Posting Operating Manuals

[Nitra]

What are the forum rules if you want to post a pdf of an operating/maintenance manual that someone wants ?

Generally this will apply to obsolete equipment and schematics and so on would be included.

Is there any issue with IP or copyright issues ?

Is there a central public area where I can dump the files.

Advice appreciated.

TY

[tggzzz]

There are probably better places to put such manuals. http://www.ko4bb.com/getsimple/index.php?id=manuals http://www.lost-manuals.com/ spring to mind but there are others.

[Cerebus]

Another point is there are upload limits on the forum. Most manuals that have been scanned exceed this limit, and older manuals tend to be scans rather than originated as PDFs. I've emailed manuals to forum members that ask for them but it's much better if stuff makes its way to KO4BB or one of the other well known archives.

[dnwheeler]

Archive.org is also a great place to share/find old manuals.

[tooki]

What are the forum rules if you want to post a pdf of an operating/maintenance manual that someone wants ?

Generally this will apply to obsolete equipment and schematics and so on would be included.

Is there any issue with IP or copyright issues ?

Is there a central public area where I can dump the files.

Advice appreciated.

TY

For what it’s worth, people post PDFs of manuals here all the time in comments. I haven’t heard of it being problematic. But I do agree that, especially if it’s one that’s never been online before, be sure to upload it to the various repositories in the comments above. It’s a huge help to others!

[iainwhite]

Another handy repository is the one at  https://doc.xdevs.com/article/

This is run by forum user TiN -> TiN

[Zero999]

Uploading manuals or data sheets to this site, may be a breach of copyright, but if the creator of the material doesn't notice or care, then nothing will happen and if they do, Dave will receive a letter telling him to take it down, or face legal action. So far, I've not heard of Dave facing any legal issues due to copyright infringement.

[Ian.M]

OTOH that's more aggro for Dave, and in https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/forum-rules-please-read/ it explicitly states:

6) No sharing of commercial copyrighted material is allowed. i.e product firmware files for hacks.

So IMHO any manual etc. posted here should either *CLEARLY* be in the public domain, or be accompanied by a release from the copyright owner permitting its redistribution.

Of course if the original company is long defunct and the copyright owner is untraceable, its likely to slide 'under the radar', and limited quoting that can be defended as 'fair use' is also unlikely to cause a problem, but if Dave or his admin team have to take official notice of a posted file, they aren't going to be happy and odds are, neither will you be.

TLDR Don't post in-copyright material on a US hosted, Australian administered site without written permission.