TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

[nandelin]

Ten years ago I received an unexpected call from a federal judge ordering me to appear in his courtroom within two hours for an emergency hearing, petitioned by a former business partner of mine who was attempting to force me into relinquishing copyrights to software I created during our partnership, initiating a drawn-out law suit that I was totally unprepared for. Law suits are often a legalized form of extortion favoring the person with the most money, or the most hard-headed. Since that time, intellectual property law has been something of a hobby for me, and something that I feel everyone should be aware of if they create intellectual property for a living. It's good to keep in mind that authors are granted exclusive rights to use, copy, publish, display, perform, and make derivative works of their creative expression the moment that expression is fixed in a tangible form. Authors don't need to apply for a copyright. They don't need to publish their work in order to have a copyright. In the U.S., copyrights are granted by the US Constitution, and Title 17 of the US Code. Under US Code, employers are considered to be the authors of works created by employees within the scope of their employment, but most employers ask employees to sign agreements assigning all rights to them, just to be explicit. In the case of independent contractors, US Code grants all rights to them as literal authors unless they explicitly (in writing) assign their rights to their employers. It doesn't sit well with me that employees rights are inferior to those of independent contractors under the law but that's a tradition that goes a long way back, so my views don't get much sympathy. Earlier this year I was invited by Penton to write an article for their magazines, and they sent me their default agreement, which was written in lay-mans terms, but was basically asking authors to relinquish all rights to the publisher. I changed the agreement to grant a non-exclusive license to publish my article, but retained all copyrights myself, which they didn't have a problem with. So it's good to know what you're doing. Nathan.

[David Abramowitz]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

Ringer Software wrote: And if you are a contractor, everything you write for the client is property of your client, for the same reason. Software written under contract is the property of the contractor unless the contract specifies otherwise. (IANAL, but I do have one.)

[R.Daugherty]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

thanks for the insight, Hans. Hopefully things pick up quickly enough that consulting remote is an option. rd

[Guest.Visitor]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

Software written under contract is the property of the contractor unless the contract specifies otherwise. Yes, we all agree with that. I'm saying the reality is that big companies (IBM, Eli Lilly, Liberty Mutual, etc) have a contract that assigns rights to them, not the contractor. And you sign on the dotted line or you don't get your foot in the door. Chris

[Guest.Visitor]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

Well, plus most big companies make you go through a preferred vendor and preferred vendors make you sign a contract giving away rights to the code. If you say no, they just ask the next contractor in line. Chris

[David Abramowitz]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

I do not disagree with this statement. The operative words here are "most big companies". Almost all of my contracts have been with small caps. OTOH my personal experience is having done work for some very large firms on just a handshake. Dave

[SoftwareTrend]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

"do these companies pay you royalties for using YOUR code?" These are Iseries people and the work is maintenance work of customised apps written by myself (as an employee of the original vendor) and myself as a 13 year independent. I do create new programs etc and slap my copyright statement on the app but this is more to offer the potential to prohibit unlawful use down the track. There is another copyright holder involved so it would be messy anyway. I've never signed an employee contract nor a contracting contract in my entire 22 year career. That includes a period having to support SSA products - the king of contracts. A really lucky run. But the point of my original post was that there are still a lot of naive enterprises that do not understand the copyright laws in connection to programming services. The case I gave previously happened 3 years ago and involved a product with an existing user base. The contractor won the day.

[Guest.Visitor]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

Having to do with independent contract work (extensive) done over a two year period in which my invoices were routinely paid 7 - 8 weeks past delivery. This is unacceptable to most vendors and I parted with about 8 or 9 weeks pay outstanding. To encourage their prompt attention to the outstanding payment due, I reminded them that they were using copyright protected software without my explicit permission...Which I always assumed comes automatically with paid-in-full status. I received no rebuttal, just the check for the full amount about 3 days after that conversation. I honestly didn't expect to see anything because they knew I was a standalone without resources to jack them around in court.

[MCWebsite.Staff]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

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[J.Pluta]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

** This thread discusses the article: TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT **
Okay, I admit to being biased because this is showing up in RGP Developer, but this really is some cool code. The code itself is pretty impressive, showing how RPG can be just as powerful as any other modern language in developing complex algorithms. At the same time, I really enjoy some of your syntactical conventions, especially the consistent application of long name syntax in the D-sepc (the ... notation) even when the names aren't long. I think RPG programmers can take a good look at this and see how a sense of style can make your free-form RPG look really good. Joe

[H.Boldt]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

** This thread discusses the article: TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT **
Adam wrote: "Ever been jealous of your Perl programming colleagues with their built-in hash tables? Learn how to make your own using RPG!" Let's see how the example looks in Perl. I don't think Perl programmers will ever be jealous of their RPG colleagues. Cheers! Hans

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[H.Boldt]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

** This thread discusses the article: TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT **
Oh yeah, here's the same coded in Python. Cheers! Hans

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[A.Glauser]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

** This thread discusses the article: TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT **
Hi Hans, Of course it will always be easier and nicer to use hashes in a language with direct support for those constructs. However, IMO there are situations where such constructs would be useful in RPG, and having a less easy to use version is better than none at all. At the very least, it can be a good exercise to do something like this in RPG, if only to get thinking outside of our usual RPG paradigms.

[Guest.Visitor]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

** This thread discusses the article: TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT **
Hans, The point is, nobody at this jobsite uses, Python, or Perl but we control billions of dollars with RPG. If we wanted to know how to do this in either, we would Google it. Adam, thanks, for helping us push the RPG envelope. This is what I am talking about, bring it on. Let's take RPG where its never been before.

[H.Boldt]

TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT

** This thread discusses the article: TechTip: Create Hash Tables in RPG with the Dictionary ADT **
Adam: Did you consider implementing these functions using the independent index MI instructions? Cheers! Hans