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Licensed C64 Emulator Rejected From App Store
Miasik.Net writes "A fully licensed Commodore 64 iPhone emulator has been rejected from the App Store. The excuse Apple used is a clause in the SDK agreement which doesn't allow for applications that run executable code. It seems Sega is exempt from that clause, because some of its games on the iPhone are emulators running original ROM code."
It's not an "excuse", it's clearly against the terms of the *agreement* the developer *agreed* to *before* starting work on it.
You can argue that Sega ought to be treated the same way (and I'd agree with that), but to call it an "excuse" when the terms specifically and explicitly forbid it smacks of throwing one's toys out of the pram and screaming "waaaaaaaahhhh"! "I want, I want, I want!" is such an ugly character flaw when it's seen in "adults"...
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
...because I am tired of reports of apps not working on iPhone and other ways Apple limits it. If people care so much about freedom, why don't they stop using it?
An iPhone emulator that runs on a Commodore 64? Color me surprised!
Hopefully this means that I can upgrade my old boxes by emulating dual core processors on them. Links, anyone? ;)
-b
No offense, but I've stopped responding to AC's.
If I recall correctly, the limitation in the SDK license is that Apple will not allow an interpreter that runs arbitrary code. That would mean that an interpreter that executes a single hardwired game does not violate the license.
Apple is about quality first and they are just holding back the release date until the iPhone's cassette tape inferface is ready.
If you RTFA, you will find that Manomio contacted Apple Europe before developing the app and they "seemed really excited". So here we have yet another developer wasting time and money just to have Apple reject another application despite approving others that do the same thing. I really hope Manomio decides to port his C64 app to the Android instead so some of us can enjoy it.
Of course Sega is exempt; their programs are a single ROM, run via emulation. You don't buy a Sega hardware emulator and then download ROMs for it, so they can test it fully before allowing it to be released. An open emulator, able to run any ROM you give it, is essentially a way to run un-tested, 3rd party code on the platform. There's no way for Apple to be sure the programs stay within their virtual environment. In essence, it would be a way to circumvent the security and execution protection on the phone entirely; it's a jailbreaker.
I'm about as far from an Apple apologist as you can get, and can't wait for this app store bullshit to quiet down. But let's not start reviling them for merely following their stated policy. If these people want to release their emulator, they'll need to do what their competitors have: bundle it with specific games and sell THOSE instead.
High horse? At least I'm not stuck in the intellectual mud like you are. All of you people are ignoring the larger problem here, which is that Apple purports to control the applications a customer runs on a device he's purchased outright. It's ludicrous. Apple has no moral authority to set these rules at all.
The larger problem here is that Apple can reject applications at all. You people seem to have passively accepted it. It's as if you were in Salem arguing about whether a witch should have been burned or hanged while ignoring the larger question is whether you should execute the alleged "witch" at all!
Last time I checked, the iPhone could not run C64 programs natively. So, essentially, the games are interpreted by the emulator (as it is with pretty much all emulators).
According to that logic, you'd have to ban any application with built in scripting (like, say, any office application that I'm aware of), hell, a PDF reader would be banned as well because PDFs may include scripts. If you want to go bonkers, you could pretty much ban any application that takes any kind of not built-in data because technically, this is interpreted by the application as well.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I hope so too. I'm not defending Apple here as much as defending the rightness of enforcing a contract. As I point out above, I don't believe he contacted Apple Europe anyway, because if he did he'd have something in writing along the lines of "Yes, you can develop your emulator and we will let you load it onto the iPhone".
Talking to someone from Apple marketing over the phone and getting a verbal "hey that sounds cool" is completely and utterly worthless. Getting written permission as above would give him a fully justifiable case (and probably a lawsuit). He's probably somewhere in the middle, but unfortunately unless you have the written permission, you have nothing.
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
So, you're saying that whining on Slashdot is actually useful?
The mind boggles, it does.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration.
What a stinky, steaming pile of horse crap!!! (Even if Holy Saint Dijkstra said it.)
Hundreds of thousands of programmers got their start writing C-64, TRS-80, Apple & Sinclair BASIC on their home computers before graduating to structured languages, and 10s of thousands of them turned out to e good or great programmers.
In fact, I know that it's perfectly possible to write good structured code in COBOL-74. You "just" need a good knowledge of the features of the language (in addition to the standard prerequisites required by all good programmers).
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Hear hear. If you want to write an AIM client that runs in the background you can do so. If you want to buy an iPhone, take it apart, and put it back together in a Kindle, that's fine. No problem. Do whatever you want to do. Apple isn't stopping you from doing whatever you want to do with your iPhone.
Just don't expect Apple to distribute it for you. Just don't expect Apple to make it convenient for you to distribute it. Just don't expect any support from Apple after you've done these things.
Basically, if you do these things, you're on your own. That doesn't preclude you from doing it. It just means nobody is going to help you out if you turn your iPhone into a very expensive brick. It means that if your battery won't hold a charge because you wrote an app that drained the battery in 20 minutes and you now have to send your phone in for battery replacement 4 years earlier than expected, don't blame Apple.