vixie@palo-alto.DEC.COM (Paul Vixie) (06/13/88)
# Okay, fact time. Yeah. There's a dbm.c and a dbm.h in X Windows Version 11 Release 2. It's part of HP's contribution in the server directory. Since X.V11R2 is freely distributable, I am assuming that this DBM package was written by HP and is not AT&T-derived (otherwise HP and MIT could get in trouble for sending it out to people without AT&T source licenses). Looking at the code very briefly and comparing it with my memory of the 4.2bsd DBM source (not NDBM), it looked totally different. If this version of DBM is "free", perhaps HP can post it to comp.sources.unix under separate cover? They'd be the heroes of the Net. For a few hours, anyway. :-). -- Paul Vixie Digital Equipment Corporation Work: vixie@dec.com Play: paul@vixie.UUCP Western Research Laboratory uunet!decwrl!vixie uunet!vixie!paul Palo Alto, California, USA +1 415 853 6600 +1 415 864 7013
oz@yunexus.UUCP (Ozan Yigit) (06/14/88)
In article <3046@palo-alto.DEC.COM> vixie@dec.com (Paul Vixie) writes: > >There's a dbm.c and a dbm.h in X Windows Version 11 Release 2. It's part >of HP's contribution in the server directory. Since X.V11R2 is freely >distributable, I am assuming that this DBM package was written by HP and >is not AT&T-derived (otherwise HP and MIT could get in trouble for sending >it out to people without AT&T source licenses). Looking at the code very >briefly and comparing it with my memory of the 4.2bsd DBM source (not NDBM), >it looked totally different. > >Paul Vixie Hehehe. This is neat. It is indeed there, and you are wrong, it is the one and the same dbm.c we know and love (?) (look under "old" sources in your 4.3 distribution, and you shall find an identical dbm.c). I strongly suspect though, that the cat was out of the bag long before hp put dbm.* into X distribution. There was a posting few years back, called mdbm, that was a derivative of ndbm, which i suspect was derived from dbm.c. So, it is possible that even the neighborhood cabbie may have a copy of it in her atari/st. Now, I do not know exactly how long does it take for a piece of software to lose its "trade secret" status and/or its copyright protection, but, it appears to me that dbm/ndbm/etc. are good candidates. If I posted dbm.c to this newsgroup tomorrow, would I get sued ?? I kinda doubt it. [Relax, this is just hypothetical. I am not going to post, not until I get some legal or otherwise informed opinion :-)] So, you want dbm.c ?? See x.11.2/driver/os/hpux/dbm.* in your X distribution. If you do not have the X distribution, ask your neighborhood cabbie for a copy. :-) oz -- The DeathStar rotated slowly, | Usenet: ...!utzoo!yunexus!oz towards its target, and sparked | ....!uunet!mnetor!yunexus!oz an intense SUNbeam. The green world | Bitnet: oz@[yulibra|yuyetti] of unics evaporated instantly... | Phonet: +1 416 736-5257x3976
honey@umix.cc.umich.edu (Peter Honeyman) (06/15/88)
sorry, paul, but that's the v7 dbm. peter