Why do non-working packages remain in distro repos after many years?
 

Hi.

Why do broken packages remain in distros repositories after many years?

For example, for years now Vice (a C64 emulator) has not worked in Ubuntu. I checked Debian Jessie and it also does not run (I presume has not worked for years also). I am more surprised that Debian still has Vice.

No doubt, there are more packages like this in many distros.

The error Vice give is [image attached.

Other people seem to get it working, including someone using Ubuntu 16.04 three weeks ago. ;-)

http://www.n00bsonubuntu.net/content...-ubuntu-12-04/

Many emulators, such as that one, require ROM/BIOS/OS files which are NOT released under any sort of open source or public domain license. As such, they can't be legally included in various distribution repositories. It's the same reason why the Doctor Who xscreensaver includes a placeholder "image not found" image rather than the Doctor Who logo.

That's the reason why you have to do extra effort and download files from other locations to get them to work.

I stand corrected. :redface:

I've used the windows version in Wine without issue for a long while now. I think I'll stick with that for now.

:D No problem. You should give the installation a go though - I always think it's preferable to get an application running natively in Linux, if it is possible, rather than running under Mono, Wine or in a Windows VM.

The Windows version comes with the ROM. Not sure how legal that is. Most linux distributions won't take the chance.

I still have loads of my old C64 games on cassette tapes. :hattip:

The ROM in question isn't on any cassette tape, it's the physical ROM installed within the C64 itself. It includes Microsoft BASIC (which probably actually isn't necessary for most games), the built in character ROM fonts, and the KERNAL (which is necessary to load anything from cassette, but might not be necessary for some cartridge based games). None of these are public domain or open source; none may be legally freely distributed.

Hi Isaac. I still have my old C64.