Frank heckenbach wrote:
samiam@moorecad.com wrote:
P5 is a much better basis for a compiler front end, being 40 years old, very well documented, and completely ISO 7185 compliant (not a subset), and completely free of copyright or license encumberments.
Where is the copyright/license/public domain statement from its authors? I didn't find them in p5.zip from your web site. Note that "no copyright notice" doesn't mean "no copyright", but in fact the opposite "all rights reserved" is the default. Like it or not, that's the legal situation.
Only since the Berne convention was adopted. Pascal-P predates the Berne convention (in the USA, I guess it depends on where and which treaty you are talking about, Berne dates back to 1886)[1], it was written in 1972. It was also openly distributed to anyone that asked for it. Steve Pemberton published it without problems (or agreement with the original authors) in his book, and made it available on his web site, again without restrictions (and I asked the author about it personally).
You could also ask Wirth about it, but I don't suppose it would make a difference, since he didn't personally write it, his students did.
Neither the old nor the new united states copyright laws specifically stated what the exact meaning of public domain was. The former law simply stated that copyright didn't apply by default, but the berne convention says it does. In any case, the courts have weighed in on the subject, and ruled time after time that works given out freely and freely published loose any copyright status. In fact, I have yet to see a single example of a work that was freely given out by the author, but later retracted and successfully sued over (note patents are a completely different subject).
However, its not really my office to talk you into anything here, just point out possibilities.
Scott Moore
Berne convention:
[1] This Convention shall apply to all works which, at the moment of its coming into force, have not yet fallen into the public domain in the country of origin through the expiry of the term of protection.
US "Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988"
Sec. 12. Works in the public domain.
Title 17, United States Code, as amended by this Act, does not provide copyright protection for any work that is in the public domain in the United States.