MAME Released Under OSI-Compliant, FSF-Approved License (mamedev.org) 41
New submitter _merlin writes: MAMEdev just announced that MAME (formerly Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator) is now entirely available under OSI-comliant, FSF-approved licenses. The project as a whole is available under the GNU General Public License, version 2 (GPL-2.0), while individual source files are available under BSD-3-Clause, LGPL-2.1 or GPL-2.0 (all compatible with GPL-2.0). Over 90% of the code, including core functionality, is available under the BSD-3-Clause license.
Whatever happened to... (Score:2)
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https://xkcd.com/927/ [xkcd.com]
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Politics. People don't agree on what constitutes "open source". Funny that.
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It's currently available UNDER "OSI-comliant, FSF-approved licenses"
It used to be available OVER "OSI-comliant, FSF-approved licenses"
I hate having to repeat everything for everyone. Listen the first time.
And what the fuck does "comliant" mean?
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And what the fuck does "comliant" mean?
It means that it comlies with their requirements.
Re:What was it before? (Score:4, Funny)
Wow I got moddeded down. Why not comlain to me in erson rather than hide behined mod oints?
Re: What was it before? (Score:5, Informative)
It was previously a license based on the BSD-3-Clause license with additional terms prohibiting commercial use, distribution alongside unauthorised ROM images, and certain kinds of derivative builds. This caused it to fall afoul of OSI and FSF rules. It also tended to hurt potential legitimate users (e.g. rights holders wanting to re-release classics) while doing nothing to stop software pirates and arcade game bootleggers.
This change also makes it easier for other F/L/OSS projects to leverage MAME code, and may help get MAME accepted by F/L/OSS software distribution services (such as main package repositories for major Linux distributions).
Note that MAME is a registered trademark, and the are still restrictions on use of the MAME name, logo and wordmark.
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As it is "just an emulator", like DOSBox or any similarly-created programs, and doesn't bundle ROMs itself (nor condone misuse of licensed ROMs or unlicensed ROMs at all), having that be the blocker to their inclusion in mass-market products like Linux or, indeed, things like Steam games created by the original companies (e.g. Atari, etc.), it does seem to be a sensible move.
"apt-get install mame" should be possible. It doesn't do anything, or allow anything, that "apt-get install dosbox" didn't.
And now th
Re: What was it before? (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, ten months of tracking people down and wrangling agreements. In the end a small amount of code had to be removed for the rare cases where authors couldn't be contacted. However we think it's effort well spent.
Re: What was it before? (Score:2)
Leverage? You mean use.
Re: What was it before? (Score:3)
Hey in my day job I'm a CEO of a financial services company, so I get paid per buzzword. Gimme a break!
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Hopefully the BSD licensed version continues to see development and the GPL version is ignored.
Why would they downgrade the license?
Re: What was it before? (Score:5, Informative)
Most of the source is BSD-licesnsed while parts are [L]GPL. The entire emulation/scheduling core is BSD, so if you want to take advantage of that to make your own emulator, go right ahead. However if you're in it for the games, some rather widely used sound cores in MAME are under GPL, so you can't go closing them up.
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Why would they downgrade the license?
Translation: Waah waah stuff people are giving me for free isn't exactly to my liking!
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You don't understand the difference between GPL and BSD but felt the need to fart in the forum?
Exactly what I expect of you!
Re: What was it before? (Score:3)
MAME was never BSD-licensed: it was BSD plus additional restrictions. This made it impossible to use MAME code in a GPL project, or to use [L]GPL code in MAME, without first securing a license exception for the code in question. The vast majority of the code in MAME is now BSD-licensed. However since some code is now [L]GPL-licensed, binary distributions of the entire project fall under the GPL.
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You don't understand the difference between GPL and BSD but felt the need to fart in the forum?
I understand the difference perfectly. I also understand that you're whining that people doing stuff in their spare time are doing it not to your liking.
Whine whine give me your stuff for freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee whine.
Re: What was it before? (Score:3)
We failed to contact people who contributed under these names:
Edgardo E. Contini Salvan
insideoutboy
Ralf Schaefer
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Coming soon:
* Lion's MANE gaming system.
* Badly MAIMED arcade emulator.
* Free MAIN game emulator.
In all seriousness, I'm happy to see the change. I ran a mid-sized arcade for a few years, and was acutely aware of how expensive it was to keep diagnosing and repairing the decades-old systems. It's blindingly obvious how very much cheaper (in maintenance AND electricity!) it would be to replace
Don't care, wish they would focus on playability (Score:1)
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That's what all the other emulators are for. And quite a few of them exist, even MAME spin-offs designed for nothing more than performance, ease of setup, and game compatibility.
I don't know where you've been looking, but they are everywhere. It's like complaining that Debian is too "pure" when there are a million spin-off distros based on it that aren't, and some of them more popular than the original.
MAME have always stated that their aim is preservation and accuracy of emulation of old games. Not for
Re: Don't care, wish they would focus on playabili (Score:5, Informative)
We're doing plenty to improve the user experience of MAME. We recently integrated the MEWUI user interface code, giving better system selection and configuration from within MAME. MAME now supports UI localisation. We added "autofire" features.
New APIs are supported depending on your host OS including CoreAudio, Xaudio2 and Xinput, for lower latency and support for newer peripherals.
The Direct3D renderer has supported CRT simulation for a while, and the OpenGL renderer supports pluggable filters. But the new cross-platform BGFX renderer will support all that and more with a clean, data-driven approach in an upcoming release. We're also looking to integrate code from GroovyMAME to support people using MAME in arcade-style cabinets and with CRT monitors.
But most importantly, the emulation keeps getting better, leading to more playable games and usable emulated computers. For example recently MAME became the first emulator to properly support the Zaccaria classics Cat and Mouse and Laser Battle (licensed to Midway as Lazarian) with correct colours, full video effects and sound. MAME also recently added the very rare Korean games 96 Flag Rally and Philko Lock On. MAME's support for the historically significant Osborne 1 computer got a lot better last year, including proper memory banking and support for the SCREEN-PAC add-on.
MAME's slot system allows emulation of many peripherals and add-ons that other emulators can't handle. Things like add-on procesor cards for the Apple II, or the IBM PGC.
This is only possible because MAME has a flexible emulation core and a huge library of well-tested cores for emulating CPUs, video hardware, sound chips, and other devices.
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Re: Don't care, wish they would focus on playabil (Score:5, Informative)
If you just want to play NAOMI/Atomiswave games, you're better off using DEmul. It attempts to map PowerVR onto D3D and has a recompiling SH4 core. MAME doesn't come close to that performance. However DEmul uses the MAME CHD format for GDROM images and uses MAME-documents disc/ROM dumps, and the DEmul developers share findings with the MAME team and vice versa. MAME research/technology contributes to non-MAME emulators all the time.
There are issues with encryption/protection blocking progress on some of the later Namco games. There has been some progress behind the scenes, but it hasn't got as far as making anything playable.
There are dedicated Sega Model 2/3 emulators which, once again, are heavily dependent on the documentation from MAME.
As for MAME emulating things you've never heard of, that's one of the big benefits of MAME: ensuring these things aren't lost to future generations. Without MAME's preservation efforts, a lot more of our digital heritage would be lost.
Re: It would be better CDDL'd (Score:4, Informative)
MAME doesn't dynamically link to the code under emulation. It's not an issue.
/. not copy/pasting GPLv2+ correctly (Score:3)
From http://mamedev.org/?p=422 [mamedev.org]:
From the /. story pointer: