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Archive 1

Categorization

I thought about using a categorization by OS that the emulator runs under, but there are just so many - MAME, for example, runs on many different OSes. There'd be quite a bit of duplication. I figured it'd be better to categorize by the system being emulated - anyone else have ideas? Check out Zophar's Domain for a pretty comprehensive list of emulators, by the way. -- Wapcaplet 17:47 22 May 2003 (UTC)

Removed:

    • UNIX/Linux emulators
      • Cygwin emulates bash and a number of other GNU utilities
      • LINE (based on Cygwin) runs Linux applications on Windows
    • Microsoft Windows emulators
      • WINE [1] emulates Windows for Linux
        • CrossOver Office [2] extends WINE to run popular Windows-based office programs
        • WineX [3] extends WINE to play Windows-based videogames.

None of these are emulators. Cygwin is a POSIX API subsystem for Windows; cygwin programs such as the cygwin version of bash are natively compiled Windows programs. LINE and WINE ("WINE is Not an Emulator"!) are similar, respectively supplying a POSIX API on Windows and a Win32 API on Unix, combined with a binary loader for the other OS's executable format and capturing and translation of system calls. There is no emulation of hardware. --Brion 17:55 22 May 2003 (UTC)

Very true. Though, even though WINE Is Not an Emulator, for practical purposes many consider it as such. Perhaps another section could be added for programs that aren't emulators, but are commonly mistaken for emulators? Cygwin definitely isn't, though... -- Wapcaplet 17:58 22 May 2003 (UTC)
Yes, that's probably a good idea. --Brion 18:00 22 May 2003 (UTC)
What about WinBeth?
~~Lenny
Eh? --Brion
For practical purposes, they are emulators. LINE and WINE run precompiled and unchanged programs, so even if they aren't technically emulators, they still act like them.

I keep going to make edits to this page, but hardly know where to begin. (Pretty funny, considering I created it in the first place :) Part of the problem is that there are so many emulators out there. Zophar's Domain lists almost 70 NES emulators for Windows alone, 26 of which are mostly if not fully functional. Listing them all (along with all the ones for other platforms and other systems) would be an enormous list, and not at all helpful to a reader of the article, but trying to select a few based on some set of perceived merits would be difficult.

Considered formatting all of it as a table, possibly with columns for each of the major platforms that the emulator has been ported to (Win/DOS/Linux/BeOS/Mac/Other), but that would be just about as long. Also considered listing them in comma-separated form, but then it'd end up looking like one of the "List of ___ topics" pages (such as List of legal topics), which are often hard to look at. Again, this would not be very useful to the reader, unless many of them have their own articles (which they most likely will not have).

Perhaps it should be split into multiple articles? Perhaps the article shouldn't be here at all? Perhaps it would make more sense to turn it into a set of articles on the historical development of emulators, how some of them borrowed from others, etc., but that's a pretty big undertaking.

I'd love to hear other ideas. I'm interested in writing about emulation but I'd hate for this to become a pet project of mine that I someday get bored with and leave a mess for someone else to clean up, a la Atlas Shrugged. Suggestions are welcome! -- Wapcaplet 21:41 23 May 2003 (UTC)

Obsolete emulators

I'm not sure if obsolete (previously commercially available) emulators are appropriate here. If so, I've got this:

--Jpgordon 20:12, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Should Wikipedia involve it in a matter that is considered illegal?Erre 02:21, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

  • I'm not sure what you mean. Emulators are not illegal, if that is what you are asking; distributing copies of copyrighted software in the form of ROM images might be unlawful in some jurisdictions, but emulation itself is not. -- Wapcaplet 02:54, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, you're right. But who uses emulators for anything else?Erre 20:44, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

  • Well, I think emulators have a bad legal reputation because the original (legal) form of ROM distribution for many of them is cumbersome and obsolete. If you had the technical means, it would be perfectly legal to play a cartridge NES game through an emulator. Having binary copies of the ROM is more convenient, but also makes pirating and unlawful distribution easier. There are plenty of legitimate emulation uses, though; Bochs allows you to run operating systems and other software through emulation on a non-native environment (Windows programs under Linux, for example). VMware and Wine may be used for this as well; they aren't technically emulators, but are similar enough to be classified as such. You might use a TI-85 emulator to write, test, and run graphing calculator programs before downloading them to your actual TI-85. Any time a certain platform is needed within another environment, emulators are useful. -- Wapcaplet 03:04, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • There are also companies such as Amstrad who have explicitly stated that their old system ROMs may be distributed for emulation, meaning that to download a ZX Spectrum or Amstrad CPC emulator and use the machine's BASIC is 100% legal. Added to that, several of the old game producers have released their work into the public domain so the further download and use of certain games and apps is legal. ThomasHarte 13:45, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Organizing this topic

I lamented the difficulty of organizing this article almost a year ago (see above) and the situation hasn't really improved since then. I think that tables are probably the way to go; someone has already started on this, but it could be improved.

