Mark Pizzolato, the main developer of the retro -compound simulator simh , Added to License text The restriction regarding the possibility of using future changes made to SIM_DISK.C and SCP.C. files. The remaining project files, as before, are distributed under the MIT license.
The change in the license has become a reaction to criticism Autosize functions added last year, as a result of the work of which the images of the discs launched In the emulator of systems, metadata was added, which increased the size of the image by 512 bytes. Some users expressed dissatisfaction with this behavior and recommended that the metadata not in the image reflecting the contents of the disk, but in a separate file. Since it was not possible to convince the author by default behavior, some derivatives began to change the indicated functionality through the use of additional patches.
Mark Pizzoato resolved the issue radically, adding a item to the project license prohibiting the use of the whole new code that will be added to it to SIM_DISK.C and SCP.c after changing the license text, if the default behavior or default values are related With the functionality of Autosize. SIM_DISK.C and SCP.c code added to a change in the license, as before, it remains available under the MIT license.
This action was criticized other participants in the project, since the change was made without taking into account the opinions of others developers and now SIMH as a whole can be perceived as a non -free project, which will interfere with its promotion and integration with other projects. Mark Pizzoato indicated that the changes in the license relate only to SIM_DISK.C and SCP.C files developed personally by them. For those who are dissatisfied with the addition of data to the image when loading it, he recommended connecting disk images in the only reading mode or disconnect the Autosize function by adding ~/symh.ini file “set noUutosize”.