Need to know parameter format for a Call function?

[Will1]

Can you tell me is it 16 or 32 bit exe files?

Tim S.

It is DOS 16 bit!

Wot - source code not included?! And whatever happened to ADAM, by the way? I thought you were going to upload the source for that too so that we could review it and offer up our expertise to possibly modernize/make-portable?

ADAM is an Access Method that I don't want to make public because the methodology is my trade secret. As far as Pro Football Prophet goes, it has a quite a few programs in it, all written in 16 bit DOS. If I can get ADAM (full features) converted to Windows32 I will be able to convert the Prophet to Windows32.

Anyone have any comments about (trying to run) Pro Football Prophet?

[Elkvis]

My advice:

Path A:
1. Copyright ADAM.
2. Get patents on the technology in ADAM, if it is unique and "novel" enough to qualify for one or more patent.
3. Draft a non-disclosure agreement, and use it to protect your intellectual property, while receiving assistance with its conversion to Win32/Win64/Linux.
4. Sell Win32/Win64/Linux version of ADAM to a large company with deep pockets.
5. Collect your profits and retire comfortably.

Path B:
1. Release ADAM under an OSI-approved open-source license (BSD and Apache are great licenses), making it clear that it is your intellectual property.
2. Get the world to help with its conversion to Win32/Win64/Linux.
3. Feel good about your contribution to the advancement of data storage and computing in general.

[stahta01]

It is DOS 16 bit!



ADAM is an Access Method that I don't want to make public because the methodology is my trade secret. As far as Pro Football Prophet goes, it has a quite a few programs in it, all written in 16 bit DOS. If I can get ADAM (full features) converted to Windows32 I will be able to convert the Prophet to Windows32.

Anyone have any comments about (trying to run) Pro Football Prophet?

Then as I tried to tell you in the past; 16 bit apps will NOT run under windows 64 bit without using a third party emulator like DosBox.
DOSBox - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Do you understand me this time? If not, I will give up on trying to help you; the communication gulf is just too wide!

Tim S.

[Will1]

Then as I tried to tell you in the past; 16 bit apps will NOT run under windows 64 bit without using a third party emulator like DosBox.
Do you understand me this time? If not, I will give up on trying to help you; the communication gulf is just too wide! Tim S.

Tim - I never said that a DOS 16 bit app would run on WINDOWS 64 bit. It runs on WINDOWS 32 bit in DOS mode which comes free with WINDOWS 7 and earlier. (Click "start" and then click on the "C:\_ Command Prompt") I don't think Pro Football Prophet, that I posted earlier, will run on Linux or Mac either. If you have WINDOWS 64 bit I guess you'll have to get a DOS emulator if you want to run Pro Football Prophet. Anything else you'd like to know?

Will

[Sebastiani]

ADAM is an Access Method that I don't want to make public because the methodology is my trade secret.

Only problem is, you have no chance of marketing this idea because you lack the skills and knowledge to do so! Of course, you could instead release it to the community as an open-source project and actually stand the chance of making some money off of it yourself. Or don't - there are plenty of decent database systems out there that already work on multiple platforms, right out of the box, so no big loss there...

[Will1]

My advice:

Path A:
1. Copyright ADAM.
2. Get patents on the technology in ADAM, if it is unique and "novel" enough to qualify for one or more patent.
3. Draft a non-disclosure agreement, and use it to protect your intellectual property, while receiving assistance with its conversion to Win32/Win64/Linux.
4. Sell Win32/Win64/Linux version of ADAM to a large company with deep pockets.
5. Collect your profits and retire comfortably.

Path B:
1. Release ADAM under an OSI-approved open-source license (BSD and Apache are great licenses), making it clear that it is your intellectual property.
2. Get the world to help with its conversion to Win32/Win64/Linux.
3. Feel good about your contribution to the advancement of data storage and computing in general.

Thanks Elkvis - good advice except that Path A: parts 1 and 2 are pretty well out because I wrote the "father" of ADAM on a mainframe back in the early 1970s. Two things happened while I was devloping the Father of ADAM. First I talked to a lawyer about patenting it. He informed me that software couldn't be patented at that time. (Sometime between then and now the government has allowed what are called methods patents to protect software methodology.) The lawyer recommended that I copyright it but I decided that not making the source code available to anyone was enough. A copyright doesn't protect a methodology from being copied. The second thing that happened was IBM came out with VSAM which, very closely resembled it. I may well have been the original designer of both ADAM and VSAM (see post 96). I made a small fortune off from the father of ADAM on mainframes but, as corporations migrated from IBM System 360s to System 370s it went obsolete, IBM gives VSAM away with it's Operating Systems and I couldn't compete with that price. Recently, one Assembly Language program developer said that he wouldn't sign a non-disclosure contract because it would bar him from ever developing any Data Bases in the future.

Path B sounds like it might work but what's to keep someone else from copying the methodology, say in C or C++?

I'd sooner ADAM not ever become available to the computer world than to have someone copy it and make a fortune. I would need a better license than you're talking about before I would make the source code available to anyone. Modern program developers should study up on how VSAM works and copy it as an Access Method for PCs. I don't think IBM has it patented becasue methods patents weren't available when IBM came out with VSAM and IBM never saw the future of the business coming so they even published the general methodology that VSAM uses. They assumed that the mainframe would "rule" forever. Probably their biggest ever mistake was allowing Bill Gates, who didn't write Dos, to sell it to others. Gates bought DOS for $5,000.00 from GE when he got the contract from IBM to supply an Operating System for IBM PCs. He copied the entire "Office" line of software from others. He also copied Netscape and called it Explorer. Anyway, ADAM is going nowhere unless I go with it.

Pro Football Prophet has my encryption method for the ADAM files that it uses and I'm convinced that no-one can break the encryption and figure out how ADAM works. (I guess I'm bragging when I say that ADAM methodollogy is better than VSAM methodology.) If you downloaded the Prophet, you can try to break the encryption method on the "RECORDS.NFL" file.

Will

[phantomotap]

If you downloaded the Prophet, you can try to break the encryption method on the "RECORDS.NFL" file.

O_o

I'm not a lawyer, and this comment is not offered as legal advice, but I'd advise everyone against that path.

This guy seems exactly like the sort of person who would use DMCA, or similar laws in other jurisdictions, to suppress/extort.

Soma

[Sebastiani]

Path B sounds like it might work but what's to keep someone else from copying the methodology, say in C or C++? I'd sooner ADAM not ever become available to the computer world than to have someone copy it and make a fortune. I would need a better license than you're talking about before I would make the source code available to anyone.

Sure, you can release the source as free for non-commercial use and require a paid license otherwise.

[Elkvis]

Path B sounds like it might work but what's to keep someone else from copying the methodology, say in C or C++?

That's the point of open source software. Let's be honest here. There's no way ADAM has any chance of seeing widespread use until it's converted to a programming language more people understand, and made to work on modern operating systems. When DOS was considered modern, I'm sure ADAM was right at home, but DOS is not state of the art anymore, and neither is assembly language. ADAM needs to change with the times, if you expect it to be competitive.

Gates bought DOS for $5,000.00 from GE when he got the contract from IBM to supply an Operating System for IBM PCs.

This is incorrect. Tim Patterson wrote 86-DOS, which was owned by Seattle Computer Products, and Gates, et al, purchased for $75,000 to sell to IBM. GE was never involved in the transaction.

I agree with Sebastiani on the licensing. Allow it to be used under an open source license for personal and non-commercial use, and require a paid commercial license for commercial use.

[Will1]

Sure, you can release the source as free for non-commercial use and require a paid license otherwise.

I already would offer ADAM to program developers for $250.00 but the problem is that Version 1.2 is a DOS 16 bit system, virtually already outdated. That wouldn't get you the source, just the .obj with a user's guide. You don't need the source to write programs that use it. Version 2.0, Windows 32 bit, which I'm working now on has 2 of the three .obj modules already working. It will be available under the same license, and cost. Of course, to developers who would like to try it, I'll provide it for a free trial period. There is a second license available where you can get ADAM for free and pay a % of the gross amount of revenue you generate from any use of it.

Will

[Sebastiani]

I already would offer ADAM to program developers for $250.00 but the problem is that Version 1.2 is a DOS 16 bit system, virtually already outdated. That wouldn't get you the source, just the .obj with a user's guide. You don't need the source to write programs that use it. Version 2.0, Windows 32 bit, which I'm working now on has 2 of the three .obj modules already working. It will be available under the same license, and cost. Of course, to developers who would like to try it, I'll provide it for a free trial period. There is a second license available where you can get ADAM for free and pay a % of the gross amount of revenue you generate from any use of it.

