One interesting aspect of MAME is that the source code itself is key to its mission. Even if you do not run the code, it is already fulfilling its goals, which can be described as a "hardware museum in the shape of technical specifications".
Such museum (without any ROM file) is now fully free, regardless of what you might attempt to do with it at runtime after compiling it. The source code is the most important portion of the MAME project, because it is though the source code that the goal of "preserving the history of gaming and computing hardware" is achieved. The runtime binaries tend to be seen as a mere collateral effect of the hardware documentation efforts (also providing evidence that the hw documentation is probably accurate). On Tue, Mar 29, 2016 at 11:10 AM, J.B. Nicholson <j...@forestfield.org> wrote: > ra...@openmailbox.org wrote: >> >> The MAME project has recently re-licensed the project to GPL2 (with GPL3 >> parts). It is now free software. http://mamedev.org/?p=422 > > > Wouldn't this change make MAME free software that depends on nonfree > software in order to run? > > As I understand it, the programs MAME emulates are nonfree. If so, this > should raise a warning because MAME is an instance of what was known as the > Java Trap (https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/java-trap.html) -- a free program > with nonfree dependencies. > > Are there any free software programs MAME emulates? >
