{"id":13648529,"url":"https://github.com/evmar/retrowin32","last_synced_at":"2025-04-04T19:11:51.279Z","repository":{"id":59904029,"uuid":"539279688","full_name":"evmar/retrowin32","owner":"evmar","description":"windows emulator","archived":false,"fork":false,"pushed_at":"2024-05-29T05:53:54.000Z","size":6876,"stargazers_count":506,"open_issues_count":3,"forks_count":21,"subscribers_count":26,"default_branch":"main","last_synced_at":"2024-05-29T06:37:37.888Z","etag":null,"topics":["emulation","emulator","retrocomputing","win32"],"latest_commit_sha":null,"homepage":"https://evmar.github.io/retrowin32/","language":"Rust","has_issues":true,"has_wiki":null,"has_pages":null,"mirror_url":null,"source_name":null,"license":"apache-2.0","status":null,"scm":"git","pull_requests_enabled":true,"icon_url":"https://github.com/evmar.png","metadata":{"files":{"readme":"README.md","changelog":null,"contributing":null,"funding":null,"license":"LICENSE","code_of_conduct":null,"threat_model":null,"audit":null,"citation":null,"codeowners":null,"security":null,"support":null,"governance":null,"roadmap":null,"authors":null,"dei":null,"publiccode":null,"codemeta":null}},"created_at":"2022-09-21T02:57:15.000Z","updated_at":"2024-05-30T21:29:00.251Z","dependencies_parsed_at":"2024-01-14T10:59:22.905Z","dependency_job_id":"c8bb94f4-338e-4470-ac08-d21ce4abd151","html_url":"https://github.com/evmar/retrowin32","commit_stats":null,"previous_names":[],"tags_count":0,"template":false,"template_full_name":null,"repository_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/repositories/evmar%2Fretrowin32","tags_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/repositories/evmar%2Fretrowin32/tags","releases_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/repositories/evmar%2Fretrowin32/releases","manifests_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/repositories/evmar%2Fretrowin32/manifests","owner_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/owners/evmar","download_url":"https://codeload.github.com/evmar/retrowin32/tar.gz/refs/heads/main","host":{"name":"GitHub","url":"https://github.com","kind":"github","repositories_count":247234922,"owners_count":20905854,"icon_url":"https://github.com/github.png","version":null,"created_at":"2022-05-30T11:31:42.601Z","updated_at":"2022-07-04T15:15:14.044Z","host_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub","repositories_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/repositories","repository_names_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/repository_names","owners_url":"https://repos.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/hosts/GitHub/owners"}},"keywords":["emulation","emulator","retrocomputing","win32"],"created_at":"2024-08-02T01:04:19.634Z","updated_at":"2025-04-04T19:11:51.250Z","avatar_url":"https://github.com/evmar.png","language":"Rust","funding_links":[],"categories":["Rust"],"sub_categories":[],"readme":"# retrowin32\n\nretrowin32 is a still-early Windows emulator for the web (and other non-Windows\nplatforms).\n\nTake a win32 `.exe` file and run it in a web browser or a Mac.\n\nSee [some demos](https://evmar.github.io/retrowin32/).\n\n## Status\n\nCan run a few programs, including console, win32 GUI, and DirectX. Likely will\nfail if given a program I haven't worked on yet.\n\n- 2024/03: runs some of Minesweeper and more demoscene programs.\n- 2023/10: preliminary support for using\n  [Unicorn](https://www.unicorn-engine.org/) (basically QEMU) for x86 emulation.\n- 2023/08:\n  [new blog post](https://neugierig.org/software/blog/2023/08/x86-x64-aarch64.html)\n  about new Rosetta-based emulation support. retrowin32 now can run on web,\n  native with CPU emulation, or Rosetta x86-64. (Native x86-64 ought to be\n  relatively easy to add too.)\n- 2023/04: \"monolife\" demo now can sorta render first scene.\n- 2023/02: can now run natively via SDL.\n  [See blog post](https://neugierig.org/software/blog/2023/02/retrowin32-progress.html).\n- 2022/10: released. Barely runs a few console programs and one DirectDraw\n  program.\n  [See blog post](https://neugierig.org/software/blog/2022/10/retrowin32.html).\n\nSee\n[a list of blog posts](https://neugierig.org/software/blog/2023/09/retrowin32.html)\nfor more detailed updates.\n\n## The idea\n\nSoftware today is written in a world where the platform continually changes --\ncode you release today may stop working next year as the APIs and deprecations\nchurn. You know what doesn't change? Dead platforms. Old video games written for\na NES will work forever because the NES won't ever change again.\n\nwin32, the Windows 32-bit API, is such a platform. \"win32 is the stable Linux\nuserland ABI\" is the observation that it might actually make sense for video\ngame developers aiming for Linux to target the Windows API (which doesn't\nchange) and rely on some translation layer to manage the Linux part (which\nalways changes).\n\nToday there are all these old `.exe` files lying around that are increasingly\nhard to run. Even on Windows itself, there's a\n[32-bit Windows translation layer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WoW64) when\nrunning on now standard x86-64 hardware. On non-Windows the best tool is Wine,\nbut it still needs x86 hardware (or a CPU emulator).\n\nSo my idea is this: what if you treated a win32 executable in the same way you\ntreat a NES ROM -- as machine code for a CPU you no longer have, expecting\nhardware and an OS that doesn't exist? retrowin32 is an emulator that interprets\nthe x86 instructions and implements the Windows OS API such that a win32\nexecutable can run directly, without the Windows OS or an x86 beneath it.\n\nSee a\n[comparison against other Windows emulator approaches (WINE, qemu, v86)](doc/comparison.md)\nfor how this is similar but different.\n\n## Running it\n\nSee [HACKING.md](HACKING.md) to get started on the code.\n","project_url":"https://awesome.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/projects/github.com%2Fevmar%2Fretrowin32","html_url":"https://awesome.ecosyste.ms/projects/github.com%2Fevmar%2Fretrowin32","lists_url":"https://awesome.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/projects/github.com%2Fevmar%2Fretrowin32/lists"}