Talk:DOSBox

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Note to maintainers: do not delete old discussions. They should be archived instead -- see WP:Talk page guidelines#When pages get too long. I have just restored and archived the entire body of text (sans vandalism) after it was gradually and completely blanked over the past year. Please don't do that again! Ham Pastrami (talk) 22:29, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Different versions for different consoles

Instead of removing platform-specific information (such as the GP2X paragraph removed on April 18), why not start a new section focusing on the differences between DOSBox versions on different platforms?

This article is pretty short anyway, some expansion won't hurt it... Esn (talk) 03:25, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

I guess we could do that. But the main contention I have is that nearly all of these ports are source forks managed by one or more third parties, and they are not official releases from the DOSBox team. Features and design considerations may overlap or contradict each other, so the article must remain clear on the point that these versions are not handled by the DOSBox team. If a particular fork is notable in and of itself, as the GP2X might be, consider creating its own article, such as DOSBox (GP2X). Ham Pastrami (talk) 10:08, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
Would there be any sense in creating a separate article when most of the information would be identical, though? Also, since this is an open-source project, why should it matter whether or not a port to another platform is "official"? I thought the whole point of "open-source" is that no particular person or group owns the code.
I'm not saying separation is absolutely necessary, but being open source means, well we've already seen from the article that a lot of forks exist, so inviting discussion about them here has a potential to snowball. I also do not want to see a situation where each field of the infobox has a dozen lines to account for all possible forks. The point of open source is... beyond the scope of this discussion, but in fact the code is owned by the authors and that is how they are able to enforce the license. Ham Pastrami (talk) 00:04, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
Anyway, quick question: which ports are "official"? Esn (talk) 22:58, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
The ones that are available from the official site.[1] Ham Pastrami (talk) 00:04, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, it's obvious that I have no idea what I'm talking about... I'm still not even really sure what the difference is between "official" and "unofficial". I'd just like the article to include a bit of more info about the differences between different versions, that's all... Would it be allowed to link to the GP2X DOSBox article here, for example? Maybe use that as the "source" instead of (or in addition to) the link to GP2X.de, since it provides more information? Esn (talk) 08:19, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
It shouldn't replace the gp2x.de article because that article is being used as a reference, and wikis are not reliable references. But you are right that the wiki has a lot of content for the GP2X version, so I'm not opposed to adding your link as a standalone external link. In fact, that seems to be a pretty good solution for redirecting GP2X discussion. I'll make the edit now. Ham Pastrami (talk) 17:50, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
Um, this will sound rather impolite I suppose, but ya'll really had this nice little discussion about minor tweaks and nobody took the time to rmv that awful list format and try to make a proper article out of this? Ah well, I shouldn't complain, tis just the sort of thing I enjoy doing anyways. :) Still needs a better format though, with subsection headings and additional detail. Something with a flow, like 'intro, history, advanced features, availability & etc' might make good sections. I dunno, that is not the sort of thing I enjoy (at this moment, anyways). Hope someone else does. Eaglizard (talk) 09:38, 6 May 2008 (UTC)