surely tiny at this point.

If VSI were to issue a VIS OpenVMS VAX 7.4 then there exists *a* version for VAX
which is hugely better than the current situation. But it would still be illegal to
explore the history of OpenVMS. To date all I've ever seen is OpenVMS VAX 5.5 (for
which I have a condist set that came with my VAXstation 4000/60 but without a
license due to the transfer issue - that was thrown out by the previous owner AFAIK)
and Compaq OpenVMS 7.3 (for which I have a hobbyist CD). I'll never again be
allowed to use either version or any other version.

Meanwhile I'm free to explore the complete history of Microsoft Windows - second-hand
boxed copies of that are no trouble to find and there is no license transfer issue preventing
me from legally playing with it. The history of Windows will be preserved but the history
of VMS will not.

On 7/31/2022 8:30 AM, David Goodwin wrote:
> On Saturday, July 30, 2022 at 5:53:10 AM UTC+12, Dave Froble wrote:
>> On 7/29/2022 1:42 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>> On 2022-07-29, Dave Froble <da...@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>>>> On 7/29/2022 8:56 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>>> On 2022-07-28, David Goodwin <dgso...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> And maybe VSI will some day buy out VMS completely and make historic
>>>>>> releases available in some form rather than letting the few remaining valid
>>>>>> permanent licenses slowly vanish as companies throw them out or
>>>>>> hobbyists (who bought new or had them transferred) die without transferring
>>>>>> them on to someone else.
>>>>>
>>>>> Sorting out the rights to the third-party IP within VMS may be a problem
>>>>> if that ever happens.
>>>>>
>>>>> Simon.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> There should be no issues.
>>>>
>>>> As stated, VSI has the right and capability to issue a new version of VAX/VMS,
>>>> and then issue licenses (of any type) for the new version.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Read the above again.
>>>
>>> The suggestion above is about VSI buying out VMS completely from HPE.
>>>
>>> In that situation, issues around third-party IP most certainly do come
>>> into play.
>> Possibly. Possibly not. Compaq bought DEC. HP bought Compaq. Were there any
>> third party IP issues there? Perhaps Compaq and HP illegally issued VMS
>> licenses? Fun questions.
>>
>> But VSI does not need to do any "buy-out" in order to issue a VAX/VMS version.
>
> My point there was more for past releases from DEC and, to a lesser extent, Compaq.
>
> There were a lot of version of OpenVMS for VAX and Alpha that can no longer be
> licensed. What if, when I someday finish restoring my VAXstation 2000, I wanted to
> run the version of VMS that originally shipped with it? The hobbyist program allowed
> that but the hobbyist program is no more. How many permanent licenses for that
> version of VMS are even still in existence at this point and are any of those in hobbyst
> hands? And the quantity of layered product licenses for that era of software still in
> existence is surely tiny at this point.
>
> If VSI were to issue a VIS OpenVMS VAX 7.4 then there exists *a* version for VAX
> which is hugely better than the current situation. But it would still be illegal to
> explore the history of OpenVMS. To date all I've ever seen is OpenVMS VAX 5.5 (for
> which I have a condist set that came with my VAXstation 4000/60 but without a
> license due to the transfer issue - that was thrown out by the previous owner AFAIK)
> and Compaq OpenVMS 7.3 (for which I have a hobbyist CD). I'll never again be
> allowed to use either version or any other version.
>
> Meanwhile I'm free to explore the complete history of Microsoft Windows - second-hand
> boxed copies of that are no trouble to find and there is no license transfer issue preventing
> me from legally playing with it. The history of Windows will be preserved but the history
> of VMS will not.
>

Well, this is a bit hard to comment upon.

I guess different people have different expectations. I for one would never be
interested in any but the latest releases. After all, for the most part,
nothing is ever removed, so the earlier capabilities would still exist. Even
dropping support for say, a MicroVAX 2000, is most likely due to memory
requirements or lack of hardware to do qualification testing, not due to code
being removed. Just guessing.

Attempting to consider similar things, I wonder if vehicle registration and a
license would be available for say, a drag behind litter, or such. Still
usable, but one might argue the legality, huh? Got to wonder if there were
licenses for horses?

Anything before VMS V5 doesn't have the LMF, as far as I know, so no PAKs
needed. After that, as mentioned, there is PAKGEN.

As far as I'm concerned, some people take the "legal issue" way too far. Who is
going to give a rat's ass if someone is playing with VMS on a MicroVAX 2000?
Maybe Simon and Arne, but considering the whole planet, they are not even a
statistic.

Go ahead, play with your history, I sure don't care, and I doubt other than the
above mentioned pair, and maybe Bill and a few others, will care.

--
David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: davef@tsoft-inc.com
DFE Ultralights, Inc.
170 Grimplin Road
Vanderbilt, PA 15486

On 7/29/2022 3:47 PM, Johnny Billquist wrote:
> On 2022-07-29 20:04, abrsvc wrote:

>>  From what I recall, VSI bought the rights to Alpha and Itanium along with the
>> rights to create the X86 variants.  VSI does not have the rights to do
>> anything with VAX versions at all.  HP retains the rights to allow/disallow
>> any licensing for VAX machines or emulated VAXes.  All licensing for these are
>> handled through HP Financial.  This includes both the purchase of licenses as
>> well as transfers.
>
> That was the belief of a lot of people, but VSI (or people from VSI) publicly
> corrected that belief in this newsgroup some time ago. They do have the rights
> also to the VAX bits. But there isn't even a snowballs chance in hell that they
> will build a new VAX version, it has been said.
> And VSI cannot issue any licenses for HPE versions of VMS, which is why the VAX
> is in such a limbo.

What Johnny has written is 100% correct.

--

--- Rob