stigzler

ooops - already posted bits of this above. However, query directed here as another request: --------------------------------------------------- Soo.. the backend db stuff in GameEx is as mysterious as Dr Who's life insurance policy. Dabbled a bit with PHP and MySQL years ago, but just wondering.... Built up lots of games over lots of platforms. What would be great is if: 1. Could classify games (like in mame) as lightgun, racing etc... 2. You could group games together, across platform in "classic series" - like R-Type, Wipeout and (for illustration) Street fighter. Then - you could go into a separate "Classic Series" page which would give the series name + then sub pages of the game (e.g. R-Type 2) to sub page of platforms. 3. Star ratings!!! Rate each game on the fly. Also to include other user-specific fields for each game (I dunno.. like 'nostalgia rating' - user defined ones - ya know?) I guess this would involve having some kinda user specific db + accompanying tools to batch/gui process them would be a bonus! Just remembering a touchscreen jukebox software I used to use years ago ( "Nordbeat's Jukebox"). You used to be bale to rate/favorite on the fly and then display custom views based on this. ----------------------------------------- Just wanna say big thanks to all you guys doing the coding behind the scenes. I've spent all week, all day, every day wrestling with a controls mapping database system. Thought it would take a couple of days to knock together. Not even half way through yet. I dunno how you guys do it and stay cheerful/sane! Keep on fighting the goof (<eeep - bad typo!!) good fight!

Heh. Wasn't sure whether it was feature request or if I was missing some functionality. Question answered. Cheers

God. I loath this piece of c**p. "Out of memory Error" - loosing forms with no method of recovery... Think I'm gonna bill Bill for all my lost time. Wish I hadn't started with this application now. I did have a look at Database Browser Portable but didn't seem to have form design. However, after my second 3 hour recovery from the last corruption, and then to loose it all again - had enough... I'm off searching for a free alternative (libre Office crashed very quickly!) grrrr

S'up Null! Been a tedious journey, so not sure how exactly ended up using access!! Am indeed using the gameex dbs, but not referencing directly so no worries about updates. These were in two formats - db3 and mdb. Ended up using access because thing i remember using years ago - but wish I hadn't now!! I need query/form design as my confidence in sql coding is slight. Used to use SQL and PHP years ago when dabbled with web design, but these days, I'm "too old to code." Hat off to any sane database engineers out there - really is driving me potty - it's like having a pedantic and nagging wife! grrr - roll on this finishing.

OK... so I'm no database engineer and I am using 2003... However, even back in 2003 - wasn't "useability" and "human computer interaction" alive and kicking... sheesh (sorry - it;s for a GameEx project). Fine way to spend a week off - wrestling with the most pedantic and unnecessarily convoluted piece of software I've ever used.

Good thing going on with this plugin

Crackin.

Great work - love the option of power cord or not. Didn't include the recoil, but LG build one of my early projects.... how you getting on with emulator setups for LG games !?! PCSX2 was a dirty word for weeks. https://sites.google.com/site/alienarcade74/sub-projects/lightguns-build

Ah OK - ta for the response - how's the study btw? Did find a bit of a work around... I dusted off an old copy of Office 2003 I had lying around somewhere Used SQLite Database browser to export GameData table to csv. Used Excel to import csv + then saved as xls Then (somehow) imported the xls into Access, which auto'd the fields etc.. Feels very cumbersome! But back making progress again

Wow! Testing out CPWizard's capabilities for Emulators... Suprised at making some progress with this! Created Emu ini + got keys feeding to CPW.... However, real headaches with the game info stuff.. As I understand it, CPWizard accesses a database file to pull the names etc from this (via command line - haven't started trying to figure GEx integration yet). It requires mdb (the default extension in the 'database' dialogue). Was hoping to use the GameEx emulator/platform dbs. HOwever - most of these are in .db3 format. And that's where I hit a brick wall. Spent few hours now looking at how to convert .db3 to .mdb - but with little progress. My limited understanding is that db3 is an sqlite (sql3) file? I have opened it with SQLite Database browser, but only export options are to "SQL." Have tried using Libre(Open) Office + some wierd routine invovling ODBC setup/plugin or something -= but still no joy. Sur every technical - google gives loads on mdb>sql converstion, but not vice versa. Found something called "flow heater" but think it requires access to create a db in the first place! Any easy work arounds? And it was all going so well, too! cheers

Soo.. the backend db stuff in GameEx is as mysterious as Dr Who's life insurance policy. Dabbled a bit with PHP and MySQL years ago, but just wondering.... Built up lots of games over lots of platforms. What would be great is if: 1. Could classify games (like in mame) as lightgun, racing etc... 2. You could group games together, across platform in "classic series" - like R-Type, Wipeout and (for illustration) Street fighter. Then - you could go into a separate "Classic Series" page which would give the series name + then sub pages of the game (e.g. R-Type 2) to sub page of platforms. 3. Star ratings!!! Rate each game on the fly. Also to include other user-specific fields for each game (I dunno.. like 'nostalgia rating' - user defined ones - ya know?) I guess this would involve having some kinda user specific db + accompanying tools to batch/gui process them would be a bonus! Just remembering a touchscreen jukebox software I used to use years ago ( "Nordbeat's Jukebox"). You used to be bale to rate/favorite on the fly and then display custom views based on this. Wonder if you can do all this already in GEx?

CHeers Alpha - I couldn't find any entries like that - but comforting this is here for future reference!