We can organize by one of two things: System being emulated, and platform (host) running the emulation. Organizing by host platform seems logical, since most people have only a few platforms they could use for hosting (Windows, Linux, PalmOS, or whatever), while they may be interested in running many different emulated systems (Atari 2600, NES, Genesis, etc.) Basically, it comes down to the fact that there are fewer potential host environments. Relatively few people, I think, will say "I want to run NES games--what platform should I use?", but rather "I have Windows; can I run NES games?"

I can envision a huge table that has sort of a cross-reference: Host systems across the top, emulated systems down the side, and emulator names at the intersections. Very simple example:

  Windows Linux
NES Nesticle, FCE Ultra FakeNES, TuxNES
Sega Genesis Genecyst DGen

Obviously, this table would be far too wide for a single article, but it could be in an expanded article somewhat like Periodic table (huge).

The only feasible approach I can come up with is to have separate articles for each host system. List of emulators for Windows, List of emulators for Linux and so on. This article can simply list all of those articles, and perhaps include a table of the most popular emulators for the most popular platforms. I guess if someone is interested, they could create articles like List of NES emulators, List of Sega Genesis emulators, etc.

Comments? Criticism? -- Wapcaplet 19:09, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

Someone has created those articles, at least the NES one. I am creating List of SNES emulators. I get my updates via rss: http://www.aep-emu.de/backend.php

Planetemu.net also has pretty up to date news, but is in french. Family Guy Guy 22:09, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

This is a good idea, many articles are in need of such differentiation. Such as lists of books can be by author, by title, by year. There has been talk about a WikiData project, perhaps that can help the list articles out since with a click you can list by author, title, year, platform, company, genre etc.
I agree with your suggestion. 1) By platform: emulators for Windows, emulators for Linux etc. 2) By console: List of NES emulators, list of SNES emulators. I also liked that chart of yours where it has the different platforms, that would also be useful.
Anyone reading this, would you reply with ideas on what columns we would need? I think Name, license, version, status (defunct, production etc.), link would be good ones, any others?


FANTASTIC IDEA

good thing i know the difference between column and rows:D

what you need in the column are

  • Version
    • if the emu has 2 versions, or more than 10 like Mame
  • OS
    • will be either XP or Mac ect
  • Ratings
    • the most used emulators
  • Internet
    • if it supporst kailleria client, lan to play together online
  • Support
    • if it supports other emulators, for example the Visual Boy Advanced can play GameBoy roms. Or and if the emu is a emu built in, like if a Dreamcast emulator is build for Mame aracde
how do you like my brain? AKA my idea's?:P

>x<ino 12:58, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Example

  Version Operating System Ratings Support
GBA Visual Boy Advanced, Boycott XP and Mac 10/10 or Most Used Can play Gameboy roms

>x<ino 13:10, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

We can't really add ratings, because of Wikipedia's neutral point of view. But otherwise, I think this is what needs to be done. ThomasHarte 13:47, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
We can't add ratings but we can add a status item. Ex:
  Version Operating System Status Support
GBA Visual Boy Advanced, Boycott XP and Mac 9/10 or Works for almost everything Can play Gameboy roms
Instead of having "Works for almost everything", what would be better is a separate table at the begining giving an explanation of each rating of status telling what it means. Ergzay 06:50, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

emu

you people are great

i can't believe you got the full listing of them:D
good thing i belong here:P

>x<ino 12:44, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

ScummVM

Should ScummVM be added to Mistaken as emulators? Jraregris 16:59, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Why I asked for expert attention

