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<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4>I guess there is. I spoke with Corine today and
she said Dennis use to give out the codes. So yes, the code is out there
somewhere.</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4>Where is E-voice when you need it? E-voice was a
free voice mail services with tons of Dectalk groups on it. Out of all
those people I bet someone knew the codes.</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4>How the heck do we track it
down?</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4>SNOOPI</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT size=4></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV>In a message dated 2/27/2006 1:33:50 P.M. Pacific Standard Time,
ratguy@bellsouth.net writes:</DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid"><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>Hi,<BR>You mean, there is publicly available source code for
DECtalk?<BR>Jayson.<BR><BR>----- Original Message -----<BR>From: "Corine
Bickley" <corine.bickley@gallaudet.edu><BR>To: "'DECtalk Discussions'"
<dectalk@bluegrasspals.com><BR>Sent: Monday, February 27, 2006 11:29
AM<BR>Subject: Re: [DECtalk] new to the list<BR><BR><BR>Thanks for the
encouragement, Snoopi, but unfortunately I have no influence<BR>on Fonix
decisions.<BR><BR><BR><BR>I was thinking tho that we might be able to get
federal grant support<BR>(NIH-NIDCD) for such a project. Whoever thinks this
would be a good use of<BR>OUR tax dollars, please reply. If I can show enough
need for the project (to<BR>take publicly-available source code for DECtalk
and update it to run with<BR>current operating systems and be usable to
current screen readers and<BR>accessible devices), then we can show the need.
I'll volunteer to write the<BR>application, and have been able to get funding
for similar projects in the<BR>past, and I'd be extremely interested in making
this happen - IF enough<BR>users out there want it. Please let me know what
you think.<BR><BR>corine<BR><BR><BR><BR>-----Original Message-----<BR>From:
dectalk-bounces@bluegrasspals.com<BR>[mailto:dectalk-bounces@bluegrasspals.com]
On Behalf Of Dectalk@aol.com<BR>Sent: Monday, February 27, 2006 11:02
AM<BR>To: dectalk@bluegrasspals.com<BR>Subject: Re: [DECtalk] new to the
list<BR><BR><BR><BR>Well, Corine is on this list. When she reads that
this can be done, she'll<BR>probably call Fonix and scream for
permission. I've been trying to tell her<BR>that this could be done, but
Fonix says it can't. I know it can, I had<BR>friends crack and modify
other programs, even Windows professional. Illegal<BR>as you can get,
but we did it. So I laugh when Fonix says it can't be done,<BR>I know it
can.<BR><BR><BR><BR>I hope we get the go ahead, it would put Fonix back on
track.<BR><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR>SNOOPI<BR><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR>In a
message dated 2/27/2006 3:00:22 A.M. Pacific Standard
Time,<BR>shaun.e@xtra.co.nz writes:<BR><BR>What we could do is approach the
current owner of dectalk and ask them if we<BR>could hack the old code out of
either the old dectalk synths, or out of old<BR>software, say 4.3 and make
some open source mod bassed on that.<BR>We couldn't call that dectalk or
access 32.<BR>Probably open dectalk simular to open office or whatever
though.<BR>We could have someone set up something on sf.net.<BR>There
are loads of such opensource projects on linux, I don't see any<BR>problem if
we get permission to, if we just hacked the code and based on<BR>that made our
own synth.<BR>After they will not sell olded out dated software.<BR>At 09:52
p.m. 27/02/2006, you wrote:<BR>>Hi,<BR>>Let's not start World War III
about this, but here are a few more thoughts<BR>>on this.<BR>>First, if
you've ever seen the darker side of the net, you doubtless know<BR>>there
are people out there who just love to take popular
commercial<BR>software<BR>>packages and crack them. Copy protection
mechanisms are disabled,<BR>>registration key systems are bypassed or, if
not bypassed, a key generator<BR>>program is included so you can make up
your own key out of thin air. In<BR>>some cases, the crackers may
even have to disable sanity checks built into<BR>>the programs designed to
prevent just this sort of happening. Also there<BR>>are programs on
the market designed to encrypt executables so they can't be<BR>>cracked so
easily. E.G. you write a program that's going to bring
in<BR>>millions, run it through an encrypter program before putting it on
the<BR>>market so crackers either can't crack it at all or have to do lots
of extra<BR>>work to get the job done.<BR>>Also, I'm not saying that by
disassembling a program you get the original<BR>>source. You
don't. What you'd get is the machine code, probably
something<BR>>like assembly language for whatever microprocesser the
program was designed<BR>>for. Let's say you took the Apple II
Textalker program and disassembled<BR>it.<BR>>You'd most likely get 6502
machine code. Now Textalker may well have been<BR>>written in
Assembly, but the original source would probably have meaningful<BR>>label
names if not comments, and the developers of the original program<BR>>would
know, or would have known, how to make changes to their
version.<BR>With<BR>>a disassembled program you wouldn't get the meaningful
label names,<BR>comments<BR>>or anything, and you wouldn't have the
knowledge of the program's internal<BR>>structure that the original
developer had. But still, if you knew what you<BR>>were doing you
could probably modify the software, and you could certainly<BR>>find out
how certain things were done. In fact, the author of Cider
Press<BR>>did disassemble some copy protection code on some old Apple II
cassette<BR>>tapes to find out how it worked and how to circumvent
it.<BR>>As for the DECtalk software itself, I seem to recall that the
DECtalk PC<BR>>uses an 80186 processor and the Express uses an 80386.
