[Info-vax] [Attn: HP Employees] PDP-11 OS hobbyist licensing

[Johnny Billquist]

On 2013-10-03 21:11, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2013-10-03, Paul Sture <nospam at sture.ch> wrote:
>> In article <l2jlgg$8pc$1 at dont-email.me>,
>>   Simon Clubley <clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote:
>>>
>>> However, at the same time, I don't see the same as applying to the public
>>> documentation; I don't see any reason why I cannot read through the public
>>> RSX documentation also available from Bitsavers.
>>
>> I remember some pretty serious copyright statements on that
>> documentation, for example "shall not reproduce in whole or part...
>> without the express written permission of..."
>>
>
> Johnny said earlier on that DEC released it's control over the out of
> print documentation and that's a recollection I have as well.
>
> However, thinking about it, I now wonder if that applies to only, say,
> the PDP-8/PDP-10 documentation and any older versions of the PDP-11
> documentation at Bitsavers or if it applies to _all_ the PDP-11
> documentation as well.
>
> I had a quick look around and found a statement on a PDP-8 website
> confirming the above statement about DEC releasing control of out of
> print documentation, but without any exact details of what out of print
> means in this case.
>
> For example, does out of print apply to manuals for the old versions of
> RSX developed at DEC, or does the control release not apply to _any_
> RSX manuals because a later version of RSX was developed by Mentec
> and hence a current version of the RSX manuals might technically
> be considered to be still in print by the person who took over from
> Mentec ?
>
> At least with VMS, we don't have this problem because DEC/CPQ/HP put
> the VMS documentation on it's own website in a freely downloadable
> format.

I guess this question could be refined down to "what does out of print" 
mean?

I honestly don't know the answer. I'm wondering if the RSX manuals are 
out of print or not. I think it would be very hard to order a set today. 
But I can't say for certain if it would be totally impossible or not.

	Johnny