[Info-vax] VMS License Generator

[Paul Sture]

On Mon, 30 Jan 2012 00:51:37 -0800, John Wallace wrote:

> [to richard and others]
> 
> It's not a licence validation process, not in general anyway, not
> according to DEC anyway. (I have no idea what HP's current formally
> stated position might be).
> 
> The official position statement from DEC on a number of occasions was
> that PAKs were a licence tracking aid, not a licence validation/
> enforcement tool. I can't readily find any evidence of this (it was
> pre-Web) but confidence is high.

I read that opinion on this newsgroup several years ago, and it was 
posted by responsible people working in OpenVMS Engineering.

However, back when LMF et al was first introduced, an independent 
hardware engineer told me that DEC personnel were switching on LMF 
history logging without the knowledge of the customer if they got a 
chance.

> A PAK is a piece of paper (or electronic equivalent), it does not of
> itself grant the legal right to use something. A licence grants that
> right. Typical licences are full of far more legalese than fits on a PAK
> sheet. A PAK is also not (or at least back then was not) a "Certificate
> of Authenticity" such as is required by some software products before
> they can be fully installed or used.

The PAKs I personally had for my VAXstation 2000 definitely said 
something to the effect that they were valuable documents and should be 
kept in a safe place.  This might have been in an accompanying letter in 
the PAK folder, but I took it as an official statement from Digital.

> So a documented customer without the required PAKs but who could provide
> proof of purchase or other evidence of legitimate entitlement wouldn't,
> according to DEC's stated position, ultimately need the relevant PAK as
> proof of licence. I'd guess that "borrowing" a PAK (a Temporary Service
> PAK or whatever) might be OK; I know they were reasonably easy to come
> by for customers with a credible story, while a longer term fix was
> identified.

We had a fair number of temporary PAKs for new and test configurations 
when I was working for a bank.  They were certainly easy to get hold of 
when you were regularly buying large quantities of kit.

-- 
Paul Sture