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Sedoric rights

Posted: Wed Mar 11, 2020 6:19 pm
by Chema
A friend of mine is working on an Oric core for the Mist/SIDI. The machine works perfectly and he is now including Microdisc support.

He is planning to include sedoric (3 or 4, I am not sure which yet) in the release, so people have everything they need in package. I have no idea how this goes, as I don't have any of those FPGA solutions, but apparently people download and install the core along with disk images or something.

In any case, he has asked me about any possible copyrights still in placefor these operating systems. Does anybody have any information regarding this? If Sedoric 4 is copyright of CEO, could he get their permission?

Re: Sedoric rights

Posted: Thu Mar 12, 2020 2:01 pm
by Symoon
Sedoric 4 new functions were based on a POC I made yeaaaars ago, but didn't go far with including them into Sedoric 3 kernel (just worked on the DIR command and a beta MKDIR). Michel B. (still CEO member I suppose) later achieved the incredible task of completely programming it, and André C. heavily tested and made the Telestrat version (Stratoric 4).
I don't think any of use would have any problem with it being freely distributed.

Thing is, Sedoric 4 is based on Sedoric 3 (unless I'm mistaken, mainly by André C. with Ray McLaughlin's help), itself beign based on Sedoric 2 by Ray McLauhglin, itself being based on Sedoric 1 by Fabrice Broche and Denis Sebbag for Oric International. I can't recall any of the last two giving explicit permission for anything, but they clearly knew things were happening with Sedoric and never objected (Denis Sebbag visited the CEO meeting around 2004).

Here's the lineage ;)

Re: Sedoric rights

Posted: Fri Mar 13, 2020 9:05 pm
by coco.oric
Very impressive Symoon

Do you have an agenda with all your meetings, an archive with all the software variations ...
I want your knowledge in a 1000 pages book

(and shift, i wrote this message 3 times)

Re: Sedoric rights

Posted: Sat Mar 14, 2020 3:15 am
by Symoon
coco.oric wrote: Fri Mar 13, 2020 9:05 pm Very impressive Symoon
Thanks but not really, my memory is not very good: I forgot to mention that you helped (at least) in the screens translations and design for Sedoric 4, IIRC. Maybe you did some testing too?
Do you have an agenda with all your meetings, an archive with all the software variations ...
No, be carfeul! ;)
Especially these days where multiple cool things are happening (hardware or software), and my spare time being busy on other subjects right now.

Re: Sedoric rights

Posted: Sun Mar 15, 2020 6:06 pm
by Steve M
Dr Ray did Sedoric 1.7 through to 2.1. In those days it was shareware and anyone that registered got updates.
Sedoric used to be sent out with a cassette insert for Krillys to validate it being on the disk. Registered users got the manual by Jon Haworth and Allan Whitaker (who ran Oric Enthusiasts & HGC which registered Sedoric.)
It isn't clear to me how Allan Whitaker became the owner/ distributor of Sedoric (?)
The original manual was of course by Fabrice Broche (& Denis Sebbag.)

I'm not sure what issues of Sedoric there were from V1 to 1.6 ?

I tried to get in touch with Dr Ray about his titles and transferring things from OUM to Rhetoric. I did get a correspondence from him saying he wasn't really that interested in receiving funds for his work as it didn't amount to much. He was occupied with other work and seemed more interested in repairing old British motorbikes. (Old British bikes seem to need constant repair!)
Dr Ray had been rewriting the Byte Drive DOS and BASIC since about 86 with his own Word Speed and Compiler programs receiving regular updates.
Part of the reason for updates was the problems in the code that seemed to go unnoticed until release. BDDOS updates went out with the FORMAT command failing and elaborate instructions in how to use a previous version to format a disk - not ideal! Sedoric also had the odd glitch with Sectmap not working. I tried to get that sorted and the update wouldn't work either. I'm not sure how much attention Dr Ray had on the job you get the impression his enthusiasm was diminishing with each update. After over 20 years I think he wasn't interested any more.

Yes, André C did a rewrite for Sedoric 3. I'm not sure how much of the previous code he used(???) But it has become the standard version to use. It was sent out without Krillys insert and was never shareware, so it's hard to specify a copyright status but I think we can treat it as freeware.

I found the 'folders' in Sed4 to be more of an hindrance with files getting lost from view and becoming more difficult to get at. I haven't given it a fair trial but I think it'd take a lot to stop me using Sed3 as the default.

Re: Sedoric rights

Posted: Sun Mar 15, 2020 9:20 pm
by Chema
Thanks for your replies... I will send them to my friend. He is quite strict when talking about rights, and did not want to include a sedoric disk image if he was not sure it was ok.