WiiLi.org

[crono141]

I've been watching the community off and on for a while now, and I've still not seen any significant progress. Then I got to thinking...

What the point of running linux on the wii apart from "just to do it"?

If you want a media center, it doesn't have enough storage for this purpose. If you want a media center extender, there is already software (like TVersity) that transcodes on the fly into adobe flash, similar to youtube, that you can point your Wii to on the internet channel.

Any of the other cool tricks can already be done with a PC+Wiimote combination with glovepie.

So, whats the point?

[kiddo7]

I might be the only one who thinks this way, but sometimes, "just to do it" is a very good reason in and of itself. To you and me today, there might not be a glaringly apparent reason for running unsigned code on the wii. But it very well might be the ground work needed for someone else to come along and do amazing things that everyone will appreciate and value.

Mind you, I am not insinuating that this is the only reason for wiili. I am just sick of seeing potentially brilliant ideas dropped because it has no immediate value for a select few. We would never have the PC, among many other things, if every one only concentrated on what is of value now!

[Goldy]

you see you are only thinking of the media center aspect, you need to think What can linux do that the wii can't?

also why do any of us do anything that we find fun/interesting? just because we can:)

[tom61]

Once Linux is running on the Wii, the lack of storage will be far less trouble, as USB harddrives drives could be used with the Wii. Video quality should be better than Flash based video, and no transcoding needed.

It'd open up an entire world of open source games, even without 3D accel. Lots of fun games that could be adapted to the Wiimote easily, all free.

You could use your Wii as a full on PC, even without internet connectivity. Edit documents, balance your checkbook, even print.

For $250 and some hacking, it is not such a bad deal for miniture PC (price out a new Nano-ITX or 5.25" biscuit motherboard for a comparison) with TV out.

Also, there may be cool features hidden away that are just waiting to be tapped. iPod Linux opened up higher quality recording options, added video capability to pre-"with video" models, and let games be downloaded & played on them before Apple did.

[crono141]

Tom, all that stuff you just mentioned can be done better on a PC. And you can pick up budget PC packages with better horsepower than the wii for less than 500 dollars from dell or gateway or any of those others.

Open source wii games? Why? The only unique thing about the wii that makes it useful for open source games is the motion sensing controller. And its painfully easy to get the controller working on a PC. So why not just write your open source Wii game for the PC with an include Wiimote driver specifically for your game? Or bundle glovepie and requisite script if writing your own driver is too hard?

I've noticed that the community has resorted to putting up a bounty for getting unsigned wii code running. Is it worth it? I understand the drive of the hobby, but you have to ask yourself, will anybody want this by the time we're done? And after we're done, will it really even be useful?

I'm just trying to point out the lack of direction and dwindling interest in this project. There are 10 times as many posts in the "wiimote/nunchuck" and "glovepie scripts" forums than in actual development. There hasn't even been a working hack yet, much less an elegant solution for booting wiili.

Has anyone gotten the wii to even say "Hello World" in wii mode? Shouldn't this be the first step before talking about what kind of interface wiili should have and what applications to include?

Its time you guys get serious here. If you are serious about porting linux to wii, ask yourself why anyone would want it. Then after you found an answer, as how am I going to do it. After there is an answer to that question, then you can start worring about what goes into it and what kind of apps you want to include. Until then, you're putting the cart before the horse, and going nowhere.

[tom61]

[crono141]