[MonoDevelop] A dreadful story...

[Michel Salim]

On 07/09/2007, Peter Bradley <P.Bradley at dsl.pipex.com> wrote:
> Ysgrifennodd Michel Salim:
> > On 05/09/07, Chris Morgan <chmorgan at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >>> At worst, you could dual boot Linux and Windows. Many schools provide
> >>> Windows and VS for free or next to nothing.
> >>>
> >>>
> >> Or run Windows/development tools under VMware. VMware server is free afaik.
> >>
> >>
> > But cheap versions of Windows are specifically not licensed for
> > running under emulation. Sneaky marketing people, Microsofties!
> >
> >
> The stuff educational establishments provide for free are not
> necessarily the cheap versions.  Not in the UK, anyway (under CHEST).
> That's not to say they're licensed for running under emulation, though.
> Someone would have to check the license to find out.
>
Ah, quite true. I just remembered that the student bookstore here
sells Vista Business (under the Student Select Agreement), and members
of the CS departments actually get to download most Microsoft OSes for
research.

Here's what the Vista Business EULA say about virtualization:

f. Use with Virtualization Technologies. You may use the software
installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware
system. If you do so,
you may not play or access content or use applications protected by
any Microsoft digital,
information or enterprise rights management technology or other Microsoft rights
management services or use BitLocker. We advise against playing or
accessing content
or using applications protected by other digital, information or
enterprise rights
management technology or other rights management services or using
full volume disk
drive encryption.

The DRM restriction is surprising, but I guess they want to make it
harder for people to reverse-engineer the protection mechanism.

Now, two things:
1. in the USA, it's illegal to reverse-engineer any DRM technology
anyway (DMCA), unless you're doing it for data preservation reasons
2. In some countries (as Jacek mentioned) I wonder if it might not be
illegal to add restrictions like these.

-- 
Michel
>
> Peter
>
>