This needs work and has came across the problem most emulator articles have run in to. What exactly is an emulator? No one ever seems to agree so we often end up with inconsistency. I have tried to remove the inconsistency BUT I'm not saying I got it right. For those of you not sure what I'm on about, I haven't gone through the history, but it appears someone has came along and added a 'mistaken for emulators' section. Either the people who added to this section neglected to remove what they added from the 'emulators' section or people have come along and added things listed in the 'mistaken for emulators' section to the 'emulator' section. Whatever the case, clearly this doesn't make sense. Something should either be listed as a 'emulator' or 'mistaken for an emulator' not both except in special cases (e.g. Virtual PC for Mac is an emulator, Virtual PC for Windows is not). I have done my best to remove anything that is listed in the 'mistaken for emulators' from the 'emulator' section BUT I haven't carefully checked. I have also tried to introduce consistency so basically moved anything that uses virtualisation to the 'mistaken for emulators' section which I identified. Of course, I may have missed some. I'm not sure on the status of QEMU (the name suggests it's an emulator) so left in in the emulator section. I really think someone needs to write a guideline or something on when we call something an emulator and when we don't so we don't get this business that keeps repeating of someone calling something an emulator then somewhere else someone says it isn't! Or perhaps you think this differentation shouldn't be made, whatever. We need consensus, preferbly with a guideline on when something is an emulator. I can't help, I don't know much about comp science related topics. Nil Einne 17:09, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

In summary (since I can get long winded)
  • A decision needs to be made on when something is an emulator and when it isn't
  • Based on this decision, anything which is not an emulator should be removed to the 'mistaken for emulators' section.
  • If there is anything in the 'mistaken for emulators' that should be classified as an 'emulator', move it.
  • Make sure there is nothing in both sections except for special cases such as Virtual PC for Mac vs Virtual PC for Windows
  • Obviously, this should result in consistency. If virtualisation software is 'mistaken for emulators' then all of it should be, not just some virtualisation software (unless there is a valid difference)
  • Consistency between articiles is also needed. If any article on the subject calls it an emulator when it's listed as 'mistaken for emulator' then there is a problem!
  • Ideally, we need a guideline since this problem keeps reoccuring from what I've seen. At one place, some says it's an emulator then somewhere else, someone says it's not. Given the backgrounds of many Wikipedia editors, surely we can be consistent and produce better quality comp science articles?
Nil Einne 17:21, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
The problem with the term emulator is that it doesn't have a well defined meaning. People in the emulation community don't agree and the use of the word in computing circles is too new and/or obscure for most dictionaries to have properly weighed in. Mine says "reproduce the function or action of (a different computer or software system)", which would include WINE since it reproduces the GDI from Windows but the name of the thing makes it clear the the authors don't think it is an emulator. Since wikipedia can only follow trends and not dictate them, the article must include some admission that some software is not clearly classifiable one way or the other. To further the WINE example, that is apparently not an emulator because it uses the host CPU in its native mode then uses software to simulate Windows DLL functions but UltraHLE apparently is even though it uses the host GPU in its native mode and a whole bunch of native C library functions but uses software to simulate some CPU functions.
That said, it is obvious that listing the same software (subject to different pieces of software that share a name, as per Virtual PC) as both an emulator and mistaken for an emulator is obviously wrong.
I guess better categorisation is the answer. Emulators of hardware platforms are usually entirely without controversy as to classification. Emulators of software platforms are not. Even beyond OS "emulation", there are other projects such as Tile World which purport to be emulators, in the main part operate as emulators (recreating the logic applied to data of a defunct product), but which most people wouldn't class as emulators.
I propose an "emulator of hardware platforms" and "emulator of software platforms" split, which introductory text to the effect of (although they need some work):
A hardware platform emulator executes software as though it was being run on a different hardware platform. This often involves low level simulation of hardware devices and the communication channels between them but in some cases may benefit from direct mapping of functionality to native hardware.
A software platform emulator executes software as though it was being run on a different operating system. Usually this requires some recreation of an alien operating environment but does require low level hardware simulation. For this reason, many of these products are not usually classed as emulators.
Incidentally, I am the author of ElectrEm, so have been around the emulation scene for a few years now although I'm hardly a significant member. ThomasHarte 14:18, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Reformat

OK the list is pretty messy. I have reformatted it some, giving headings instead of indents, but it still needs alot more work. Sort the things by company, and make sure the page makes clear both which system the emulator is ON and which system the emulator is FOR.

Now that I'm done sorting all this out, I can go find that atari emulator I was looking for ... --Nerd42 02:01, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Does anybody know of an Atari emulator for the PC/WindowsXP that will do save states like emulators for other systems? It's kind of annoying not being able to save my game, particularly since I don't have the time to play it for hours on end. (I'm playing the old Adventure) --Nerd42 15:39, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
On January 29th, "tocright" gave a nice concise table of contents on the right side, that looked great. After the changes massively expanded the table of contents, it looked awful. I removed the "tocright" template as the least intrusive alternative that made the article look better. Aumakua 08:52, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Contents

Can we please fix the ---- contents page! This article doesn't look professional!

>x<ino 14:40, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Kindly watch your language. HoCkEy PUCK 20:08, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

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