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<p>Yes, there are a number of ways to get around a license check for
just about anything if you try long enough and find the points to
stub out the checks. This is probably not a great idea. Just
because you've stubbed out a call for local validation doesn't
mean you've gotten everything, such as reporting (covert or not)
to a central site. At a minimum, you'd probably be put on the
spot to pony up. <br>
</p>
<p>I'm not surprised if VSI wouldn't attempt to extract some amount
of money from the older licenses. They are currently in the
middle of a port to X86_64 and, speaking from experience, ports
between architectures can wind up taking an unexpected amount of
time. Once booting on the x86_64 platform (which they have done),
they will likely need to expend resources addressing which device
drivers to write or port. Such human resources are expensive and
during all these time, the x86_64 product isn't generating any
revenue.</p>
<p>That can put a young company into a cash crunch. In other words,
all R&D and no sales = chapter 11. Once the port is fully
operational, one assumes that a certain amount of expenditure will
need to be done to enter new markets, perhaps regain lost
customers. That could be tough. Linux is increasingly difficult
to compete against, Windows (data center addition) shows
consistent improvement and well, IBM. I do think that VMS has
some desirable market differentiators in the data center; besides
Tops-10, Tops-20 and z/OS, it is one of the few operating systems
I know of with an actual functional unified operator interface, a
working batch system and tape management.</p>
<p>But either way, I wouldn't bet against it being a slog for VSI
for some time. With regard to the licenses themselves, I think
the following language from the VSI website appears relevant:</p>
<blockquote>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">October 24, 2019 - As part of its
exiting the OpenVMS market, Hewlett Packard Enterprises (HPE)
has sold the rights to all its support contract renewals to VMS
Software, Inc. (VSI). Both HPE OpenVMS (V8.4 and <i><b>earlier</b></i>)
and VSI OpenVMS (V8.4-1h1 and higher) contract renewals were
sold to VSI. When combined with news earlier this year that HPE
had stopped selling all new VSI upgraded license products and
new VSI support contracts, this means that HPE has divested the
controlling rights of the OpenVMS operating system solely to
VSI.<br>
</div>
</blockquote>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">I think the word 'earlier' may be
operative, perhaps meaning 'all licenses, now, in the past and
forever'.<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:b6823e25-801f-f53c-f8ee-8f29099482a6@neurotica.com">
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<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">On 3/7/20 11:50 AM, Dave McGuire wrote:
</pre>
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap=""> Many people have ways of generating working PAKs. Those people,
whomever they happen to be, should try very hard to avoid impacting
VSI's business in any way.
-Dave
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
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<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">On 3/7/20 6:58 AM, Johnny Billquist wrote:
The one, potentially scary thing, is the question of licenses for VAX.
VSI didn't, as far as I can remember, formally take over the VAX side of
things, which could mean that VAX people might be left out in the cold
no matter what VSI does.
</pre>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
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