Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ksr!breakpoint!richt
From: richt@breakpoint.ksr.com (Rich Title)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: Re: AT&T Joining OSF
Message-ID: <378@ksr.UUCP>
Date: 1 Aug 88 13:02:49 GMT
References: <10474@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com> <5960008@hpcupt1.HP.COM> <5796@orstcs.CS.ORST.EDU> <377@ksr.UUCP> <5838@orstcs.CS.ORST.EDU>
Sender: nobody@ksr.UUCP
Reply-To: richt@ksr.UUCP (Rich Title)
Organization: Kendall Square Research, Cambridge MA
Lines: 26

>>... And, DEC ships sources in 
>>micro-fiche format *free* with every major release, and machine-readable
>>source is available for those who want to pay for it. Which, is
>>a whole lot more open than Sun, for example.
>
>... Does this mean that anyone can use the VMS source
>as a basis of a port to any other machine and then sell it just like it's
>done with UNIX?  This certainly is news to me.  I wonder why there aren't
>as many other machines running VMS as there are DEC machines running UNIX.

No. First of all, the guts of VMS (what UNIX folks would call
the "kernel") is still written in VAX assembly language, and
hence is not portable. Secondly, DEC retains copyright over
the sources. 

The VMS microfiche (which is actually compiler listings)
is intended mainly for people who want to read the code to gain
a better understanding of VMS internals. It's not in a suitable
format for hacking on. The machine readable source
(which costs money) is intended mainly for people who
want to tailor VMS for a particular application. It doesn't
give them the right to re-distribute it.

Just clarifying,
 
    Rich (former DEC VMS person, now a UNIX person)