Source release

CD-i Emulator is the first fully evolving windows compatible emulator project of the Philips CD-i system. Discuss the emulator, compatibility issues, seek help and support to get the program operating and post what you'd like to see in future revisions of the program. CD-i players ROM (BIOS) requests, begging and links will not be tolerated. Otherwise feel free to post your thoughts on this amazing new piece of software.
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Maturion
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Source release

Post by Maturion » Tue Jan 29, 2008 7:23 pm

Hello.

I love your emulator. It is great work. But would it be possible to release the source?

that would be great.

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cdifan
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Post by cdifan » Tue Jan 29, 2008 11:32 pm

Releasing the source to CD-i Emulator is entirely possible, there are no legal or other issues preventing it except that I'm (still) of the opinion that it wouldn't contribute anything to my goals of the venture.

And before you ask, these goals do not include making money as a concern of any significance. A few days of regular work earns me more then I ever got from selling CD-i Emulator.

What exactly would you do (or expect others to do) with those sources?

Please note that providing a full edition binary for free was discussed (in small circle) and considered unadvisable, months before the public release in 2005. To date I have seen no indications that this decision was wrong; every petulant whine I see (into which category I do not consider your posting to be), here or in other fora, actually supports the original reasoning.

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question

Post by eDRoaCH » Wed Feb 06, 2008 4:54 am

So I have stumbled upon your emulator's website several times in my past travels around the net. After awhile, ive always come to the 'nah, no reason to download something time limited' opinion.

Today I dug a bit deeper, and ended up here. And I noticed a very recent post and reply in this forum, and it made me want to inquire further:

Just what are the reasons its pay-for-play? I do understand the scene is painfully small, but couldnt part of that be the emulators availability?

I have donated willingly to many open source projects in the past. However, being open source is not my qualification for donation. The two qualificaitons are:

1. how useful it is to my life
2. its being actively developed

everything i see about this emu is 2005. its going on 3 years without development. As I said, I havent used it myself, so do you consider it perfect? If not, and its an abandoned project, maybe releasing source makes sense. It may increase the scene hugely. Or it may just not go anywhere. Still, it is given a chance to grow.

I hope you dont find me to be one of those idiots you spoke of, I really honestly want to know.

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Bas
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Post by Bas » Wed Feb 06, 2008 10:18 am

do you send the same kind of messages to all software developers who have a two year old product, demanding to get it for free including the source?

I really can't believe why you kids ask the same question over and over again.

But back to your question:
Just what are the reasons its pay-for-play?
The post above yours, the first of cdifan, actually answers this pretty good, so read closely!!
Releasing the source to CD-i Emulator is entirely possible, there are no legal or other issues preventing it except that I'm (still) of the opinion that it wouldn't contribute anything to my goals of the venture.

And before you ask, these goals do not include making money as a concern of any significance. A few days of regular work earns me more then I ever got from selling CD-i Emulator.

What exactly would you do (or expect others to do) with those sources?

Please note that providing a full edition binary for free was discussed (in small circle) and considered unadvisable, months before the public release in 2005. To date I have seen no indications that this decision was wrong; every petulant whine I see (into which category I do not consider your posting to be), here or in other fora, actually supports the original reasoning.
So in this context, I find your post rather silly.

In my opinion, cdifan should leave it the way it is now. I'm confident in the future new versions will arrive, and I'm even more confident that you have to be a true CD-i developer to understand the difficulties of CD-i.

Ofcourse, you all want to play Zelda for free, but if the platform was more interesting for emulation there would have been more attempts in trying to emulate CD-i on the PC. I think you underestimate the complexity of CD-i Emulator ;)

This Emulator Support forum is changing into a 'kids-who-want-it-for-free" forum which I don't think was the purpose of it. Maybe we should change some groundrules and keep this a support forum.

Thank you for your attention.

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clarification

Post by eDRoaCH » Thu Feb 07, 2008 6:51 am

Sorry, I should be more clear. What I was wondering is what are the stated 'goals' of the project? specificly what would be hindered by releasing it to a wider audience if money is no issue as he stated?

I dont underestimate the complexity of any task such as this. I have tried, and failed, before to dabble in programing. I just dont have the detailed, logical mind for it. (Too ADD I guess)

I also believe in people getting paid for their efforts. As I said, I was just wanting to know what the goals were.

I should also note that I am no kid, and cant think of a 2 year old software product I have paid for that hasnt had an update in that time. Even my treo (as bad as palm is these days) has had a couple updates. But I find this type of stuff irrelevant. The general rule of questions (other than 'a/s/l' type) on the net are that if someone asks, there are probably many others thinking it.

If you love the system, and it is difficult to program for, and you are no longer developing (that last one a big assumption, I know, it was part of the original question I had) then why make the next people start from scratch?

I guess its a good thing that no one had liscencing keys and patents on the wheel huh.