Will

No source? No thanks!

[Will1]

That's the point of open source software. Let's be honest here. There's no way ADAM has any chance of seeing widespread use until it's converted to a programming language more people understand, and made to work on modern operating systems. When DOS was considered modern, I'm sure ADAM was right at home, but DOS is not state of the art anymore, and neither is assembly language. ADAM needs to change with the times, if you expect it to be competitive.

True - see my previous post

This is incorrect. Tim Patterson wrote 86-DOS, which was owned by Seattle Computer Products, and Gates, et al, purchased for $75,000 to sell to IBM. GE was never involved in the transaction.

You may be right there, my source for what you quoted may have been mistaken about the price and source, but the point is that Bill Gates didn't write DOS, he bought it, and copied about all of the other software that MicroSoft sells. (I wonder how much Tim Patterson is worth? I'll bet he isn't a BBBillionare like Gates is. I'd rather end up broke than suffer the same fate that Patterson did.)

I agree with Sebastiani on the licensing. Allow it to be used under an open source license for personal and non-commercial use, and require a paid commercial license for commercial use.

Again, see my previous post.

Will

[Will1]

No source? No thanks!

Why would you need the source? (You don't get the source other software products but you use them!)

[phantomotap]

Why would you need the source? (You don't get the source other software products but you use them!)

O_o

Why don't you stop pretending to know what you are talking about?

As a developer, I wouldn't pay for any library from any developer without getting the source. By the way, you really should contact a lawyer. Giving people the code isn't a problem. People aren't paying for the code; they pay for the expertise behind the code. If you can't show that expertise, your product isn't worth the price even at free.

As a user:

abiword
aria2
audacity
bash
bc
bison
blender
bzip2
cdrtools
cinelerra-cv
clang
clonezilla
conky
curl
db
ddrescue
dia
dosbox
firefox
fsarchiver
galculator
gcc
gdb
geany
ghex
gimp
gnuplot
gpicview
gtkdialog
gucharmap
guile
gzip
htop
imagemagick
inkscape
less
lighttpd
lilyterm
lua
make
mariadb
mcomix
minidlna
nano
nitrogen
nxgl
openbox
openssh
parcellite
patch
pcmanfm
perl
postgresql
python
sed
slim
sqlite
sudo
tar
thunderbird
tint2
udisks2
unrar
unzip
usbutils
virtualbox
vlc
wget
which
xchm
xz
zathura
zip

Those are the application I've specifically installed on most of my machines.

I have the source code for every single one.

I will save myself the trouble of listening the related dependencies which would triple the list, but I have source for those as well.

[Edit]
As a matter of interest, that list includes "Berkeley DB", "Postgre SQL", "Maria DB", and "SQLite" because I went out of my way to install those database engines because some of my recent work involves "crossdb" programming.

Thanks to dependencies, I actually have four more engines installed on most machines.

I only bring this up because I have the source for eight database engines I use on several machines I maintain.
[/Edit]

Soma

[Will1]

O_o

Why don't you stop pretending to know what you are talking about?

As a developer, I wouldn't pay for any library from any developer without getting the source. By the way, you really should contact a lawyer. Giving people the code isn't a problem. People aren't paying for the code; they pay for the expertise behind the code. If you can't show that expertise, your product isn't worth the price even at free.

I guess you're saying that I didn't know what I was doing when I wrote ADAM, later Pro Football Prophet, and Snelling & Snelling's Temporary Employee data base. What is it that I've posted where I don't know what I'm talking about? Granted, Elkvis has given me some good information, but people like you, who rave about what I keep to myself, are certainly no help at all.

All you have to do with the prophet is download Pro Football Prophet, extract it into a folder with winzip, use the "C:\_" Command Prompt, and type in "football" to get the menu program to run. That, of course, assumes that you know how to use the Command Prompt. Otherwise you can use the more complex Windows "My Computer" Icon and eventually click the "football.exe" icon when you get the Prophet extracted into a folder.

Unless you use any Operating System than Linux you don't have the source code for it.

Have you downloaded Pro Football Prophet and tried it? You don't need the source to do that and you don't need the source for ADAM to use it. You just need the .obj modules and a user's guide.