Page 1 of 2

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 6:30 pm
by Einar Saukas
Joefish wrote: Thu Jun 06, 2019 3:11 pm Was it actually 'freeware'? Or was it just not paid for?
"Freeware" means "copyrighted but available for free". Therefore it's a program that has an owner, but others are allowed to use without paying for it.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 6:39 pm
by Joefish
Whatever your definition, there's still no automatic permission to re-distribute it in this way.
And I very much doubt the author has given such permission, since he has a newer version to sell!

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 6:42 pm
by Alessandro
Joefish wrote: Thu Jun 06, 2019 6:25 pm Just because you can download it for free doesn't make it 'freeware'.
You have no automatic right to host or distribute something that's someone else's copyright, however you obtained it.
I am sure as eggs is eggs that Jonathan made Spectaculator freely downloadable and distributable before he changed this policy with version 6.0. And even then, he kept it on his website for some time more, if my memory serves me correctly.

Anyway, I don't quite understand why we should be that much concerned about a Spanish website hosting a "development environment" including an old and superseded version of Spectaculator. The Web is filled with sites hosting "denied" Spectrum-related stuff (let alone the rest) about which we cannot do anything, and this isn't even the case.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 6:55 pm
by Einar Saukas
Joefish wrote: Thu Jun 06, 2019 6:39 pm Whatever your definition, there's still no automatic permission to re-distribute it in this way.
And I very much doubt the author has given such permission, since he has a newer version to sell!
It's everyone else's definition too.

For instance, Wikipedia:

Freeware is software, most often proprietary, that is distributed at no monetary cost to the end user.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 7:32 pm
by Einar Saukas
Anyway I'm a software author myself, also my work on ZXDB requires me to be aware of copyright implications all the time so we will never infringe on anything. Thus I obviously understand the concern about respecting other people's copyrights.

However let's also keep in mind the following points:

* Licenses cannot be changed retroactively. If v5.3 was released under a license that allowed free distribution, then the authors have the right to also release v5.3 again under a different license (then users will have 2 licenses to choose from), and the right to change the license for newer versions. But they cannot "invalidate" the original license for v5.3. Otherwise imagine you downloaded a free program, checked the license to ensure you have the right to use it for free, start using it... then you suddenly get sued for using it without paying because "surprise they changed their license yesterday!".

* The copyright owners have the right to impose whatever conditions they want on distribution of their freeware programs. But they made these programs available for free without imposing any distribution restrictions, it's implicit that it can be distributed freely. I believe that's the case with v5.3.

Besides these legal points, in practice Jonathan is not even maintaining the commercial version of Spectacular anymore, so I very much doubt he would bother about someone distributing the very old v5.3 that he used to freely distribute himself anyway.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 8:16 pm
by Ralf
30 seconds long search reveals this:
https://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/discussion/2214/
Spectaculator is being distributed as freeware (although donations are
welcome) and can be obtained from http://www.spectaculator.com/
So yes, older version were freeware.
I can imagine that people hosting these versions in 2019 may "hurt" Jon's business a bit. Actually
most of folks probably just want to play their few favourite games from childhood and they can do
it perfectly well using older versions so why pay?

But we can say the same about every other free emulator ;)

Personally I purchased Spectaculator long ago and I'm really happy with my money spent. I used it
for countless hours and it very rarely let me down.

Today it's getting a bit old without any updates for years but still not obsolete in any way. If
I remember correcly it's also cheaper nowadays than it used to be - 15$ vs 30$ if I remember correctly.
So if you hesitate my advice is "buy it" :)

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 9:01 pm
by Joefish
Einar Saukas wrote: Thu Jun 06, 2019 7:32 pm * The copyright owners have the right to impose whatever conditions they want on distribution of their freeware programs. But they made these programs available for free without imposing any distribution restrictions, it's implicit that it can be distributed freely.
No, it's not. You don't assume any rights over someone else's copyright material that you aren't explicitly granted.
You have no right to publish someone else's work unless they specifically grant it to you.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 10:39 pm
by djnzx48
Yay, another copyright thread!

I did find this from 2004, it only mentions CD-ROM distribution though:
It says, basically, you can't distribute it on a CD-ROM without express written permission from myself (even if you don't charge for it).

