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1994-07-30
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Path: wupost!uhog.mit.edu!news.kei.com!MathWorks.Com!mvb.saic.com!eskimo!rwing!pat
From: pat@rwing.UUCP (Pat Myrto)
Newsgroups: alt.sources,comp.dcom.modems,comp.protocols.misc
Subject: Re: Other Unix Zmodems (was Re: zmtx/zmrx, zmodem implementation build from scratch)
Message-ID: <3639@rwing.UUCP>
Date: 28 Jul 94 07:12:36 GMT
References: <CtI6tx.8At@newsserver.aggregate.com> <CtL1KA.M7C@txnews.amd.com> <1994Jul27.101406.14692@omen.UUCP>
Organization: Totally Unorganized
Lines: 69
Xref: wupost alt.sources:11023 comp.dcom.modems:65017 comp.protocols.misc:3469
In article <1994Jul27.101406.14692@omen.UUCP> caf@omen.UUCP (Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX) writes:
>In article <CtL1KA.M7C@txnews.amd.com> aad@lovecraft.amd.com (Anthony D'Atri) writes:
>>> If this is an issue than kermit with good sized packets and
>>> sliding windows
>>
>>And non-quoted 8-bit chars.
>>
>>> on ftp: kermit.columbia.edu I believe. Kermit provides decent
>>> emulation on PC's and Mac's so it should make a usable replacement
>>> for any comm package a student would be using.
>>
>>It also has the advantage that at least one *working* implementation exists
>>for originating calls on Unix machines.
>
>Oh what words come from the keyboards of babes!
>
>Professional-YAM and a number of other packages supporting ZMODEM have
>been avaiable for Unix for years.
I believe the difference is that one is free, easily available (kermit),
the other, while nice as an xfer protocol, has a license that effectively
makes it unusable unless you want to shell out a lot of $$$. Things
like defining 'commercial use' as someone downloading a file from a host
that happens to charge a fee for accounts is just a ploy for saying
"you can't use zmodem for anything but sending to yourself" (even though
the protocol is supposed to be public domain), and trying to prevent
useful versions from being written by nitpicking on the code...
Another problem: Pro-YAM is available as BINARY ONLY (unless things
have changed), and was never available for my first platform years ago,
even though requests were sent, which were unanswered. This creates an
unwanted problem for a lot of people (Omen doesn't have quite the stake
that, say, Sun has in ensuring no 'unfriendly' code is present, so them
and Sun selling binary only aint the same thing), and carries a lot of
unnecessary baggage for situations where one only wishes to use some
other comm program besides Pro-YAM, or only wants to use the rz/sz part.
Pro-YAM is kinda big to load just to get zmodem. Be much better to have
a full-featured zmodem, WITH SOURCE, available for a reasonable price,
not 3 figures to just get a file xfer protocol. Face it, many users
are casual users and don't want to fight with a phone.t file to add
another site to dial, and much usage doesn't use the comm portion at
all.
Make source available, and without charging 3 arms and a leg, and you
will probably have more takers. That is what turned me off - absence
of source, and this big ... thing ... many times the size of an older
rzsz, just to get zmodem for one's preferred comm program that is
available for FREE, and with source. Also, the newer versions of rzsz
are deliberately crippled to deny that use, presumably to force people
to buy the 80 percent of unwanted baggage in Pro-YAM, *WITHOUT* source,
just to get zmodem). The real effect is to force one to purchase a
binary-only version of a comm program one does not want, just to get a
zmodem that will work with one's EXISTING (and preferred) comm program.
Or hack on an older one, and live without the features that are supposed
to make ZMODEM so great.
Not a good deal, IMO.
Its your code, you do what you want, but that is why one may be more
apt to find kermit than zmodem on a randomly picked site. Better to
use a slow protocol that is THERE, that will get the file xferred, than
to use a faster one that is unavailable because of what I (and I suspect
others, as well) consider unreasonable restrictions.
--
pat@rwing [If all fails, try: rwing!pat@eskimo.com] Pat Myrto - Seattle WA
"No one has the right to destroy another person's belief by demanding
empirical evidence." -- Ann Landers, nationally syndicated advice columnist
and Director at Handgun Control Inc.