djrobx

Hmm, combining the two ideas above, maybe you could have dice with game character logos on them?

Oh geeze, how did I miss that? Try this keymonitor and see if it's any different. Leave the pause OUT of the config file. keymonitor.zip

What is this doing? Try removing it from your config. LaunchBefore=C:\launchbefore.bat

Okay, now when you say it "does the exact same thing", on the first try, what exactly is it doing? Is GameEx returning immediately, or is it not returning when you exit? If does not return on exit, if you press ctl-alt-del to look at the task list, did epsxe really fully exit? Is Keymonitor.exe still running?

Mine works fine both with spaces and apostrophes. *Shrug*

Hi Tom, Yes! I would absolutely LOVE to handle this aspect for your official product. You've probably noticed that I have put a lot of thought into my current "script", and would be very pleased to re-create it in a proper way in C# for the official product. Give me a basic rundown of how you'd like it to work (basic config structure you'd like to see, where to pull it from, parameters, etc) and I'll run with it from there. I've added "built-in" joy-to-key mappings to my app now too, BTW. I'm using it so I can play VPinmame with my gamepad. Trying to avoid needing lots of little helper scripts for different apps. I think I've worked through most of the quirky scenarios that are needed at this point. EMKO, Please post the contents of your batch file that calls KeyMonitor.exe. It must be exactly as I posted above in order for it to work. -- Rob

Why not? You don't need to close the joystick down for other apps to access it. Just leave it open (nonexclusive) and you'll continue to get button presses and axis movements even though your app is not foreground. You could also use this to allow the "attact mode coin in" feature for a joystick button assigned to insert coin.I set up my KeyMonitor program to watch for L+R+Start to exit, and it works just fine alongside all my emulators.

Ahh, didn't know you were using OpenGL. If you use DirectX, you can leave showdesktop false. However, it's always a good idea to leave ShowDestop true until you get things stable. GameEx should wait for cmd.exe to exit. Question is, why is it still running? Please re-post the section from gameex.ini that you are now using.

Yes, I see the same thing with regards to re-launches being significantly faster. Another thing is it looks like you launch mame.exe -help. That's consuming over a half second. Maybe you could skip that check once mame has been verified? Maybe instead of boot-time validation, you could have a "Check installation" button in the config application? I think it'd be nicer to be able to check & correct problems from there anyway. You just seem to be trying to shake "bloated and slow" impressions, and I think reducing the startup time whereever possible could help a lot with that perception. Just offering ideas, not nitpicking. -- Rob

You can use Nero (or many other any CD burning programs) to burn an .ISO. Just use the "Burn image" option. Or, get a copy of Daemon Tools http://www.daemon-tools.cc/dtcc/portal/download.php Which creates a virtual CD drive, that you can mount the ISO in. Then you can either play it, or use your CD burning software's CD copy function.

Could you do that at run-time when the emulator is first selected instead of scanning each one at boot? Why not just assume the information in the config file is correct, and then log an error if that turns out to be incorrect when someone actually selects the emulator?If you need to wait even 1 second for HideOS for some reason, perhaps you can pass that task off to another thread so you can be processing config files or something while you wait?

Make sure you do NOT put quotes around [ROMPath]\[ROMFile]. -- Rob

The runtime speed improvements are very noticeable. Good job! Since you seem to be in the optimizing mood - maybe you might look into optimizing the startup sequence? It takes roughly 10-15 seconds to get from launch to the main menu on a "cold" start. On all my systems, HideOS.exe is taking nearly two seconds to launch: 17:49:31.7 7/24/2005: Get other settings 17:49:31.7 7/24/2005: Launching HideOS.exe 17:49:33.7 7/24/2005: Hiding Taskbar Another thing that may help and would be easy is to eliminate the emulator path validation at startup. It is contributing to a full second of slowdown on my networked machines per the log. -- Rob

Heh, ZSnes is exactly what I used to debug and investigate the problem with the original SendKeys routines not working. It doesn't surprise me that you found more bugs - there were some pretty big ones in the original code. In any event, I'm glad it was useful to you! -- Rob

Have you reported the problem to David Michel? He's got his own forum and is active there.

If you don't want the DVD and video functions, you could install the Lite option. However, that will reset your theme (where full doesn't). With the latest rash of practically daily updates (and that is certainly not a complaint!), I've given up trying to take them off the menu.