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Thu Jun 06, 2019 11:29 pm
by Stefan
Just found the installer for Spectaculator 5.3 which states:
License Agreement:
------------------------
This Software Product may be freely used, copied and distributed as long as it is not sold, and all original files are included, including this license. You are NOT allowed to make a charge for distributing this Software Product (either for profit or merely to recover your media and distribution costs) whether as a stand-alone product, or as part of a compilation or anthology, without explicit prior written permission. By using this Software Product, you agree to these terms and the terms of the Disclaimer below:
So while this may not have been the intention, the license explicitly states that it may be distributed as long as there is no charge.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 6:53 am
by PeterJ
Well found [mention]Stefan[/mention]

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 7:15 am
by djnzx48
However, it does require that the license be included, which this distribution does not.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 7:49 am
by Stefan
djnzx48 wrote: Fri Jun 07, 2019 7:15 am However, it does require that the license be included, which this distribution does not.
Agreed.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 8:51 am
by Alessandro
At the cost of repeating myself, I'll state it again: this whole affair is none of our concern. SC has already so many troubles trying to achieve authorization to host software on itself to keep track of what others are doing.

It should be an act of courtesy - not an obligation since we are not talking about explicitly "denied" software - of those who run the website hosting that development environment to ask Jonathan himself about an outdated, and freely distributable as far as we know, version of his emulator being included in that package.

Arguing about what other people should do on their own websites and/or with their own software is just pointless.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 10:36 am
by Ralf
Arguing about what other people should do on their own websites and/or with their own software is just pointless.
Arguing about copyrights is mostly pointless.
Some people in such threads are always trying to be more catholic than the pope. You distributing some old freeware emulator without
attaching the license? You very,very bad man ;)

My advice is - if you want to live by very high moral standards, do it. But don't impose your vision on others, especially in area of retrogaming.
After all , most of of us copied games form tape to tape and downloaded them from internet when it became possible ;)

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 11:07 am
by Joefish
It's about respecting other people who are still developing.
Exploiting and disrespecting actual contributors is a sure-fire way of ensuring there will be no more contributions.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 5:20 pm
by PeterJ
Joefish wrote: Fri Jun 07, 2019 11:07 am It's about respecting other people who are still developing.
Exploiting and disrespecting actual contributors is a sure-fire way of ensuring there will be no more contributions.
I would suggest that we do far more than any other site to respect copyright. For example we spent a considerable amount of time discussing, developing, and implementing a whole new system to add custom text on download sections for titles like your own. The other main download site that hosts Buzzsaw+ has never offered this. We have rights to host Zenobi titles because we care about developers and add custom text for them too.

There are many sites out there that have 1000s of titles for loads of systems, make a fortune from advertising and don't give a monkeys about copyright. Do we all get together and try and close these down? Where are the mass protests?

Regarding Spectacular 5.3 (out of interest version 8 was released in 2012, and I don't believe there has been any active development of the Windows version since this time) on it's own with the license in the installer is fine to paste here. The development environment just needs to add a text file with the license, and a copy of it in their documents.

We argue about copyright every few years (we seem to be in a forever loop, and this always holds us back), and ignore the awful stuff the rest of the internet is doing. I'm not even going to mention the Vega+ and the amount of money they took from the community and never paid to copyright owners or donated the promised sums to charity

We have no advertising, no commercial interest and don't actively request donations (this may change in the future), and don't charge for access to the site. We just want the Spectrum to survive for generations to come.

Sorry for the rant.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 6:21 pm
by Joefish
This was never meant as criticism of how Spectrum Computing is run.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2019 6:31 pm
by PeterJ
Joefish wrote: Fri Jun 07, 2019 6:21 pm This was never meant as criticism of how Spectrum Computing is run.
OK. Apologies for my misunderstanding.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Sat Jun 08, 2019 7:25 am
by ZxSpence
Personally I count 14 angels on the head of your average pin.

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Mon Jun 10, 2019 9:58 pm
by Bedazzle
Ralf wrote: Thu Jun 06, 2019 10:02 am Thr trick is that they aren't using Spectaculator 8.0 :D
Does it really need to be tied to SC, and not to any other (or any) emulator?
There are pair with more-less active authors, why not to collaborate with recent really free software (not sure about ROMs)?

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Tue Jun 11, 2019 9:02 pm
by eurocamsuite
I would like to thank all the users for their opinions on the cross-development environment DEVASM-Z80, which integrates only completely free tools (Freeware), for their contributions regarding the legal use of this software.

In this sense I want to declare that the Spectaculator legal license has been included since today (you can download it) in all the download links of the DEVASM-Z80 package as well as the SPECTACULATOR 5.3 emulator

Likewise, I take this opportunity to record in the present forum that on June 11, 2019 I have applied for express authorization for use in DEVASM-Z80 to the SPECTACULATOR author, Jonathan Needle.

In the case that the author pronounces in a negative sense regarding the authorization, I will be forced to modify the environment using another emulator.

Best regards and thanks to all!

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Wed Jun 12, 2019 8:38 am
by PeterJ
Fantastic [mention]eurocamsuite[/mention]

Re: DEVASM-Z80 - Cross Development Environment in Assembler for ZX-Spectrum based on PASMO

Posted: Tue Jun 25, 2019 1:37 am
by Turrican
Thank you very much for that! :)