On Thu, 26 Sep 2019 09:02:44 -0700 (PDT) "Rodney W. Grimes" <free...@gndrsh.dnsmgr.net> wrote:
> > On Thu, Sep 26, 2019 at 8:36 AM Michael C Robinson > > <mich...@robinson-west.com> wrote: > > > > > > Is it possible to get the source code to Windows 9x and ME since > > > Microsoft isn't supporting it anymore? > > > One would want to get the source code and then open source it of > > > course. Even Windows 3.1 and Windows 3.11 is closed source. > > > Surely, Microsoft could release pre 9x Windows? It wouldn't hurt > > > Microsoft at all since Windows > > > is squarely NT based now where many modern systems won't even > > > support DOS let alone DOS based Windows. I realize it would > > > probably be very expensive to get Microsoft to cough up the > > > source code, but has anyone even looked into this? > > > > > Richard Stallman apparently broached this subject to a Microsoft > > vice president when he visited there to give a talk. > > https://stallman.org/articles/microsoft-talk.html > > It might happen someday. > > My general feel is "not going to happen" there are probably things > MS considers trade secrets buried in that code and no way in H*ll > are they about to put TS at risk by releasing the code without a > disclosure enforcing licenses. Yes, there are people who have > access to this source code, no I am not one. > > It may be ancient code, but a TS is a TS and if you go release it > as open source it is no longer a secret and your now out any legal > path to enforce your TS. > One of those 'trade secrets' includes the _NSAKEY, which is still in modern windows releases. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSAKEY _______________________________________________ PLUG mailing list PLUG@pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug