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[xcutnr1]

In the interest of staying legal, I've done some research. It seems some softmods are illegal (i.e. Ndure), while others are not (i.e. UDE, UXE). Also, apparently some older bioses are legal, but it seems all of the newer ones are not. Is there an easy way of identifying what is and what is not a legal build? What is the reason that most stuff isn't just built with OpenXDK? Is it just not that advanced yet? Too many bugs, or what? Thanks for any help.

[openxdkman]

I would say the problem is the lack of motivation of many to improve situation.
Even myself, I gladly worked on xbox1 network adapter and gpu hardware acceleration for openxdk but only because I knew they were very close to existing nvidia chips on PC. So the effort I put in it will payback later with PC stuff.

I bet there are 20 millions xbox1 worldwide. They are no longer manufactured. Maybe half are modded (and you will always find lawyers and judges to find a reason to name them illegal whatever is the mod details).

My personal point of view is all the efforts put in open dev kits may finally payback on PC platform. There will be more and more attempt to lock the PC platform in future (Vista being a nasty one, claiming unique power just because of well paid non disclosure agreements on drivers contents). Graphic cards on PC evolve constantly and really make us dream. At a given launch time consoles may get a nice GPU but two years later only exclusive games are the real reason to use them. So, I believe the kind of efforts put in XBMC, SMS or useful homebrew can be transported later to PC0 (PC's without harddisk, or what you may call NC network computer, data being on your ftp account, or better, a family large ftp server in your house).
I truely think you can have wonderful PC0 configuration if you accept to be one year late of last gpu gfx card, and only update 100 bucks on it yearly. Without harddisk and OS the PC hardware should top at 200 bucks (no harddisk=100 bucks save, no XP=100 bucks save, no Vista=400 bucks save).

But indeed, the true reward of PC0 is to no longer hear about lawyers and judges...

So, to answer you, openxdk is fine but lack of motivation and some despair about lawyers and judges behaviour towards homebrew scene prevents people from doing frenzy things with it. Illegal XDK can produce instant nice things because it just accepts regular sources developped for DirectX 8 Windows version.

But go ahead. Graphic hardware acceleration has been unlocked a few weeks ago (so it's recent).

This post has been edited by openxdkman: Feb 4 2007, 10:56 AM

[torne]

QUOTE(xcutnr1 @ Feb 4 2007, 01:53 AM)

It seems some softmods are illegal (i.e. Ndure), while others are not (i.e. UDE, UXE).

Not true; the exploits themselves contain no MS code and are probably perfectly legal - the fonts used to exploit the dash are fine, nkpatcher is fine, etc. The problem is that the installer packages for these exploits (the complete 'softmod' kit) usually contain some XDK-built files as well (a copy of EvoX/UnleashX/similar to use as the dash after the mod is installed at least - Krayzie's NDURE installer uses both EvoX and UnleashX to provide installer menus, too) - and they usually contain MS dashboard files. The latest versions of the MS dash available through Live *can't be exploited* by the font exploit as they have been fixed; softmod installers usually install files from an older dashboard version to allow the exploit to work and these files belong entirely to MS; you have no legal right to redistribute them.

As far as I know (and I've looked) there is only one legal softmod installer package easily available on the 'net and that's the original Mechinstaller setup for booting Linux - this requires that you already have a MS dashboard of a suitably old version, and it boots Cromwell rather than any XDK-compiled dashboard.

Anyone who has an Xbox with a sufficiently old dash could use this as a basis for installing an nkpatcher-based exploit instead, and as long as the xbe it booted was Cromwell or some OpenXDK-compiled binary it would be entirely legal - but this will be no use to anyone who has a newer, un-exploitable dash.

[sakir2000]

HI i also noticed tha lack of motivation for openXDK application.
But maybe i can motivate you.
I want to port my ShugenDo project to the Xbox1 and want to use the OpenXDk for it.
But i am not able to use any C++ feature in the openXDK( like vectors, strings .... )

As soon as i know how compile stuff with openXDK and C++ i will port it.
Also i think the xbox should have its own free SDK like OpenXDK.

All i need for this Port is C++ suppport and SDL support whcih is allready included in the OpenXDK.

herer a link
http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=585075

and here a video link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ra-xTHAUHfk

This post has been edited by sakir2000: Feb 10 2007, 07:56 PM

[openxdkman]

I've seen the video. Actually it's too good for current openxdk+sdl. I mean without antialiasing it will look too much pixelized and without hardware acceleration you will run into speed troubles.
Currently SDL has no hardware acceleration in OpenXDK.

Progress I've made with pbKit is very recent, but there is no way I can offer you a standard OpenGL or DirectX API to take advantage of it (I bet you are using one of them on PC platform).
I can't really add hardware acceleration to OpenXDK SDL because I'm not part of the team that have write accesses to it. I can just unlock secret stuff and open direct GPU hardware access to other developers who have such priviledges.

In other words, if the lack of C++ compatible stuff blocks you, non standard API for hardware acceleration stuff will block you even harder.

As far as I know the one who really cared about C++ compatibility is Craig, the owner of openxdk.org site.
His email address appears on his site, you can try to ask him C++ and OpenXDK related questions.
You can also write a minimal small C++ source (hello world) using what you need and post it here to have other developpers take a look at it, the makefile you are using, and the compilation errors you get.

Personally I'm fully happy with C.

[sakir2000]

QUOTE

In other words, if the lack of C++ compatible stuff blocks you, non standard API for hardware acceleration stuff will block you even harder.

Good thing is only the C++ stuff  blocks me.I use C++ and SDL and no other lib.
And as i know the SDL lib is ported to the openXDK.
On the PC version i offer 3 render and one of them is a SDL based software rendere
( the other are D3D and a OPenGL )

But even with the SW render it could run on the XBOX at full speed with some optimization.
And even when i use ther XDK from M$ i would use the SW renderer.
Also most of the emus for the xbox are using SW rendering.


BTW great work with the GPU stuff respect man.

I allready wrote craig an emial but no answere from him.

OK i will post an C++ example which should be compileable on openXDK to get my
project ported

[Sirmatto]

QUOTE(openxdkman @ Feb 11 2007, 12:49 AM)

I can't really add hardware acceleration to OpenXDK SDL because I'm not part of the team that have write accesses to it. I can just unlock secret stuff and open direct GPU hardware access to other developers who have such priviledges.

They have to let you have access to the source repository, especially after all the amazing progress you've done.  Maybe talk to d0wnlab, I'm pretty sure he has access to it.

[xcutnr1]

Ok, so basically, it is redistributing MS property that is the problem?  Is is possible to build similar apps to Unleash/EvoX using legal programs?  The problem I run into, is that it is legal to install chips, and it is legal to run unsigned code, and it is legal to use the xbox in any way you see fit, but in order to do most things everyone wants to do, you have to use an illegal app.  Is there a way to do everything completely legally?  I'm a big fan of fair use, and reprogramming the xbox sounds like the perfect example of fair use.  If I wanted to run a different OS on a computer, I could, so why not on the xbox?

[torne]

QUOTE(xcutnr1 @ Feb 11 2007, 07:53 PM)

Ok, so basically, it is redistributing MS property that is the problem?  Is is possible to build similar apps to Unleash/EvoX using legal programs?  The problem I run into, is that it is legal to install chips, and it is legal to run unsigned code, and it is legal to use the xbox in any way you see fit, but in order to do most things everyone wants to do, you have to use an illegal app.  Is there a way to do everything completely legally?  I'm a big fan of fair use, and reprogramming the xbox sounds like the perfect example of fair use.  If I wanted to run a different OS on a computer, I could, so why not on the xbox?

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, but I am reasonably confident that my previous post in this thread, and this post, are more or less correct as regards the law in the United Kingdom.

Here's the steps you'd have to take to get a modified xbox capable of running legally developed OpenXDK apps without infringing MS's copyrights (I am discounting methods that are only capable of booting Linux as I already mentioned that in my previous post):

1) First you need a way of running unsigned code at all. The only way I'm aware of that doesn't involve MS code is using the dashboard font exploit to launch nkpatcher. This requires that you get hold of an Xbox that already has a sufficiently old dashboard that the font exploit works, as you can't download the old dash for this.

Aside: All available modchip bioses capable of launching XBEs are unauthorised derived works from MS's kernel, so a chip is not an option unless you were to write a new bios yourself (copyright law does not prohibit you from modifying the MS bios that's on your xbox, it only prevents you from copying/distributing it). It might be feasible to write a program which takes a dump of a retail bios and patches it in the same fashion nkpatcher does, which could then be flashed onto a modchip and used. This still technically involves copying (dumping your own bios is still making a copy) but could possibly be argued to come under fair use.

2) Once you have a way of running unsigned code, you need some kind of dashboard/launcher to boot from it. OpenDash is an OpenXDK based dash but it is not complete and may or may not do the things you need it to. Any XBE developed without using MS tools is a legitimate choice, though.

3) Last, you'd actually have to have some OpenXDK-compilable apps to run. There aren't a great number afaict, and the most popular homebrew app for modded xboxes (XBMC) is a very long way away from being able to be compiled by OpenXDK =(

The other legal issue aside from copyright is the DMCA (and its EU analogue, the EUCD), but I expect that if you had gone to all this effort to use OpenXDK software you could easily argue a significant non-infringing use for interoperability purposes.

So that answers the technical and legal issues to the best of my ability.. but your post raises a philosophical issue as well: why have MS chosen to make the Xbox this way? In short, it's just their fears of illegal copying of games. MS are demonstrating with XNA for the 360 that they are not completely blind to the possibilities of homebrew software, though this is a relatively recent development and they may not have thought the same way when the original Xbox was being designed. The original Xbox does not have the security provisions the 360 does - XNA apps are pretty effectively sandboxed first by the CLR environment they execute in, and second by the 360's internal security hypervisor, and it's relatively easy for MS to assure themselves that it is not a likely path to enabling illegal copying of games. The original Xbox's security is, by necessity of their using standard components as much as possible, a rather more all-or-nothing affair: there was no easy way they could've allowed homebrew while preventing illegal copying. Every hardware or software based exploit for the original Xbox can in theory allow the use of illegally copied discs (even the way I describe in this post).