[Nuke said:
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tona said:
Team Twiizers still has homebrewers in mind with their bootmii plans. They're just trying to look ahead and avoid IOS dependencies and whatnot.
This seems a contradiction as Team Twiizers have not asked us coders what they want, we all seem to be kept in the dark, then expect to ride with it once released. IOS Free dev kills all what I'm working on, but this isn't why i'm voicing this. I feel strongly that console developers (not linux coders) want the true experience of that licensed coders get, Nintendo makes it hard to do that so we use the next best thing (homebrew) which gives a great experance and fun which you know.
Now you bring in a Linux IOS free dev environment and it gives you a console trying to be a PC, and we can then only contribute to linux, port some sdl apps but its just that, linux. Now don't get me wrong this is fun but it removes the real experience were looking for. If you take PS3 as an example it has a real poor homebrew scene, but then look at Xbox 360 XNA, even its 100 USD it has some cool contributions on it, not just doom ports but actual original demos and games. Yes Nintendo fucked up and should of given us ability to make Wiiware without the strings like XNA does, that would of been awesome.
Yes Team Twiizers gave us huge amount of fun on the Wii, but if this is the way forward, i think homebrew on the Wii will revert back to Gamecube Mode to keep the fun experience alive. I guess time will tell if im right or wrong on this.
Once again, people are listening on IRC. Why aren't you there? Good ideas are never stifled. Perhaps we aren't directly "asking," but we're trying to piece together what we think is best from what we hear.
I agree that linux sounds somewhat inefficient for homebrew, and I've voiced my opinions on this matter, too. Yet getting rid of IOS doesn't mean using linux exclusively.
Getting rid of IOS just means that we will have to write something of our own to run in the Starlet. In its basic form, this could mean something as simple as a "proxy" IOS (Which will prod registers on command from the PPC), built by devkitARM. Current libogc functions which use IOS could be rewritten to be done on the PPC instead of doing ioctls.
In its fullest, a co-processor or an IOS replacement providing the functions of a standard IOS would be possible--yet take a lot of work.
The two of these, however, are doable alternatives to linux that wouldn't really "kill" much, and get us away from Nintendo code.
Now, let me paint another picture for you.
Wii homebrew stays as it is now: A constant battle against Nintendo's updates and IOS patches. Assuming we keep on finding bugs and ways to keep the homebrew channel installed, Nintendo could take the offensive: Find bugs in libogc's handling of IOS functions, and tweak certain IOS to kill homebrew that try to use those functions.
They could kill ReloadIOS, they will probably kill things like DVDX, and they essentially have control over what Wii hardware we can and can't use.
Of course, Nintendo software will still need to use these functions, so it's not likely they'd do anything to drastic, but the point remains that we're putting ourselves at the whim of Nintendo's proprietary software.
Not just that, though. We're practically at the whim of just one VERSION of IOS.
IOS36, and IOS35 work great for most homebrew, but if you've ever tried developing on different IOS versions, you'll find many libogc functions break completely. This weakens our hold under Nintendo's software--they only have to break one version of IOS and suddenly libogc no longer works.
That system IN ITSELF is bad for libogc--only being able to support one single version of IOS. The alternative of trying to support all IOS in one libogc is infeasable, and would become a giant mess of code--which could likely easily be broken by Nintendo's crap.
Here's another possibility: Nintendo could get tired of the current IOS situation and push an update for the system menu which changes the title booting methods: It keeps a list (updated) of titles which have been assigned "new" IOS to use--and uses the new IOS listed instead of that specified in the TMD. Suddenly, WiiWare, Brawl, and other games using IOS36 don't use IOS36 anymore, and they delete IOS36 from the system. Now libogc is going to be fairly broken, and all current homebrew will have to be recompiled with an updated libogc which has a new way to deal with selecting an IOS to use.
These are the kinds of contingencies we're talking about getting rid of. And they NEED to be removed--badly.
Linux doesn't have to be the answer--but it's going to be hard work regardless.
Now, if we're running homebrew from bootmii, with custom starlet code, we have a (hopefully) stable coding/homebrew environment which we control.
Nintendo's only control of the system is whether or not we can get bootmii installed. The hackers can deal with fighting off Nintendo's updates, homebrew is moved farther away from piracy, and hombrewers have a stable unchanging environment to work with. Sounds much better, doesn't it?