Scott, (01)
I wanted to update you on the progress of the Augment project and
request an introduction to your counterpart at BT. (02)
The software side of the project is making great progress. I
mentioned earlier that we got a clone of Augment running on a DEC 20
emulator that one of our team members had written. We now have the
early Augterm (x86 assembler), and later Visual Augterm (Digitalk
Smalltalk) running, and are working on a new Java based version that
can run as an applet. At this point, we're going through the system
to catalog its contents while we work through the legal issues. We'd
like to release the system to the community sometime in the first
quarter of 2006. (03)
The project is starting to have a hardware aspect, which is something
I never anticipated. A number of people have Augment related
hardware in their garages and attics, and are willing to give them to
a good home. We recently acquired a couple of the original chord
keysets and mice, and are trying to interface them with
Augterm/VAT. We're in the process of acquiring several other pieces
of equipment. One is the original, wire wrapped 4004 based "line
processor" used to communicate between the DEC-20 and the DM2500
terminal, together with a complete set of schematics. Another is a
DM2500 terminal. I'm also on the trail of the original DEC-20 used
by Doug's group at SRI-ARC. One of my hair-brained ideas is to bring
up a complete hardware system to run in parallel with the software
emulation, and we're getting close to doing that. (04)
On the legal side, Sally Abel, a CHM board member and IP attorney who
has been working with us, went back to Kathy Gallagher, the in-house
lawyer at Boeing to ask for a quitclaim. Sally was surprised when
Kathy refused to do this. According to Sally, Kathy is convinced that
Boeing assigned all those rights to BT. She bases here understanding
on the fact that she saw a trademark assign to BT, and that someone
in the company who was involved with the BT sale says all rights were
transferred to BT. Kathy feels it would be bad faith on Boeing's
part to execute a quitclaim under the circumstances. Kathy also said
Boeing has no intent of coming after the Museum for using the
software/marks. I've asked Sally to have Kathy send a memo containing
these facts, since it's the best we're likely to get. Can you think
of any other avenues we should pursue? (05)
I know you said that you have only a casual acquaintance with the CIO
at BT, but I'd appreciate it if you could make an introduction. I
located a 2001 article in CIO magazine that gave his name as Jason
Compton. Is he the one that you're acquainted with? Several other
people on the project are following indirect connections to people at
BT, but I'd like to move this along more quickly through discussions
at the appropriate level. Thanks in advance for your help with this. (06)
Best regards, (07)
Philip Gust
Nouveau Systems, Inc. (08)
phone: +1 650 961-7992
fax: +1 520 843-7217 (09)
mailto: gust@NouveauSystems.com (010)
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