Yes, both of those things work with my script. There are still some quirks with moving the display due to my script's "aggressive" focusing, but it won't exit on you. The "Yes I am" dialog seems to work 100% of the time. I mostly posted it for discussion purposes, but I've attached it in exe form if you want to give it a try. Note that I use the Fullscreen option inside of VPinMame. In Tom's script he had a maximize call which doesn't seem necessary. I don't know if other people are using it differently. -- Rob vpauto.zip

Might I suggest a script that doesn't depend on timing? My machines seem to be havng trouble accomplishing things in time for your script to run corectly. The "newrom" code executed only about 1 out of 10 times, and I was running into a lot of tables that would appear, then disappear. This is working more solid for me. I added a delay in the exit code to help with some Visual Pinball crashes. SetTitleMatchMode,2 waitloop: ifWinExist, Please,, gosub, newrom ifWinExist, Game Info,, goto, ginfo ifWinExist, Notice,, goto, ginfo ifWinExist, , Paused, goto, quitvp WinActivate, Player WinWaitActive, Player,,1 goto, waitloop quitvp: Send,{TAB} Send,{ENTER} WinWaitActive, dsddsds,,1 WinClose, Visual Pinball Exit newrom: Send,{TAB} Send,{SPACE} Send,{ENTER} WinWaitActive, Notice,,1 Send,{ENTER} WinWaitActive, dsddsds,,1 Send,{ENTER} Return ginfo: Send,{ENTER} Send,{ENTER} Exit [ADLIB]

I would have responded quicker but I just couldn't stop playing "F-14 Tomcat", haha. The new vpauto works much better, but the included GameEx binary doesn't run on any of my systems. 14:06:16.6 7/22/2005: Setting Resolution to 1024x768 32 bit color 14:06:19.1 7/22/2005: Creating DirectDraw Surfaces 14:06:19.1 7/22/2005: Creating Primary Surface 14:06:19.1 7/22/2005: Creating Back Buffer 14:06:19.1 7/22/2005: Loading graphic surfaces 14:06:34.7 7/22/2005: ERRORS DETECTED: EXITING I also see the same problem with moving the display. It exited when I tried to position the baby pacman display. Not a big deal, I just did it again, the settings stick. Now, we're supposed to run it WITHOUT MapKeys, correct? I can't seem to use the back key anymore to get out. Maybe that has something to do with the new GameEx binary that I can't load?

I'm attaching the source to my KeyMonitor program which has a full SendKeys implementation (from CodeGuru). It includes the necessary delay in the KeyUp along with some other fixes to the code posted there. Hope it helps. It monitors for Media Center remote keypresses, but they're generic Windows Extended Media keys, which may work with your remote too. If not you can probably add other sorts of hotkey support to it easily enough. The main loop of the program has all of the ugly "script-ish" logic in it. KeyMonitor.zip

It could, but waiting for cmd .exe to finish isn't such a big deal. The problem is knowing what app to needs to be killed when you hit esc or the back button. If you notice, you can kill a dos box but the apps it has spawned continue to run. The other problem is some apps launch others and exit, so the dos box closes and GameEx doesn't know the game is running.

With regards to SendKeys and DirectInput apps: One thing I found when adding state save and load support to my MCE remote, is that SendKeys DOES work with DirectInput, but they often "miss" codes because the SendKeys routines send back-to-back "key up" and "key down" scancodes too fast. It took me a while to figure out what was going on. If you use the Win32 API "KeyboardEvent" call instead of SendKeys, you can send the key down code, wait a little bit, then send the key up code. It will then work reliably with DirectInput.

I have the same problem as the above posters. Every once in a great while VPauto will switch focus, but for the vast majority of tables I end up with the editor ontop of the table. Seems like it takes my machine too long to render the table, and that VPAuto attempts to switch focus around 5 seconds. I wonder what VPLauncher is doing? It seems like things launch cleaner if you initiate VPinball.exe minimized (start /MIN /WAIT vpinball.exe ... ) but that breaks the ability to exit. This visual pinball thing is really fun, but man the setup is hacky! -- Rob

If I set them up as external applications they end up on the main menu. That's not where I want them. The problem with .lnk files is that GameEx has no idea what to wait for. It can wait for cmd.exe to terminate when the batch file finishes. -- Rob

What is your command line? should just be cmd .exe /c "[ROMPath]\[ROMFile]" Be sure the working directory is set to E:\emulation\systems\PlayStation\Emulator Then in the bat, you won't need that whole path. Just KeyMonitor, although having the full path shouldn't hurt.