On 06/08/18 13:48, m.roth at 5-cent.us wrote:> Frank Cox wrote: >>>> so if it would work, replace shortname with short and short1? >> >> With all of this hokey-pokey surrounding licensing and mac addresses, I >> wonder if this outfit is actually still in compliance with the terms of >> their license for this software, whatever it may be? >> >> If the software licensed to run only on Machine X and Machine X has now >> been junked and replace by Machine Y, then isn't the solution to obtain a >> license for the software for Machine Y or be out-of compliance regardless >> of the technical ability to spoof whatever it's looking for?Frank, I 100% agree with you. The only case with spoofed MAC address and license that may have chance to stand in court will be if all below are true: 1. the company issued perpetual license. 2. the company does not exist 3. the original hardware died (be it motherboard whose embedded NIC license was locked to or network card) 4. single replacement machine (meeting requirements of license; sometimes it is number of CPUs/cores, memory, etc) is used to replace it [imminently needing to spoof MAC address] 5. fair effort was made to find and notify about the above whoever inherited rights of dissolved company But I bet the lawyer can find flaws in what I tried to say. On a similar note: one of the companies whose software scientists here were using a lot (IDL is a product) changed hand several times, and last owner changed licensing terms and stopped signing perpetual licenses. With perpetual license you were able to keep upgrading software during support period, usually 1 year, and keep using last version later forever only you are locked to that older version. They stopped signing perpetual licenses, and made it "software for rent" with 1 year rent term. When that happened I recommended all our people to avoid using IDL in new projects (python was my recommendation as fair replacement - just what I know, not that I consider it better than other alternatives). As a programmer (former I should say, as I don't put my dirty hands into code lately, almost not) I wouldn't invest my time into mastering something that I not necessarily will have access to at some point in a future... Valeri>> > It's apparently a very good molecular modeling program, and to be real, my > users tell me that the company that bought the original company wants, and > I'm not making this up, $15k US to generate a license for a new > workstation. And there's two? three? workstations that run it. > > And this is a US gov't agency (civilian secrot). Budget? We don' need no > steenkeen budgets, the Magic Hand of the Market will produce all the > results we need..... > > mark "not including building maintenance budgets" > > _______________________________________________ > CentOS mailing list > CentOS at centos.org > https://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos >-- ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Valeri Galtsev Sr System Administrator Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics University of Chicago Phone: 773-702-4247 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Valeri Galtsev wrote:> On 06/08/18 13:48, m.roth at 5-cent.us wrote: >> Frank Cox wrote: >>>>> so if it would work, replace shortname with short and short1? >>> >>> With all of this hokey-pokey surrounding licensing and mac addresses, I >>> wonder if this outfit is actually still in compliance with the terms of >>> their license for this software, whatever it may be? >>> >>> If the software licensed to run only on Machine X and Machine X has now >>> been junked and replace by Machine Y, then isn't the solution to >>> obtain a license for the software for Machine Y or be out-of compliance >>> regardless of the technical ability to spoof whatever it's looking for? > > Frank, I 100% agree with you. The only case with spoofed MAC address and > license that may have chance to stand in court will be if all below are > true: > > 1. the company issued perpetual license. > 2. the company does not exist > 3. the original hardware died (be it motherboard whose embedded NIC > license was locked to or network card) > 4. single replacement machine (meeting requirements of license; > sometimes it is number of CPUs/cores, memory, etc) is used to replace it > [imminently needing to spoof MAC address] > 5. fair effort was made to find and notify about the above whoever > inherited rights of dissolved company > > But I bet the lawyer can find flaws in what I tried to say.Both users' old workstations were at least 6 years old, maybe more. They got surplused (I'm the one who did that). So it's only on the two machines that the licenses were for. But.... I assume it was very expensive when they bought it.> > On a similar note: one of the companies whose software scientists here > were using a lot (IDL is a product) changed hand several times, and last > owner changed licensing terms and stopped signing perpetual licenses. > With perpetual license you were able to keep upgrading software during > support period, usually 1 year, and keep using last version later > forever only you are locked to that older version. They stopped signing > perpetual licenses, and made it "software for rent" with 1 year rent > term. When that happened I recommended all our people to avoid using IDL > in new projects (python was my recommendation as fair replacement - just > what I know, not that I consider it better than other alternatives). As > a programmer (former I should say, as I don't put my dirty hands into > code lately, almost not) I wouldn't invest my time into mastering > something that I not necessarily will have access to at some point in a > future...Yeah. We have a number of folks here using R, and fewer still using Matlab. mark
On 06/08/18 15:26, m.roth at 5-cent.us wrote:> Valeri Galtsev wrote: >> On 06/08/18 13:48, m.roth at 5-cent.us wrote: >>> Frank Cox wrote: >>>>>> so if it would work, replace shortname with short and short1? >>>> >>>> With all of this hokey-pokey surrounding licensing and mac addresses, I >>>> wonder if this outfit is actually still in compliance with the terms of >>>> their license for this software, whatever it may be? >>>> >>>> If the software licensed to run only on Machine X and Machine X has now >>>> been junked and replace by Machine Y, then isn't the solution to >>>> obtain a license for the software for Machine Y or be out-of compliance >>>> regardless of the technical ability to spoof whatever it's looking for? >> >> Frank, I 100% agree with you. The only case with spoofed MAC address and >> license that may have chance to stand in court will be if all below are >> true: >> >> 1. the company issued perpetual license. >> 2. the company does not exist >> 3. the original hardware died (be it motherboard whose embedded NIC >> license was locked to or network card) >> 4. single replacement machine (meeting requirements of license; >> sometimes it is number of CPUs/cores, memory, etc) is used to replace it >> [imminently needing to spoof MAC address] >> 5. fair effort was made to find and notify about the above whoever >> inherited rights of dissolved company >> >> But I bet the lawyer can find flaws in what I tried to say. > > Both users' old workstations were at least 6 years old, maybe more. They > got surplused (I'm the one who did that). So it's only on the two machines > that the licenses were for. But.... I assume it was very expensive when > they bought it. >> >> On a similar note: one of the companies whose software scientists here >> were using a lot (IDL is a product) changed hand several times, and last >> owner changed licensing terms and stopped signing perpetual licenses. >> With perpetual license you were able to keep upgrading software during >> support period, usually 1 year, and keep using last version later >> forever only you are locked to that older version. They stopped signing >> perpetual licenses, and made it "software for rent" with 1 year rent >> term. When that happened I recommended all our people to avoid using IDL >> in new projects (python was my recommendation as fair replacement - just >> what I know, not that I consider it better than other alternatives). As >> a programmer (former I should say, as I don't put my dirty hands into >> code lately, almost not) I wouldn't invest my time into mastering >> something that I not necessarily will have access to at some point in a >> future... > > Yeah. We have a number of folks here using R, and fewer still using Matlab.Sounds like your former matlab users are happy with R (bad name, BTW, try to search...). Thanks, I will know now what to mention as alternative if it will be about matlab! Valeri> > mark > > _______________________________________________ > CentOS mailing list > CentOS at centos.org > https://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos >-- ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Valeri Galtsev Sr System Administrator Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics University of Chicago Phone: 773-702-4247 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
On Fri, 8 Jun 2018, Valeri Galtsev wrote:> Frank, I 100% agree with you. The only case with spoofed MAC address and > license that may have chance to stand in court will be if all below are true: > > 1. the company issued perpetual license. > 2. the company does not exist > 3. the original hardware died (be it motherboard whose embedded NIC license > was locked to or network card) > 4. single replacement machine (meeting requirements of license; sometimes it > is number of CPUs/cores, memory, etc) is used to replace it [imminently > needing to spoof MAC address] > 5. fair effort was made to find and notify about the above whoever inherited > rights of dissolved companyI can think of a few more: 1: The company does not exist and for some reason no one inherited its rights. 2: The company does not exist, it had duty to inform its customers of such events and it failed to do so. 3. The company still has rights, but the DRM is enforcing rights it does not have. Of course all of these might be blown away by the DMCA. When Sony installed malware on Windows machines, Jerry Pournelle was afraid to tell its victims how to get rid of it for just that reason. http://collaboration.cmc.ec.gc.ca/science/rpn/biblio/ddj/Website/articles/DDJ/2006/0602/0602o/0602o.html Perhaps the simplest solution might be to get the real MAC addresses right. If you cannot dig the old NIC out of the trash, perhaps you could use something with an adjustable MAC. -- Michael hennebry at web.cs.ndsu.NoDak.edu "Sorry but your password must contain an uppercase letter, a number, a haiku, a gang sign, a heiroglyph, and the blood of a virgin." -- someeecards
On 2018-06-08, Valeri Galtsev <galtsev at kicp.uchicago.edu> wrote:> > Frank, I 100% agree with you. The only case with spoofed MAC address and > license that may have chance to stand in court will be if all below are > true: > > 1. the company issued perpetual license. > 2. the company does not existBased on what's written below, it seems like the company does in fact still exist, and that therefore the organization trying to spoof MACs may be violating their license. I hope the company which sells the program doesn't read this mailing list.>> It's apparently a very good molecular modeling program, and to be real, my >> users tell me that the company that bought the original company wants, and >> I'm not making this up, $15k US to generate a license for a new >> workstation. And there's two? three? workstations that run it. >> >> And this is a US gov't agency (civilian secrot). Budget? We don' need no >> steenkeen budgets, the Magic Hand of the Market will produce all the >> results we need.....--keith -- kkeller at wombat.san-francisco.ca.us
On Sun, June 10, 2018 6:19 pm, Keith Keller wrote:> On 2018-06-08, Valeri Galtsev <galtsev at kicp.uchicago.edu> wrote: >> >> Frank, I 100% agree with you. The only case with spoofed MAC address and >> license that may have chance to stand in court will be if all below are >> true: >> >> 1. the company issued perpetual license. >> 2. the company does not exist > > Based on what's written below, it seems like the company does in fact > still exist, and that therefore the organization trying to spoof MACs > may be violating their license. I hope the company which sells the > program doesn't read this mailing list.Keith, you as well as Frank originally and following Frank I all agree that the case described in this thread may constitute violation of license agreement. So, for the OP it may be advantageous think everything over... That is why I tried to draw hypothetical set of conditions I under which if all if all are met, it may not fall under violation. To show how narrow could be the case in which it may, just may not be a violation. You trimmed away several other conditions that are necessary as well. Anyway, as we all agree, we should comply license agreement, or not use software at all if we can not comply for one reason or another. Valeri> >>> It's apparently a very good molecular modeling program, and to be real, >>> my >>> users tell me that the company that bought the original company wants, >>> and >>> I'm not making this up, $15k US to generate a license for a new >>> workstation. And there's two? three? workstations that run it. >>> >>> And this is a US gov't agency (civilian secrot). Budget? We don' need >>> no >>> steenkeen budgets, the Magic Hand of the Market will produce all the >>> results we need..... > > --keith > > -- > kkeller at wombat.san-francisco.ca.us > > > _______________________________________________ > CentOS mailing list > CentOS at centos.org > https://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos >++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Valeri Galtsev Sr System Administrator Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics University of Chicago Phone: 773-702-4247 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++