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Bas
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Post by Bas » Thu Feb 07, 2008 7:42 am

If you browse the other threads you'll find that eventually the CD-i Emulator will be more compatible even able to emulate digital video. But it's entirely possible this will take up another three years. Or maybe just a few weeks.


Most of you believe the project is dead as you've not heard anything for a while now. You remember how long it took for the first version to arrive? Years!

I wouldn't exclude any possibility that cdifan will surprise us with his developments soon, but I'm sure that when kids question him and the emulator all the time, it doesn't help at all.

As far as we're all concerned, CD-i Emulator is under development.
You just have to have patience ;)

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Post by Merijn » Sun Feb 10, 2008 1:25 am

Actually, I have to say I'm a little with eDRoaCH on this subject.

Let me first say that it is all CDi fan's decision and rights to do whatever he wants to with the emulator. If he does not wish for it to be open source, then so be it.

However, just like you say Bas, it took years for him alone to develop the emulator. Coming up on its 3-year birthday, the compatibility is still quite limited. Which is the main reason why even I myself haven't bought it yet (ok, a little ashamed to say it here, but there, I said it).

If money is not the issue, then why not try to create a community of developers for the emulator. It could still be a closed community, where you would have to apply to become a member, prove your merits and all (so as to keep the kids who want it for free out), but then at least it could perhaps take some of the burden Off CDIfan, and make for more updates).

again, it's CDIfan's decision, but it's still worth discussing. So let's not shoot everyone down here merely on the assumption that they are a 'kid who wants stuff for free'..

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cdifan
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Post by cdifan » Sun Feb 10, 2008 11:02 pm

I'm aware of the points Merijn makes, and he may even be right.
Merijn wrote:If he does not wish for it to be open source, then so be it.
When I feel the project is ready for it, source will be released in some form. But that certainly isn't the case right now.
Merijn wrote:Coming up on its 3-year birthday, the compatibility is still quite limited.
I haven't invested much time in this; I feel the functional holes are still too large. When DV emulation is in somewhat decent working order (meaning it supports at least simple continuous play) and the pointing device support is in better shape (this includes the much-wanted keyboard support), I'll add some checkpoint/tracing functionality and then the serious compatibility work can start. So far I've only fixed a few generic problems and worked around one or two title bugs (mostly null pointer errors or some variant thereof).
Merijn wrote:If money is not the issue, then why not try to create a community of developers for the emulator.
That is exactly why I replied to the initial post with
cdifan wrote:What exactly would you do (or expect others to do) with those sources?
If somebody with relevant knowledge (preferably a CD-i developer himself) wants in, I'd be willing to discuss this. So far it hasn't happened; I have had maybe four serious reactions from software developers (including porting offers) but none of them had any CD-i experience.

It wouldn't necessary need to be an "old" CD-i developer; cdoty has proved that it is quite possible to bring yourself up to speed on the platform even now. Just studying the Green Book and its references (as opposed to casually browsing it) already goes a long way. I'd certainly be supportive of such an endeavor.

Perhaps somebody feels motivated by this?

By the way, Devin, when is that tech info ever going to be online :-)

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Post by Merijn » Mon Feb 11, 2008 1:00 am

I think that last reply adresses the biggest issue in this thread. There probably aren't a whole lot of people interested or capable of developing the emulator. I for one am happy that you are still on it though cdifan!
Good also to hear you're open to people helping out, however small the chance of someone actually doing so is.

Anyone have any ideas on how to get more knowledgeable people to help out?? Do we know any old developers who could be in on this?

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Post by cdifan » Mon Feb 11, 2008 12:58 pm

Merijn wrote:Do we know any old developers who could be in on this?
Over the years I have polled a few people I knew from the time, but none seemed interested very much, at least not enough to want to contribute.

That doesn't mean that such people do not exist, of course...

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Post by 2awesome4apossum » Thu Feb 28, 2008 1:02 am

What I was wondering is what are the stated 'goals' of the project? specificly what would be hindered by releasing it to a wider audience if money is no issue as he stated?
I'm rather curious about this too. I've read this thread time and again, and either I'm blatently missing the answer, or one has not been given-- my curiosity is killing me.

Anyhow, three minutes of game-time is just fine, in my book, for free (so don't think that's what I'm posting about).

I think that cdifan is certainly correct when he asserts that there probably isn't a "closed circle of developers" who would be interested. Everyone seems to assume that releasing the "source" means that there will be more "progress", because developers are apparently attracted to this sort of thing (when in reality, if they were serious about it, I think they'd either have wanted in sooner, or would want to write their own-- think of the other "open source" emulators: mostly people write their own "plugins"). I disagree, although I really don't see the harm that would come from releasing the emulator for free (I could, however, see concerns that would come from releasing the source to whomever).