Ah thanks adultery - but had a good root round 'views' + think I'll leave it for future redesign of theme editor!

dammit - can't resist now - I'm gonna have to mod my skin to incorporate all those views! GEx can be incredibly inscrutably sometimes. I wish I could see what it was doing behind the scenes (what graphics and layout files it's calling for instance). If it aint broke... it aint being run to its full potential...

Been working for months on designing new theme to match my cab. I did try to get my head around theme editor, but found it rather unfathomable, and struggled to find any comprehensive help guides on how to use it. I did try via searching these forums, but I do find the forum backend a little lacking.... Anywhoos - do downloaded the excellent AfterDark Theme. Just went through changing all the graphics - no layout changes or anything. Today, I downloaded another theme, which I saw had a "change view" button - pressed it + wow!! Video and picture previews - how cool! However, when went back to my theme, all of my pages were messed up. Now I just have a mess of a front end. RageOn helpfully posted elsewhere that change view was disabled in the theme ini - do re-enabled. However - there seems to be very little rhyme or reason to how the change view cycles - and can't get my theme back to it's default view for love nor money. Sometimes I will be cycling through change view in emulators, for instance and then will all of a sudden jump to mame selection screens. I really am hoping that there is an easy solution to this and that I haven't just lost months of work. It's a shame, because a user friendly theme editor would be great + the ability to line up those different views would be fantastic. However, all I want at the moment is just my plain boring text-selection back please!!! Resolved - just kept cycling! Heh - Still curious now though about the views system! Think I'll wait for the new editor before I go tinkering though! Is it a big overhaul or just tweaks?

Would be cool - something with options like take snaps at random times, or videos at random times. Record audio too? And maybe mow yer lawn whilst at it! Butt.... don't want to encourage procrastination! Hope the work's going well.

Did you ever get this up and running Adultery? Trying to set same up on mine - random videos and pics whilst playing games. Tried your plugin headcaze, but couldn't configure under external applications (not listed) Cheers

Cheers chap! Hmmmm, as ever, probably missing something really obvious! Can't get quicklaunch working Below screenie of settings etc. txt at bottom was what I used to get when ran from "run on launch" in setup. Other text = runitbat with quicklaunch Any ideas?

Cheers for the nod! Would love to be doing a guide to everything I'm doing, but just so many things having to get done on this monster. Right.... Control Panel displays next....

null, yer a star and thanks for your kindly persistence. Hyper Bezel 2 took some figuring - but very impressed with it. It also suits just a 1 design bezel, or it will randomize them! Took a bit of setting up, but once figured - glad of the hours. True to my word, will set up a step-by-step guide so others in the future don't have to trawl: https://sites.google.com/site/alienarcade74/sub-projects/mame-setup#TOC-Random-Bezels-1920x1200-16:10- Thanks chaps

Oh, apologies Draco. Despite my incessant posting at the moment, I'm still a little green to 'Forum Decorum' Heh.... Forum Decorum.... I should step away from the computer. .. Oh! and thanks yet again Tempest - another Pearl

Not sure of best form as this is an old post. However - very relevant to what I;m doing at the moment. Got this setup and working sweetly! Well... almost... I'm calling the HyperBezel.exe via "Run on Launch" with command: "C:\Artwork_editors\Hyper Bezel II\Hyper Bezel II.exe" "mame" "[ROM]" This works great! However, there's also a facility to clear the generated bezel once exiting MAME by just putting a "kill" argument at the end. So by deduction, in "Run on Exit" I put: "C:\Artwork_editors\Hyper Bezel II\Hyper Bezel II.exe" "mame" "[ROM]" "kill" However, it would appear as though you can't use the [ROM] parameter at the exit stage. My suspicions confirmed in the runitgame.bat: I'm guessing the [ROM] variable gets cleared between MAME finishing and the next command being executed (i.e. "Run on Exit"). Hmmm.... getting in over me nose I reacon... dipping toes into coding and batch files >,< Could anyone offer any advice? Promise I'll shup then about Bleedin Bezels

Naw - it's me, Tempest! Getting down to the nitty gritty now and it's getting ugly! Brill - my MAME keys were set to non-default values. Just deleted cfg > default.cfg + all tickety-boo now Just one q - changing my mame settings seems to change INI > mame.ini. Does this mean I will have to manually copy it over to [MAME Root] every time :/ Thanks again Tempest - incisive assistance offered

What's the opposite of a "purple patch"? Well, I'm bloody hitting it at the moment. I'm really interested in trying out CPWizard, but failing at the first hurdle. Trying to get this running "stand alone" (i.e. without GEx) to start with. I followed these guides here: http://headsoft.com.au/index.php?category=cpwizard&page=install http://retro-replay.com/how-to-set-up-cp-wizard/ Only problem is, the game specific button names aren't being mapped onto the buttons through preview (nor in game), as per step 10 of head's guide. (Pics attached) I'm figuring that this has something to do with controls.xml (in CPWiz folder). Tried renaming it to control.dat - no joy. Weird thing is, when I enable cpwizrd through GEx - buttons are mapped correctly (in GEx) Feel like I'm being high maintenance atm, but desperately trying to get all this sorted out whilst on leave! Any help appreciated - one day when I'm all set up, I'll be able to step in (hopefully) and start helping rather than 'leeching' knowledge! Cheers chaps

Oh thanks null - will look into - good idea to produce a master... Update: Simple Bezel Layout Generator v2.3 - Doesn't accommodate 16:10 aspect ratios...