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    <div class="moz-forward-container">fyi<br>
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      -------- Forwarded Message --------
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            <th nowrap="nowrap" valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT">Subject:
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            <td>Re: [GNU-linux-libre] MAME emulator is giving incentive
              to use non-free software</td>
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            <th nowrap="nowrap" valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT">Date: </th>
            <td>Wed, 27 Apr 2016 00:31:33 +0000</td>
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            <th nowrap="nowrap" valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT">From: </th>
            <td>alĂ­rio eyng <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:alirioeyng@gmail.com"><alirioeyng@gmail.com></a></td>
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            <th nowrap="nowrap" valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT">Reply-To:
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            <td>Workgroup for fully free GNU/Linux distributions
              <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:gnu-linux-libre@nongnu.org"><gnu-linux-libre@nongnu.org></a></td>
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            <th nowrap="nowrap" valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT">To: </th>
            <td><a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:gnu-linux-libre@nongnu.org">gnu-linux-libre@nongnu.org</a></td>
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            <th nowrap="nowrap" valign="BASELINE" align="RIGHT">CC: </th>
            <td><a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:guix-devel@gnu.org">guix-devel@gnu.org</a></td>
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      <pre>Luke:
><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://wiki.parabola.nu/Emulator_licensing_issues">https://wiki.parabola.nu/Emulator_licensing_issues</a>
>
>This may prove useful in the event of further research/discussion.
this was mentioned, and it's missing crucial information.

let's add ndiswrapper to it.
it would be classified as "free + free use", but it is still rejected;
because [0] classifies it as "free + useless free use" or "useless in freedom".

proposed definition of "usefulness" for emulators:
 free software _needs_ it as a runtime dependency; or
 development tool acting as hardware replacement.

ndiswrapper fails both, so it's useless in freedom.
qemu emulates current hardware, so it succeeds the second.
wine is needed for notepad++[1], so it succeeds the first.

wine fails the second, so we could provide it just as a dependency not
directly installable.

hatari (atari st) and ppsspp (psp) fail the second.
psp was discontinued in december 2014[2], so it is possible to argue
it is not obsolete; but we probably should not support it for
development anyway[3]

these information and others already there is not really about an
emulator, but about the architecture/board ("driver" in mame[4]); we
could have separate tables describing architectures/boards and
emulators.

mame is so flexible [4] it's really tricky.
a current main processor architecture can have all boards failing the
above criteria, directly.
how much main processor emulation needs board emulation?
if a board is needed and there are no other similar
emulators/disassemblers/debuggers for that architecture with boards
succeeding the criteria, the most recently discontinued board should
get an exception.


answering [5], mac-on-linux was removed from debian/trisquel by being
unmaintained [6].
[0] and [6] should be refactored or merged.

[0]<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://libreplanet.org/wiki/List_of_software_that_does_not_respect_the_Free_System_Distribution_Guidelines">https://libreplanet.org/wiki/List_of_software_that_does_not_respect_the_Free_System_Distribution_Guidelines</a>
[1]needs checking
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Windows-only_free_software">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Windows-only_free_software</a>
[2]<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Portable">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Portable</a>
[3]boycottsony.org
[4]18:34
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://media.libreplanet.org/u/libreplanet/m/hardware-reverse-engineering-insights-from-the-mame/">https://media.libreplanet.org/u/libreplanet/m/hardware-reverse-engineering-insights-from-the-mame/</a>
[5]<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://lists.nongnu.org/archive/html/gnu-linux-libre/2016-04/msg00122.html">http://lists.nongnu.org/archive/html/gnu-linux-libre/2016-04/msg00122.html</a>
[6]<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://trisquel.info/en/wiki/software-does-not-respect-free-system-distribution-guidelines">https://trisquel.info/en/wiki/software-does-not-respect-free-system-distribution-guidelines</a>


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