"parallel port interface cable"

[Bruce Plecan]

----- Original Message -----
From: Mike Wesley <mwesley at mediaone.net>
To: <gmecm at efi332.eng.ohio-state.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, November 30, 1999 9:14 AM
Subject: Re: "parallel port interface cable"


| I think
| > that some of us who have posted up copies of chip maker's bins for
| > discussion is a questionable/acceptable area and is just part of the
fact
| > that this small group enjoys the challenge to discuss, debate and
improve or
| > maybe sell their efforts to a few friends, and this is not enough to
compete
| > with the national advertisement aftermarket chip tuners have and the
| > exposesure it brings them.
|
| This brings up a good point. It is illegal to distribute copies of chips
| (.bin or .hex) that contain a program from an GM ECU. It's illegal to
| sell them also.
| Is GM going to do anything about it?

Actually the early ecm information (code etc) was suposed to be released
into the public domain, but the EPA, and GM have been sniping about it for
like 15 years now.  It was supposed to make diagnostics tools an open
market, so that no car manufacturer risked violating any anti-trust laws.
But, pay enough lawyers long enough and nothing gets done, other than making
the lawyers rich.  Oh well such is life.
Grumpy
 Probably not..they would have done
| so by now. When I 1st started selling Ford chips, Ford took me to
| federal court. Not fun but both Ford and I learned a few things. Oh,
| they lost BTW. They still from time to time poke thier head in and tell
| me I better watch what I'm doing. Scary stuff.
|
|
| > This is truly a gray area at times and we
| > should all just bare with it the best we can.  By the way, I own a legal
| > copy of Diacom Plus and have paid for upgrades along the way and do
enjoy
| > this fine product (though they have made little improvements to it other
| > than to access more cars each year), how bout someone bust the software
and
| > sell upgrades and improvements/corrections for it that is has needed for
| > years, I know I have found flaws that were not resolved by Rinda? (now I
| > started something ;-}.  Enjoy your ride.
| >
|
| I also have a Diacom setup and don't really care for it (better to grab
| data right from the bus). I could legally reverse engineer the software
| and the cable and there's not much Rinda could do about it. Even if
| Rinda had 'secret codes' in the code that were only used by the Diacom
| software and were the key to getting the whole thing to work, you could
| put those into a 'hack' version and Rinda still couldn't do anything
| about it (Sega v. Accolade).
| I looked at the communication between the Diacom and a ECU...nothing
| special. Somebody with some time (which I don't have) should be able to
| make a 'hack' version.
|
|
| I hate/love copyright violation laws. On one side, I write software and
| make hardware to calibrate ECU's in realtime. It pisses me off to no end
| when somebody hacks my stuff to make something else. But on the other
| hand, I make my living by reverse engineering other people's stuff (OEM
| ECU's) which is protected by law. Damn double edged sword.
|
| Mike....
|