My introduction to this emulator was unwittingly stumbling upon an illegal copy (didn't work, wanted a password). The most frustrating aspect of this experience was that the page seemingly had no other explanation other than, "Sorry, illegal!" already assuming the viewer had full knowledge of this (which I obviously did not). This is part of the reason I think a free version might be beneficial to generating interesting in the emulator.

I think people just would like to see more frequent updates, and that's why they are requesting for this to be made into an open-source project. Admittedly, ever new feature added could warrant a new release, although I could see potential problems with it, it might get people to shut up about it's development though.

Thank you for your time.

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Post by cdifan » Thu Feb 28, 2008 9:47 pm

2awesome4apossum wrote:
What I was wondering is what are the stated 'goals' of the project? specificly what would be hindered by releasing it to a wider audience if money is no issue as he stated?
I'm rather curious about this too. I've read this thread time and again, and either I'm blatently missing the answer, or one has not been given-- my curiosity is killing me.
Those are two questions...

The answer to the first questions isn't stated specifically in this thread. It may be in other threads, but the clearest answer can be found in the 2005 Interview with CD-i Fan - Author of CD-i Emulator on The Black Moon Project (excerpts only):
CD-i Fan wrote:Why do you start a hobby project? Primarily because it seems like fun, of course!

A secondary reason was my great love for the CD-i platform, and the consequent desire to see it live on beyond the lifetime of the CD-i discs and players.

Of course, there was also the purely selfish reason of wanting to preserve for myself a few CD-i titles I loved, especially the ones whose production I have been involved with.

And lastly, a very important reason: It would be sooo cool :)
The answer to the second question is more involved. If the source was freely available, someone would offer a free binary almost immediately.

Releasing such a binary was discussed in close circle in the months before the version 0.5.2 release, but it was rejected because it would significantly lower the commitment required for using CD-i Emulator. Considering the entry barrier for its legal use (CD-i player, serial cable, CD-i Link, etc) we felt that this would invoke significantly more whining from "wannahaves", which we expected to be a heavy burden on the very small number of (somewhat) technically knowledgable people.

Such a burden would lower motivation very fast (this has happened or nearly happened in many open source projects, including the Linux kernel) and in the end I felt we could do without it.

Of course, you are free to disagree but I have yet to hear any compelling reasons why this was the wrong decision. Please reread the thread above :-)
2awesome4apossum wrote:My introduction to this emulator was unwittingly stumbling upon an illegal copy (didn't work, wanted a password). The most frustrating aspect of this experience was that the page seemingly had no other explanation other than, "Sorry, illegal!" already assuming the viewer had full knowledge of this (which I obviously did not).
The page you're referring to is a part of the CD-i Emulator Home site which includes a navigation bar on the left; how hard can it be to click there for more information?

And before you ask, yes, I am aware of the illegal copy that is floating around. The site still gets several failed activation attempts every day :-)
I won't discuss this any further except to say that it is a hacked version of an unlimited edition binary that I actually sold to someone.
2awesome4apossum wrote:This is part of the reason I think a free version might be beneficial to generating interest in the emulator.
See above; I am fairly sure it would generate the kind of interest that I can do without.
2awesome4apossum wrote:I think people just would like to see more frequent updates, and that's why they are requesting for this to be made into an open-source project.
The first part is quite true of course, but somebody still has to program those updates...
2awesome4apossum wrote:Thank you for your time.
You're welcome!

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Post by 2awesome4apossum » Fri Feb 29, 2008 12:09 am

Releasing such a binary was discussed in close circle in the months before the version 0.5.2 release, but it was rejected because it would significantly lower the commitment required for using CD-i Emulator. Considering the entry barrier for its legal use (CD-i player, serial cable, CD-i Link, etc) we felt that this would invoke significantly more whining from "wannahaves", which we expected to be a heavy burden on the very small number of (somewhat) technically knowledgable people.
That does make a lot of sense. Not only would it hinder the community, but probably increase the illegal activity it was used for. That makes a lot more sense! This should be an answer satisfactory to everyone for why a free version is not available, and it also makes the release of a free "lite" version make more sense as well.
Such a burden would lower motivation very fast (this has happened or nearly happened in many open source projects, including the Linux kernel) and in the end I felt we could do without it.
Absolutely agreed.
Of course, you are free to disagree but I have yet to hear any compelling reasons why this was the wrong decision. Please reread the thread above :-)
My only bit is that if a handful of qualified developers wants in, that you'd considered making the source available within your closed circle. But you and I are on the same page, at this point.
2awesome4apossum wrote:I think people just would like to see more frequent updates, and that's why they are requesting for this to be made into an open-source project.
The first part is quite true of course, but somebody still has to program those updates...
I must have misread some things, because I thought you were creating smaller level features all the time, but were not releasing any further updates until you have a nice "polished" release.

Thanks again!

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