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<p>I don't know if that's the whole story; it's not just that
monster OS/360. I believe also DOS/360, DOS/VS, MVS, VM/370, and
TSS/370; I don't know about TPF. MTS would be cool (but it isn't
IBM).</p>
<p>I believe the z versions of the above have to be licensed, even
for Hercules. There was some class action about allowing this,
but I don't know how it all turned out. That's surprising given
the Amdahl decisions.<br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Yes, I have a very large dent in my
skull from a lawyer in our company about copyrights. This was
even for firmware that would never see the light of day.</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">
<p>A number of sources for Tops-20 assemble the copyright right
into the executable in low memory so that if you try to type it
out, you first get the text (followed by gibberish). Use of
GLXLIB will force this. I'm not sure if it is in Galaxy or the
EXEC, but one of my favorite comments of the aforementioned code
is, "Somebody could steal Tops-20!!"<br>
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<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">On 3/13/20 4:35 PM, Paul Koning wrote:
I know some old OS/360 versions are freely available, but that's for a different reason. They are in the public domain because IBM exposed the sources without copyright notice, at a time when US law said that absence of notice meant the item is in the public domain. The same applies to various other software; CDC's COS comes to mind.
The law changed quite a while ago, but when I started in the software profession it was pounded into our skulls to put copyright notices on stuff because back then it actually made a real difference.
paul
<blockquote type="cite"><hr width="100%" size="2"><pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">On Mar 13, 2020, at 4:24 PM, Thomas DeBellis <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:tommytimesharing@gmail.com"><tommytimesharing@gmail.com></a> wrote:
I should add, however, that even IBM has come to understand the value of having people understanding and adoring their operating systems and maximizing the knowledgeable user base. Otherwise, finding people to do maintenance can be problematic (== $$$) or impossible.
My understanding is that while you can't get the most current version of the various 390 based OS's, you can get older ones for free for hobbyist usage. OK...</pre></blockquote></pre>
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