PE>>> ; There is no sign of a copyright on this program on the boot sector,

 RS>> Doesnt have to have one.

 PE>> True since the Berne convention.

 RS> You appear to be saying that you think it must have one since then.
 RS> Thats not correct. There are advantages in having one, but its not a
 RS> simple absolutely must have.

No, the other way around.  Before the Berne convention you required an
explicit copyright notice (spelt in full "copyright", or a c with
a circle around it, and (c) wasn't good enough).  Now you get copyright
over something whilst you're typing it!

 PE>>> ; and anyhow disks are bought pre-formatted,

 RS>> Some are, some arent. And preformatted floppys dont have a full MBR
 RS>> anyway usually. And even if they do, says absolutely nothing about
 RS>> copyright.

No floppies have MBRs.

 PE>> No floppies have MBR.  They only have boot sectors, not MBR.

 RS> If you have a bootable floppy, it boots in pretty much the same way as a
 RS> hard disk does. It does not have a partition table, but the executable
 RS> code and bios parameter block are still there in the first physical
 RS> sector.

You are confusing (MBR = master boot record) with "boot record". 
Floppy disks have the latter, not the former.  Hard disks have both.

 PE>>> ; and even if they weren't, I don't think the output from
the "format"
 PE>>> ; command is copyrightable.

 RS>> Of course it can be. Just like the output of FORMAT A:/S causes
 RS>> copyrighted components of DOS to be written to the floppy.

 PE>> Intact copies.  There's no 512-byte program visible anywhere.

 RS> There doesnt need to be. Code in roms is copyrighted, even without a
 RS> copyright notice, tho it does simplify things if there is a copyright
 RS> notice.

Ok, so I wrote a "hexdump" program.  Presumably I can say the
output of the hexdump program is copyrighted by me?

 PE>>> ; Also, I've never heard of anyone who was given a formatted blank ;
 PE>>> disk charged with pirating software.

 RS>> Thats not a bootable floppy. Technically a bootable floppy certainly
 RS>> is. Tho thats not generally considered to be a hanging offense. Thats
 RS>> a completely separate argument to copyright tho.

 PE>> I didn't say a bootable floppy, I said a formatted blank disk.

 RS> Sure, I realise that. I was saying that a bootable floppy certainly is. A
 RS> non bootable floppy has bugger all code in the first sector, just enough
 RS> to put up the 'non system disk' error message. Its certainly arguable if
 RS> that is copyrighted code and even if it is, I cant see anyone making an
 RS> issue of it. But you were discussing the MBR, the boot code, so obviously
 RS> a non bootable floppy isnt relevant anyway.

No, I was discussing the boot record, and a formatted blank floppy
certainly has one of them.

 PE>> And a formatted blank disk DOES have a boot record on it.  ie type in
 PE>> "format a: /u" and then take a look at the first sector.

 RS> I never said it doesnt, in fact said it does.

 PE>> Go on Rod, admit you're wrong!

 RS> Getting pretty desperate now. You say higher up in your message that the
 RS> floppy does not have an MBR, now you say it has a boot record. MBR
 RS> stands for Master Boot Record. Funny that.

Yes, I made both statements, and both are correct.  Your acronym
explanation is correct as well.

 PE>> It is in fact what causes the message "non-system disk,
please insert
 PE>> another" to come up on the screen when you try to boot a formatted
 PE>> blank floppy.

 RS> Thats supposed to be news to me ?  I must have first seen it there well
 RS> over 10 years ago. Way back in the days before there was any of Nortons
 RS> stuff around to help with recovery of damaged floppys. In fact back in
 RS> the days before hard disks, when you had to boot off the damned floppy.

Which had to be hand-cranked too, right?  And you tell that to the kids
today, and they don't believe you!

 PE>> Not to transmit the disassembled form electronically though.

 RS> Thats crap too. You are perfectly entitled to do that on a variety of
 RS> grounds. For example if you are writing an article which shows people
 RS> how to patch THEIR OWN copy of some software that they have bought
 RS> legally, like DOS, you are perfectly entitled to have say a page of
 RS> disassembled code which shows what a particular bit of code does so the
 RS> people can patch their own variant. Say if they want to patch their DOS
 RS> to set the default background and foreground colors.

Ok, I'm not allowed to transmit lock, stock and barrel, someone else's
copyrighted code.  Which I don't think I've done, but I can't be sure. 
Thanks for your comments to EVIBM002.TXT BTW, I will update it this
weekend. BFN.

Paul

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