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From: cross@spitfire.i.gajendra.net (Dan Cross)
Newsgroups: comp.os.vms
Subject: Re: VMS Pascal article
Date: Wed, 8 Jan 2025 13:08:29 -0000 (UTC)
Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and UNIX, NYC
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References: <vl3pi8$2r2sr$1@dont-email.me> <4fce5c9d3be918e8a00edccd228701713d4fd059@i2pn2.org> <vlkbr2$7tg$1@reader2.panix.com> <vlkf7f$2ejl5$2@dont-email.me>
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In article <vlkf7f$2ejl5$2@dont-email.me>,
Arne Vajhøj  <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>On 1/7/2025 6:02 PM, Dan Cross wrote:
>> In article <4fce5c9d3be918e8a00edccd228701713d4fd059@i2pn2.org>,
>> John Reagan  <johnrreagan@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>> On 1/7/2025 4:04 PM, Dan Cross wrote:
>>>> In article <73aedef89896db7fe5bc43b8d47a8560537c6a48@i2pn2.org>,
>>>> John Reagan  <johnrreagan@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>>>> [snip]
>>>>> I have a copy of Theo De Klerk's book on my bookshelf.  I did the
>>>>> technical review of that book (wow, that is a long time ago!)
>>>>
>>>> It looks like it would be a very nice reference; it's a that it
>>>> is no longer available.  I wonder if the author retained rights,
>>>> or if those lie with Digital Press?  If the former, perhaps the
>>>> electronic copy others mentioned might show up in the Internet
>>>> Archive's library or something similar.
>>>
>>> Good question.  My last email exchange with Theo was several years ago.
>>> I suspect that Digital Press (or who ever bought all of their IP) would
>>> still own the copyright to that version but could he provide an "almost
>>> final draft" for some archive in much the same way the C/C++ standard
>>> committees provide "drafts" of the standards to avoid copyright issues.
>> 
>> That would be very cool!  There aren't that many books about
>> OpenVMS out there, it seems; even fewer about application
>> development.  It would be great to have a few titles available.
>
>Once upon a time there were a reasonable number of of VMS books
>available - including about development.
>
>I have a list:
>    https://www.vajhoej.dk/arne/vms/books.html
>
>But most of them are both not available for sale any longer
>and not uptodate (either describe VMS VAX or VMS Alpha).
>
>Probably not enough market today. How many would buy a book
>about VMS Pascal development today? 25? 50? 100?

That's a good question; I have no idea how large the audience
for such things would be, but I suspect it would be small.

However, there's something to be said for written materials that
are in the detail level somewhere between general programming
books about, say, a language or data structures or something,
and the reference manuals for the languages.

I don't think I'm saying anything novel here, but if authors and
publishers are willing to allow some of these older titles to be
distributed electronically, that can start to bridge that gap.

	- Dan C.