Gavin Robert Brewer wrote:
Matthew Sullivan wrote:
"Gavin R. Brewer" wrote:
Anyone know how to reverse engineer AMI-BIOS for example?
What ever you do, _DO NOT_ reverse engineer the AMI BIOS....
This is a VERY BAD thing to do, you will be infringing all sorts of licenses and copyrights if you generate code mbased upon the AMI BIOS.
hmm...thanx for the warning, but it sounds rather like a certain letter Bill Gates wrote to Homebrew Computer Club during the 70's.
Besides, who says someone can put a patent on algorithms?
The ideas is as fascist as it is oxymoronic.
Maybe it is but there was a lot of dicussion about BIOS's and reverse engineering and 'clean rooming' before on this list and if I remember rightly a list member having trained/part trained as a lawyer warned us about reverse engineering and copying of code.
If memory serves me the problem comes down to if you have read the code and any of the code matches the original it can be deemed that you have copied it... however if you have never seen/read the code and write the exact same instructions you can legally use it.... The hard part is proving how you wrote the code without seeing/reading the original...
Yours
Matthew