Tom Speirs

Does the save button do nothing or hang? If you wait a while, and I mean a while, does it save? This seems to be a problem a few people are having, it does save but just takes an age. How much mem do you have? Thanks.

I think XP is a great product, but I know what you mean. I would just like one button in XP, that says 'I am not an idiot, change all interface, network, file, and folder options and gui to that affect'. Server 2003 does that by default.

Just FYI: There is a setting in GameEx to set the background to black, and this should work with all themes.

OK Let me answer the original post now I understand what was being asked. Why dont themes support alpha blended PNGS, but Videos and Text does. First of all. Fonts are not alphablended. It might look like they are at higher resolutions, but believe me that took some tweaking with the colours. Videos are alphablended yes, but this is done without using your video hardware but in software. This is very slow. Anything below a Radeon 9200 and 2Ghz and your pc will grind to a crawl if not already. GameEx uses DirectDraw which does not support Alpha Blending or Rotation using Hardware acceleration (on 99% of video cards). Alpha Blending is possible in GameEx, but needs to be done in software and not using DirectX which is again extremely slow, so thats why its not done. Thanks.

And remember, please share your work and talk about it however you want right here at http://gameex.info

LOL. Your money is no good here. The purpose, is to allow simple plugins for GameEx. Windows Media Center allows plug-ins this way too (as web pages), although obviously a bit better! Then allow these plugins to be used with a Gamepad, remote, or Arcade Controls. Which is pretty much what you cant do normally with a web browser. OK, this is what could be done with HTML applications. Just examples for you to toy with. But first Forget about an RSS Feed as I am already working on it. For non developers. How about linking to an internet web cam that show someone using a toilet (my humor sorry!) How about having a flash file or shockwave file. This could be a game, movie etc. Pictures of any sort. A help page for GameEx Porn slideshow. It could be an internet radio station that is so protected you cant add as a station in gameex. Stock price. News feed. The current time and timezone in Timbuktoo You could simply put in a link to MAWS or KLOV. You could link to a Java, Shockwave or Flash game. Movie listings for your local cinema perhaps. For people with a few skills such asp, perl, php etc. You could show statistics. How long has my server been up, the time, the date. XMLTV info. or Tv Guide. You could show your webcam, or other home automation info. You could use content scraping/ripping techniques, to create something like Weather, show current MAME version etc Use other activex controls to display multimedia. And heres how you do all that, if you want to do more than just have a link to a web site. But first, just to clarify. This feature (HTML apps) also allows you to navigate a web site purely with a joypad, remote, or Arcade Controls. That is what the Mouse Emu setting is for. You could think of it as a web browser for arcade cabinets. 1. You create a web page or pages that resize based on the size of the displayed window. In other word a TABLE with 100% width and 100% Height should do it. The reason for this is you dont want to have to scroll the page if using arcade controls, as this is a pain, it also looks crappy. 2 Advanced. If you can code javascript then you write DHTML code in the page to navigate between image links using the arrow keys and enter for selecting a link. These link to another page that does not scroll as above and fits on the page without needing scrolling as before. 2 Easy. If you cant use javascript, then either you can just create a simple web page, as long as it resizes with the display again. should get you started. If you want to use a mouse, its just like any other web page click on the links.2 Easy Part 2 If you are using a gamepad or arcade controls, then turn on the Mouse Emu. This will allow you to move the mouse to links on the page with up, down, left, right, and then click with the select button for your device. 3. Save the page on your harddisk. 4. Add it is an html app. [For files on you hard disk prefix with file:// e.g file://c:/webpages/mylinks.htm Hope that helps. Cheers!

Such a question it seems is beyond this group, as its not related to GameEx but rather the emulators themselves. May sound silly, but have you simply considered just swapping your displays over?e.g Primary becomes Secondary. Secondary becomes Primary? If this is really so important to you, why not just look into buying or building a dedicated MCE PC? Its pretty much what everyone does who has the luxury. I can guarantee* you that will work * not actual guarantee

Ill probably ask this question from time to time on the forum. I am very interested to hear what your involvment is in the following, even if a noob or purely retro gaming fan. 1. Are you active or have been involved with the MAME scene. How long, tell us how it all started? 2. Have you been or are you a contributor (of any sort) to another MAME (or MAME itself), Front-End or HTPC, or Emulation project/s? If so which ones, what did or do you do? 3. Are you a developer who would love to get your hands on the GameEx Source code for the purpose of making it better for all? What do you think you could contribute? Thanks, Tom.

Lovely

Ill take whatever is on offer! Always! I am sure others would be overjoyed too with anything you do or can provide.

I think this must be unrelated to GameEx but something else on your system perhaps?. I dont think I even check for the escape key with MAME in GameEx. Other than checking the API for a couple of keys asynchronously GameEx is really not doing much when running MAME or Daphne, its certainly not capturing input. I also really cant think what I could have changed in GameEx that would affect this. Only thing i can think of is disabling the Joystick as a longshot. Can you control Windows Media player with the remote? That would be a good troubleshooting exercise.

Great! Supporting PNG's will happen soon. I am deffinitly looking at doing that shortly. The reason it currently uses Bimaps, is just because by default natively thats all DirectDraw can use as surfaces. Its easy to convert them, and I already do this for the logos, game snaps and artwork. Sizing and positioning comes under the category of 'GameEx having full skinning support' which is not a high priority for me personally at the moment at least for now. I also would like to implement full skinning support with high quality with a skinning app provided, that is also user friendly and to make sure users cant easily mess up the presentation. Unfortunatly that's a lot of work. If the videos are animated backgrounds make sure you have turned off Alpha Blending for Videos. Its under Display options in the configuration app, I am extremely eager to see these. Let me know if that works. If not we could perhaps look at re-encoding them to MPEG or an AVI Codec that requires less utilisation to decode.

The settings that could mess this up, are under Input in the config app. Make sure DirectInput is off, and make sure Enable SlikStik is off. Does that help? Tom

Antony, this looks perfect as is. It worked straight away on my HTPC setup, and I tested it a fair bit too. Still perfect. Actually I think I am going to keep as my default for the moment Could I ask your permission to include this theme with the GameEx install? You can have credit wherever you want it, just no $$ I am afraid !! Let me know. Thanks, Tom

To all: Are there any 'web based (ie not Visual Source Safe etc, but using CVS or similar)' tools out there on the web, that allow shared source code development with security. By security I mean only making source code available to certain developers and not everyone? That could be a possibility.

Thanks for explaining that, much appreciated. My main reason for asking was to see if I could start on a Linux version using SDL.net without making GameEx open source (see other post regarding open source) which is under LGPL. So I think its OK. Thanks again.

I thought a little communication would help on this, and this is my position. 1. I like open source software, I think it is a good thing. No more explanation needed. 2. I will do my best to not make GameEx become a dead project. If I have a big lifestyle change or get tired with the project I will do my best to let it continue in the hands of others. No worries there, unless I drop dead in 5 minutes! 3. A Big however, I get a lot of fun out of GameEx. It is my creation. I would like to take GameEx as far as I can take it on my own. If I get really stuck, or want it to become something bigger I will allow that to happen by making it open source. I think it would be selfish of others to almost expect me to release the source just because more people could benefit, when it is solely my creation, and when I do so much already at a cost and provide everything for free for people who arn't developers, and just want a good software solution. 4. Its not like things dont happen with GameEx. Most sensible feature requests get implemented, and pretty damn quickly IMHO. In other words its not like making it open source would speed up development a great deal when you include setup time and management required, again IMHO. I hope that clears it up. Thanks for listening.

I'm kinda unsure of the GPL stuff. Perhaps someone can tell me if this is correct. If I use a compiled library or executable without building it directly into my executable, so I dont recompile the lib or exe, and just use the existing dll or exe, I dont have to release my source code, right? If I compile the GPLD source into my project even if unchanged, if it becomes part of my executable I have to release the source code? Yes? If I change and recompile the library or exe but keep it as a file seperate from my project as a dll or exe. I still have to release the source code for my entire project? Yes? Thanks, it seems we have a few developers here so perhaps someone can help.

Are we talking about Alpha blending one direct draw surface onto another or Loading a PNG, then loading that image into a surface and using the Alpha colour as the colourkey? I did not think the former was possible with DirectDraw like rotation is not?

I do like this idea, although I was thinking more along lthe ine of having a customizable Help item at the top or bottom of the Gameslist (bottom normally, but top if an emulators list of games) for each section (Start Page, MAME, HTPC, More programs, and each emulator). I dont like the idea of asigning this to a button, as theres no point IMHO having help if the user cant see its available, and its not easily accesible. I like the idea of supporting all image types, and displaying the help using the same routines as it does for displaying gamework art, and pictures. There will be settings in the config app to choose what image to use. There will be settings in the config to specify a path for the image, and enable it or not. Perhaps people can come up with some images for me for the regular sections such as the start page, MAME, HTPC. Then this could be included with the install for the benifit of all. Thanks, Tom.

Thanks again for your most valuable feedback Cupid. I agree with you on everything you just said. I think my real Goal if this went ahead or you could call it a mission statement if it ever comes to anything, is to be able to allow someone to create a MAME box with the easy to use and functional features of GameEx (MAME only) from a 1 CD install (not worried about using the OS for anything else) that will run on an Arcade Monitor without special hardware, for free.

Hi, Do you mean supporting the Alpha Colour/Channel in PNGS, or actually alpha blending, meaning opacity? Alpha Blending is just not possible in GameEx as it uses DirectDraw and not Direct3D. Using an Alpha Colour from a PNG is possible, I think it does already do this for logos but translates the Alpha Channel to black. Could please clarify exactly what you are asking for? Thanks.

Sure is Next version.

I've been looking into the possibility of making a Linux Version of GameEx. I would use Mono, SDL and SDL.net. The way, I see it, it would to 'start' with, miss the following features, as these rely too much on Windows API or Windows Libs. Volume Control (Windows API) Jukebox (Bass.dll and Windows Media Player) Radio (Bass.dll) DVD & Videos (Windows Media Player, FFDSHOW) TV (Not implemented yet anyway). Configuation Utlity (.net Windows Forms - Would mean Manual INI edit) I see the following possible benefits: Using AdvanceMAME and AdvanceCAB I think it would be possible to support arcade monitor resolutions without an ArcadeVGA card. Means you could build a console/MAME box for free, without needing a windows license. It would use the same source code with Compiler directives, making GameEx cross platform in a cool way I think. To everyone, what are your thoughts on this, and how important do you see this to the future of GameEx? Any developers willing to help? Tom.

Hi, I know of MaLa. Its a nice front-end. Unfortunatly I dont understand German. It could be that the LCD portion of the project might be supported with LCD-Smartie which is what GameEx uses for LCD/VFD display? Other than that, I dont really want to get GameEx into the low level IO end of things. At least at the moment. You may also be abel to do something via a cmd line app to it with the Launch before and Launch after settings in GameEx. Thanks, Tom.