DirectX DevPak for Dev-C++ no longer available...

Murphy · Post by **Murphy** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 9:26 pm

So the DirectX DevPak for Dev-C++ is no longer available as it was determined to be unlawful since it was redistributing modified versions of the DirectX headers. Seems like maybe you could distribute diffs against the originals, but whatever.

Does anyone have thoughts on what to do about this? I doubt the version of Visual C++ that I have here is capable of compiling Irrlicht without some serious and painful changes...

And downloading the DX SDK wouldn't be a picnic either over this slow connection.

afecelis · Post by **afecelis** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 9:36 pm

check the devpaks repository:
http://devpaks.org/show.php?devpak=140

edited:
now I see what you mean, it links to MS site!!!

there's the DX8 devpak here:
http://www.c-view.org/soft/devcpp/packages/

but it's not the latest dx9, I know.

I know it's there somewhere, let me check my bookmarks

edited2: wow, I just read using DX9 devpak in gcc compilers is ilegal; since when?

afecelis · Post by **afecelis** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 9:44 pm

hahaaha, found one here!
http://sf.gds.tuwien.ac.at/d/de/dev-cpp/DirectX9.DevPak

get it before it gets deleted.

eXodus · Post by **eXodus** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 10:16 pm

Well if you're going to download illegal tools, you might as well get Visual Studio 2005 Beta off torrent sites.

Armen138 · Post by **Armen138** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 10:37 pm

how can using a different compiler be illegal?
thats eliminating the competition, isnt THAT illegal??

Spintz · Post by **Spintz** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 11:14 pm

I can see this debate getting ugly quick!

It probably has something to do with IP ( Intellectual Property ) and all that. The DX license probably says something about not modifying the code. It's not really snuffing out the competition, because you can always use OpenGL.

Best bet, IMO, would be to get the MSVC Toolkit to use DirectX, otherwise just use OpenGL.

condrula · Post by **condrula** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 11:59 pm

can devcpp work with the original sdk-microsoft?

Murphy · Post by **Murphy** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 1:40 am

It isn't that using DirectX with Dev-C++ is illegal. However, the DevPak itself is illegal. Lots of freely available code has a stipulation in the license that keeps you from redistributing it at all or redistributing modified versions of the files, and I think it's one of those which is causing the problem (most free software of any sort has limits on redistribution, actually).

So if you wanted to download the DX9c SDK and modify it to work with Dev-C++, you can. But I don't feel like downloading the full SDK over dialup. Nor do I particularly feel like messing with it to get it working.

The Visual C++ Toolkit 2003 is surely a possibility, but I was hoping to take this opportunity to give the latest Dev-C++ a proper test drive. Hmm.

Joe_Oliveri · Post by **Joe_Oliveri** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 2:52 am

What about us that all ready have it downloaded does that make our current project illegal?

Murphy · Post by **Murphy** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 6:52 am

Well, I wouldn't try to sell anything that uses it without talking to Microsoft about it. I'd imagine you'd have a hard time getting a satisfactory answer from them, though... probably better off to just tweak DX for mingw yourself.

Seems like while you can't redistribute modified DX files, you should probably be able to distribute diffs (patches) against the originals. I'm not a lawyer, but if you did a context-less patch set, you wouldn't really be redistributing any Microsoft code...

Eh.

As far as I know, though, Microsoft hasn't contacted ANYONE about any of this and it's been going on for quite a while. Has anyone heard differently?