Sys V 3.2.1 online man pages (Summary)
Jim Mercer
jim at lsuc.on.ca
Wed Aug 22 02:11:34 AEST 1990
in response to my query as to the availability of online man pages for
Sys V 3.2.1, this is what i got:
> From: Bruce D. Becker <bdb at becker.UUCP>
>
> Amiga unix comes with AT&T man pages, and there was a
> 3.2 version for a while.
> From: hedrick at cs.rutgers.edu
>
> There are certainly man pages, but ATT charges separately. Some
> vendors include it in the package, some charge the user, other don't
> make it available at all. There have been enough complaints that most
> vendors are now supplying them. You should pressure yours to do so
> as well.
[ it used to be that they can as part of the DWB (nroff) package, but this is
no more ]
> From: paone at cs.rutgers.edu (Phil Paone)
>
> Until I freed my bonds of AT&T two months ago, I tried to track down
> those elusive man pages. They do exist. The only problem is that the
> only way to get them is by ordering the source code license
> ~10,000.00. I havn't found anyone with that kind of money (even in
> AT&T) to check it out, but that is what I was told.
[ we ARE a source licensee, and they still tell me i can't have them ]
> From: arnold at audiofax.com (Arnold Robbins)
>
> They do exist, and you can buy them. For a mere $10,000 U.S. Ask again,
> a little louder, and you'll find this out.
>
> Personally, that one has to pay that kind of price for the man pages
> really ticks me off.... Can you say "greed", boys and girls? Sigh.
> From: gwyn at smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn)
>
> They are certainly not covered by the UNIX System V license.
> It is possible that (as with older releases) they may be licensed separately.
>
> >as a license holder, is there anyone out there who will arrange to get these
> >to me?
>
> You shouldn't ask people to commit a federal crime in so public a forum.
[ it was my understanding that as a source licensee, we can exchange source
with other licensees (within limit's, ie. we don't have a DWB license so
i can't very well ask someone to provide DWB). as i understand it, we can
call up UCB and ask for BSD source as we already have the prerequisite
AT&T license (UCB charges a nominal fee as well).
my license says, and i quote section 7.05(b):
LICENSEE may distribute copies of a SOFTWARE PRODUCT, either in modified
or unmodified form, to third parties in the AUTHORIZED COUNTRY having
licenses of at least equivalent scope ....
(AT&T's emphasis)
if the man pages do not fit either "SOFTWARE PRODUCT" (which in our case
means Unix System V 3.2.1) or are not in the "scope" of our license, i'm
sure someone out there would let me know. ]
> From: jimm at IMA.ISC.COM (Jim McGrath)
>
> Interactive includes online man pages with its latest release (2.2) of
> V3.2. I believe that SCO does also. I don't know how one buys an
> unbundled copy, however. I suggest you contact the sales organization
> of either/both SCO and Interactive. Good luck.
> From: wdavis at x102c.ess.harris.com (davis william 26373)
>
> Absolutely correct. When 3.2 came out, ATT had just finished a deal with
> Prentice-Hall to have nice manuals printed up. Providing man pages
> would have cut into the sales by Prentice-Hall.
> From: lyndon at cs.athabascau.ca (Lyndon Nerenberg)
>
> Har dee har har har! :-) (Sorry Jim.)
>
> AT&T has an agreement with Prentice Hall regarding printed manuals that
> (apparently) prevents AT&T from shipping source to the man pages. I
> went through this some months ago. For a while, it seemed like they
> might be able to give us man page source under the terms of our DWB
> source license, however AT&T was never able to figure out if that
> was the case or not. Not that they would do you much good - SVR3
> doesn't come with nroff or a man command, either.
>
> System V: Just Consider It Bogus.
why is it that most of the vendors who have licensed 3.2 from AT&T (ie. SCO,
interactive, Commodore) issue online man pages, but AT$T (oops) decided to
squeeze some additional bucks out?
one of the reasons we have a source license is that we would like to alter
some of the programs for our environment. it would be nice to update our
man pages to reflect these changes.
i don't think submitting them to Prentice-Hall for a private run will be
very cost effective. 8^)
hmmm....
does anyone know if you get FULL online man pages with the Sys V 4.0
source distribution?
--
[ Jim Mercer jim at lsuc.On.Ca || ...!uunet!attcan!lsuc!jim +1 416 947-5258 ]
[ Systems Facilitator - Law Society of Upper Canada, Toronto, Ontario, CANADA ]
[ Standards are great. They give non-conformists something to not conform to. ]
[ The opinions expressed here may or may not be those of my employer ]
More information about the Comp.sys.att
mailing list