RE: RPG Code on the NET

<snip>
>Incidentally, my program for implementing page ranges on remote outqueues
>that I thought was obsolete but a couple of people have since expressed an
>interest in, was originally sent as freeware to a group that were going to
>host an AS/400 shareware/freeware page, but now seems to be lost. If I
>manage to recover it you can have that too.
<snip>

I have already shared the utility I cobbled together for implementing page
ranges on remote outqueues with a few other people on this list.  I am willing
to share it with the larger audience here, however, 90% of the code originated
from a News400 published utility, "Copying Partial Spooled Files" (CPYPTLSPLF)
NEWS/400, May 1997.

How do the copyrights apply in this situation?  News400's utility strictly
copied portions of a spool file to a database and was not used to _print_ a
pagerange.  Perhaps I should ask News400 if they'd put it on their shareware
site, or maybe I just need to include mention in all the source of where the
original code came from?  (Already there.)

I am all for sharing code.  I am in agreement with others that it would be best
to avoid having millions of sites with a few snippets.  As I understand it, we
do have the option of putting these on News400's shareware site (maybe
MidrangeComputing, too?).  I haven't been there in awhile, so I can't remember
all the details.

BTW, Frank, you seemed to rip on those who desire to profit on sharing their
code.  If I misinterpreted, I apologize.  However, "free enterprise" & "supply
and demand" are basic Economics 101 principles.  Is anyone going to pay me $20
for my super-duper date routine?  No (well, at least, I don't think so...);
anyone can build one.  I would be happy to share it.  What if I've got a
(large?) snippet of code that took hundreds of hours to develop, test, debug,
etc. and saves your company thousands of dollars in manhours from having to
re-invent the wheel?  Well, I haven't done anything like that (yet), so I don't
know what I'd do.

When I shared the pagerange utility with the others here, I had to take a few
hours over the course of a few days to package it so that it could be emailed
and "re-assembled" by the recipients.  Had to document how to do that.  Things
like this take time.  So don't be discouraged by the lack of response so far.
Along with others, I think you should give it (your web site) more time.

And, again, as others have mentioned, we have to be careful about who actually
owns the code we write.  If I have to genericize something down in order to
share the code, that's more time I have to spend away from my family.

And ditto the advice others have already shared.

- Dan Bale





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