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Cedega (software)

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Cedega
Developer(s)TransGaming Technologies
Stable release
6.0 / April 11, 2007
Operating systemLinux
TypeCompatibility layer
LicenseSee main article
Websitehttp://www.transgaming.com/

Cedega (formerly known as WineX) is TransGaming Technologies' proprietary fork of Wine (from when the license of Wine wasn't the LGPL but the X11 license), which is designed specifically for running games written for Microsoft Windows under Linux. As such, its primary focus is implementing the DirectX API.

The community has managed to keep Wine in touch with developments in Cedega; many of the games and 3D applications perform almost as well as when natively running under Microsoft Windows. [citation needed]

WineX was renamed to Cedega on the release of version 4.0 on June 22, 2004.

Licenses

Though Cedega is mainly proprietary software, Transgaming does make part of the source publicly available via CVS, under a mix of licenses. Though this is mainly done to allow a means for non-TG staff to view and submit fixes to the code, it is also frequently used as a means to obtain a sort-of 'demo' version of Cedega. Due to complaints of the difficulty of building a usable version of the program from the public CVS, as well as its outdated nature, Transgaming released a proper demo of Cedega. The demo released by Cedega gave users a 14-day trial of a reasonably current version of the product with a watermark of the Cedega logo which faded from almost transparent to fully opaque every few seconds. This demo was removed without comment and it is not clear if it will be re-released in the future.

Note that while the licenses under which the code is released do permit non-commercial redistribution of precompiled public-CVS versions of the software, Transgaming strongly discourages this, openly warning that the license of TG-copyrighted sections of code will be changed if they feel abuse is occurring or otherwise threatened. Transgaming similarly discourages source-based distributions like Gentoo Linux from creating automated tools to let people build their own version of Cedega from the public CVS.

Functionality

Cedega is able to play many games "out of the box." In some cases it closely mimics the experience that Windows users have (insert disc, run Setup.exe, play). In other cases some amount of user tweaking is required to get the game installed and/or in a state of playability. Cedega 5.2 introduced a feature called the Games Disc Database (GDDB) that simplifies many of these settings and adds auto-game detection when a CD is inserted so that settings are applied for the inserted game automatically.

A basic list of features:

  • Some types of copy protection
  • Pixel Shaders 2.0
  • Vertex Shaders 2.0
  • DirectX 9.0
  • Joystick support including remapping axes
  • The ability to run many Windows games

Controversy

While Cedega is popular among many Linux users, there is a sizeable portion of the free software community that refuses to use the program. There are three main reasons for this.

"Free riding" on the free software movement

Transgaming obtained the source to the original Wine project when it was under the MIT License (non copyleft) and this license placed no requirements on how TransGaming published their software. TransGaming, unlike other companies with similar models, decided to release their software as proprietary software. Transgaming does release portions of the source code via CVS; however, it attaches legal restrictions which mean that it is not free software. Cedega includes licensed support for several types of CD-based copy protection (notably SecuROM and SafeDisc), the code for which TransGaming say they are under contract not to disclose.

In reaction, the Wine project changed its license to the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL). This means that anyone who publishes a modified version of Wine must publish the source code under an LGPL-compatible (and therefore free software) license. TransGaming halted using code contributed to Wine when the license was changed, though this has resumed recently with TransGaming integrating certain LGPL portions of Wine into Cedega and placing those portions of the source code on their public servers.

Reaction to inclusion in Distros

When some Linux distributions, notably Debian GNU/Linux and Gentoo, decided to package TransGaming's software, TransGaming threatened to make the license even more restrictive to prohibit this.

Quotation from the Cedega license:

Note that while this license does permit certain kinds of non-commercial distribution of pre-compiled binary packages of Cedega, doing so on a large scale is discouraged, as it affects TransGaming's ability to continue to improve and develop the code. TransGaming reserves the right to change the license under which TransGaming-owned copyright code is made available, and will not hesitate to do so if non-commercial distribution of pre-compiled binary packages adversely affects the financing of continued development.

General criticism to Win32 compatibility layers

Some Linux users feel that in encouraging development of Cedega, they are discouraging the development of native ports of games, such as those that were made by Loki Software, or even Linux-exclusive titles. However, Loki Software no longer exists.

See also

  • Wine - the free software/open source software which Cedega is based on
  • CrossOver - another commercial proprietary Wine-based product, targeted at running productivity/business applications rather than games
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