Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!ncar!boulder!pikes!udenva!isis!nbires!maa
From: maa@nbires.nbi.com (Mark Armbrust)
Newsgroups: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d
Subject: Re: pk(un)zip
Summary: Ramblings from memory
Message-ID: <367@nbires.nbi.com>
Date: 21 Mar 89 16:14:50 GMT
References: <544@babbage.acc.virginia.edu> <1290@hounx.ATT.COM>
Reply-To: maa@nbires.UUCP (Mark Armbrust)
Distribution: usa
Organization: NBI Inc, Boulder CO
Lines: 32

In article <1290@hounx.ATT.COM> marty1@hounx.ATT.COM (M.B.BRILLIANT) writes:
>
>It doesn't even look as though we are allowed to keep PKARC.  Maybe
>just PKXARC, and then only if we use it only to read PKARC files, not
>SeaArc files.  Can I use ARCE?  I'm confused.
>
>Is NoGate's PAK legal?  It's cheap, reasonably compatible (except that
>it can't read PK's comments), and is supposed to read and write all
>kinds of ARC and PAK files.  I was going to send them a registration,
>but now you're raising doubts about their legitimacy.

My reading of the court documents that were posted months ago [I no longer
have copies] was that nobody, including P.K., was disallowed from using
PK[X]ARC.  PKware was disallowed beginning this year to distribute any
software that read/wrote .ARC format files.  Anyone else can still distribute
PK[X]ARC -- you won't get sued if someone downloads it from your BBS.

SEA, last I heard, will license you for $1 to write/distribute programs that
deal with .ARC format files with the provision that your tools will not
create .ARC files that the current version of SEA ARC cannot deal with.

Personally, I like ZOO -- it works on my PC and on the Unix box here at work.
The Unix version of ARC I have doesn't like the Green Hills compiler -- I had
to compile it with optimizer disabled and generate debug symbols, then strip
the debug info after linking!


Happy Hacking,
Mark Armbrust

maa@nbires.UUCP
maa@nbires.nbi.com