buttrer100fly wrote:

Not only do archive games come as Zip files

And there you have it. It is abandonware games that come in zips. Legitimate games may some files packed into a compressed file, but not the entire thing preconfigured and in a zip. There is an understandable reluctance to do things that even give the appearance of supporting abandonwarez.

DBGL has native support for (7)zip-file mounting using PhysFS, as explained here. The downside to this is that it will only work using a special DOSBox build (for example Ykhwong's or Gulikoza's) that includes said patch.

And there you have it. It is abandonware games that come in zips. Legitimate games may some files packed into a compressed file, but not the entire thing preconfigured and in a zip. There is an understandable reluctance to do things that even give the appearance of supporting abandonwarez.

No, that's incredibly presumptuous of you. My favorite use of compression support in front ends is for demos and intros, which are widely available for free from the authors. Just because you can envision a scenario where it could be used inappropriately, doesn't mean you have seen all of the possibilities.

-Frobme

Zip/7zip/PhysFS support hasn't been integrated into DOSBox mainly due to the abandonware issue this comes straight from the devs themselves.

The other reason is that it isn't a high priority. Most "abandonware" is already zipped. It's just not configured correctly. The official games that people have just need to be installed which DOSBox handles quite easily.

There's also issues of teaching the user how to use such a feature. As opposed to other emulators you would then have 3 different ways of "installing" games in DOSBox (Official DOSBox anyway).

1. Unzipping an "abandonware" game and configuring it.
2. Installing from the original disks and configuring it.
3. Downloading an approved DOSBox archive that is already configured and runs right off the bat.

Right now we have #1 and #2 to cover which is already plenty as far as tech support, obviously #3 would negate alot of the issues with #1 and #2 but unfortunately unless you plan on wiping out #1 and #2 from everyone's hard drives and making them use #3 then we'd have to troubleshoot #1, #2 and #3 issues. Lot's of fun.

The DOSBox archive would definetly need a different extension, a hash function and possibly a certificate as well if it were to be done right. (You definetly wouldn't want to half-ass it).

The above are only a few of the issues.....there are plenty more......

Most "abandonware" is already zipped. It's just not configured correctly.

thanks for your replies all. I'm trying to do all this on SDHC cards, not fun either..but enormously rewarding....

I respect the wishes of devs. Fair enough. But my point was that I'm just so surprised that the community is like this. Compare to MAME....

Been thinking about this for a while now - perhaps the difference between this and the console/8-bit/16-bit communities, who lets be frank have gone to some considerable lengths and have done a great deal of work to enable zipped collections (and yes not half as much work as the game devs, but unpaid), is maybe that DOS and early windows is not a collectors community. its a community for people who want to play their old games. Correct? Will it ever be a collectors community do you think?

That plus there appears to be thorny tech issues. But this is where the two things meet (which is intreging) - why has some avid collector not just made a DOSBOX archive collection?

You should stop that kind of talk right now. This is not the place to discuss this topic. "Abandonware" (which doesn't really exist, the correct term is simply "pirated games") is not supported in any way by DOSBox and on VOGONS.

You can't compare a console game to a DOS game like you're doing. Have you ever looked inside one of your ZIP archives? All console games (cartridge based) consist of one single file, which is easy to handle by any frontend or emulator. Arcade ROMs have a few files, but it's a small number of files still. User data for both consoles and arcade games is stored in small external data files, which are the equivalent of "emulated" memory cards or EEPROMS. PC games (DOS and Windows) are _very_ different. They usually contain lots of files, and some of these files may even change when playing the game (saves). I know of no PC/home computer emulator that'll handle this type of stuff. Even emulators with advanced GUIs, like for example WinUAE, rely on the user to manage files.

And to make this very clear: what you are calling a "collecting community" is nothing but organized pirating. I have my own opinion on the subject, but you have to recognize the simple facts. Your comment towards MAME is silly, and shows you do not understand the emulation community one bit. Just go to a site where MAME devs can be reached, and try to talk about ROM trading/collecting with them. You'll be glad about the friendly comments here after that.