Both have some type<BR>>of digital to analog convertor. So it might
not have been that difficult<BR>>for Digital to modify the software to run
under Windows, since I don't<BR>>assume they're emulating an old
board.<BR>>Jayson.<BR>><BR>>----- Original Message -----<BR>>From:
"Tony Baechler" <tony@baechler.net><BR>>To: "DECtalk Discussions"
<dectalk@bluegrasspals.com><BR>>Sent: Monday, February 27, 2006 3:22
AM<BR>>Subject: Re: [DECtalk] new to the list<BR>><BR>><BR>>>
Hi. I'm sorry, but I'll have to disagree with you here. First,
the<BR>>> point of compiling a program in the first place is so that the
source<BR>>> isn't easily apparent. If it was possible to just
randomly<BR>>> disassemble software, we wouldn't need the GPL, BSD,
Linux or any<BR>>> other open source project. I could just take
the Windows kernel,<BR>>> crack it, invent my own version and release it
as the free kernel or<BR>>> something. It obviously doesn't work
that way. Also, remember a<BR>>> previous discussion about
emulating the Echo on the Apple II? The<BR>>> problem is the same
in both cases. The Echo is a chip on a card that<BR>>> goes into
the computer. The DEC-Talk is a separate<BR>>> computer.
According to the manual, it has its own<BR>>> microprocessor. So,
even if they had the firmware, it wouldn't do<BR>>> them much
good. It's a nice thought though. Considering that it<BR>>>
keeps getting sold, it's no surprise to me that they don't have
the<BR>>> 4.40 source, or won't release it if they do. Personally
I would like<BR>>> to see a good, high quality open source synthesizer,
either using<BR>>> already existing hardware such as the DEC-Talk or
easily programmable<BR>>> software with good speech quality. I'm
not interested in what's<BR>>> already out there for free, it all sounds
like crap and won't sing<BR>>> very well if at
all.<BR>>><BR>>> At 08:12 PM 2/26/2006, you wrote:<BR>>>
>I also don't understand how Fonix could have lost the code. If the
only<BR>>> >copy is on a dead hard drive obviously they could send
the drive in to a<BR>>> >data recovery company if they still have it,
but those places are<BR>>expensive.<BR>>> >I mean, with the move
from Digital to Force and then from Force to<BR>Fonix,<BR>>> >you'd
think somebody somewhere would have something laying around.
I<BR>>have<BR>>> >the firmware version 4.2CD for the Express as
well as the DECtalk PC<BR>>drivers<BR>>> >which as I understand it
actually contain the DECtalk code which is<BR>>loaded<BR>>> >onto
the board at startup. And of course the 4.3 demo is available
at<BR>>the<BR>>> >archive. I don't know how to disassemble
the software, but bet the<BR>right<BR>>> >person who knew what they
were doing could do it and create machine code<BR>>> >from which new
equivalent source code for the lost versions could be<BR>>>
>recreated.<BR>>><BR>>>
_______________________________________________<BR>>> DECtalk mailing
list<BR>>> DECtalk@bluegrasspals.com<BR>>>
http://jaybird.no-ip.info/mailman/listinfo/dectalk<BR>><BR>>_______________________________________________<BR>>DECtalk
mailing
list<BR>>DECtalk@bluegrasspals.com<BR>>http://jaybird.no-ip.info/mailman/listinfo/dectalk<BR><BR><BR>_______________________________________________<BR>DECtalk
mailing
list<BR>DECtalk@bluegrasspals.com<BR>http://jaybird.no-ip.info/mailman/listinfo/dectalk<BR><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR>----------------------------------------------------------------------------<BR>----<BR><BR><BR>>
_______________________________________________<BR>> DECtalk mailing
list<BR>> DECtalk@bluegrasspals.com<BR>>
http://jaybird.no-ip.info/mailman/listinfo/dectalk<BR>><BR><BR>_______________________________________________<BR>DECtalk
mailing
list<BR>DECtalk@bluegrasspals.com<BR>http://jaybird.no-ip.info/mailman/listinfo/dectalk<BR></FONT></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV>
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