Necromancyr

I like my iPAC, but it doesn't wake from sleep entirely correctly which might be an issue for you.

Most regular emulator sets are 'done' - at least for older ones. I think once you get a set, check it against a database or something similar, you should be good to go and not have to worry about it. That being said, I'm not currently using one aside from scanners every once and awhile (I think ClrMamePro was the one I used when I last did it...but it's been awhile).

Adultery - that's not the issue. I know about that thread and it was the first thing I checked to see if something like this has been reported. It's not the X coordinates that are causing the menu item to bug out, but the y coordinates. And honestly, my theme prob. won't even be eligible either - not sure I'm going to theme everything out or it wouldn't be 'too' personalized. (I'll post some SS's soon, just trying to get a few more bits/art done and settled). Once I submit it, anyone can copy the style I did (which is very minimal and basic) and the tricks I'm trying to get certain things to happen. Regarding ranting - try to understand my POV as well. Many of the things I've asked about aren't really 'unreasonable' things to think the program can do or a themeing engine should do...most of them are standard now. The rant thread I made was because I was hoping to get a single thread, compressed 'live' place to record issues I encountered, how I solved them, and hopefully get tips on getting around issues I couldn't (or finding out there is no way to circumvent). (That, and I had a few beers that night while I was themeing so it seemed like a better idea than it was). As the small things keep stacking up and the 10-12 circumventions and 'standard' things that should be working aren't, frustration sets in. It's part of why I've stopped working on things after things start going to hell on a particular screen, etc. I don't want to start a fight or anything either, but Draco asked for a picture of a menu being present and not being present - which makes little sense, logically, to me. If he asked for a theme.ini, or any of the ini's, I would have posted them immediately...but when asked to show a screenshot of something there and not there without explaining that positioning might be an issue and that's what he's interested in, etc., made describing how to replicate the issue and the variables surrounding the bug seem much more important. TL;DR: Not the same issue as in the other thread, and I respond poorly to requests for items that don't logically make sense without an explanation and being treated as if I 'just don't understand'.

Tom, I've been working through this fairly methodically and I believe I found the bug. If a list is set with a y coordinate some number below 100 (64 is low enough) the placement of the menu bar gets screwed up and it doesn't appear. Easiest way to test is just place a list element at somewhere where y is between 0-50 of any size - the menu just doesn't appear. This may because of an overlap with something else or some other kind of error, but modifying these values resulted in BOTH pages getting fixed. (I don't see this as a major problem for what I'm doing, since having the three menu items for me is actually desirable on those particular screens - however I could see it being a problem for some others)

Current state is what it is *shrug* Any continuation of discussion is basically 'philosophical' so please don't take this as critical or anything of the sort - just discussion/talk. So, no issue with any emulators as of yet with this setup - although keep in mind I'm only using Dapne, MAME, and MESS at this point due to my requirement for mirrored output because of my cab. It's a non-traditional setup, I know, but it's also something that I could see other's definitely doing if they use U360's/analog controls and any type of modular/swappable panels. I would think that this type of combination is actually fairly common with trackball and spinner setups as well...particularly on frankenpanelish setups (i.e., no need to wire in mouse buttons, just use the buttons already on the panel for that). Basically, with the way it's working now, if I want to have multiple controls (i.e., an analog stick, keyboard based anything, and a mouse control) all work seamlessly across a control panel I need to convert all inputs using third party software to one control method. To me, it just makes more sense for the shift check to do a check across all controls - but, like I said, I have no idea what the code actually looks like, how difficult it would be to do, etc.

Adultery: I did in the first post, topmost is activated. Tom, just sent to the info e-mail address from the contact page.

Adultery: This would be the only thing I'd be remapping for, which is a bit crazy, honestly. HK: From my personal setup, it's easier since I have a multi-panel config to have one controller control the buttons at all times - it limits the needs for duplicate configurations of buttons across emulators. And I've never encountered anything that doesn't allow something along these lines. My question really is around how, if this isn't a bug, I'm just not understanding why the decision would be made to not have them work together unless it's difficult, technically.

Hrm...this is a v4 theme. And the pressing left does move into the menu when not showing. Any logs or anything I can send to try to see what's up?

I'm having some issues getting my selector - even a default generated one - centered on an item in my list. Any tips? Does font need to be a certain size or the list itself be some multiple of the font size, etc? I'm sure there's something going on in the background to determine how many items are in the list element and spacing from there since it's not configurable, but I'm not sure if this is something that tweaks this vertical alignment as well.

Ok, so I can add a second instance of MAME into GameEx that won't conflict with my normal, integrated 'MAME' setup. I'm cool with that as an option I guess. It was what I was going to have to do with Maximux Arcade as well and maybe some toggle will get integrated into GameEx later. Thanks Bkenobi, you were my only hope.

Shift Keys (Volume and Paging) working across input types (i.e., keyboard shift key also shifts input from a joystick; shift from joystick/gamepad also shifts mouse).

So, this was a design decision? Why?

The pictures actually won't show anything, that's the thing - it'll be one picture where there's a menu one where there's not. Basically, this is what happens: - Start GameEx. Start screen shows no menu. From start, the following happens (each line starts from the start screen/menu) - Go into MAME (Game List Select). Still no menu on the screen - Go into Favorites screen and menu is shown. Back into Start via back button and the menu is on the start screen. - Go into MAME (Game List Select), no menu. Back into start, menu isn't there. - Go into Emulator Select, menu is shown. Back into start, menu is there. - Go into MAME (Game List Select), go into a MAME game list and the menu appears. Press home to go straight to the start menu and the menu is there. How oddball is this? Seems to be something at initialization and then that the MAME Game List Select screen is doing. (Note: Game List Select is what I'm refering to as the screen where you can pick horizontal, vertical, original, custom lists, etc., of MAME games)

Thanks Tom, appreciate the clarification!

When is the menu supposed to appear? I'm doing some extremely wonky things in a theme, and I have this feeling that I somehow screwed something up with the menu. For instance, in my start page the menu doesn't appear at startup. If I go all the way down to a mame gamelist, the menu appears and when I back out it's always there. I do have a foreground and alpha channel turned on (which is active for all parts of the theme, right?) but that section isn't covered in the start page or the other pages by the overlay at all. Before I start digging into the theme more wanted to check if this happens with anyone else. (Also, I can move INTO the menu if I press left right - just can't see it...seems like a layer issue but I don't know what's causing it...)

Topic/description sums it up, but it appears the keyboard paging and volume shift keys don't work when you hold one of them and try to use a joystick to control the up/down. Long story short, I'm using U360's in my cab but not the button interface on them - buttons are handled by an iPac. So basically, I get zero shift functionality. Would like for that to work. (Or have another method of doing alpha page up/down that is remappable).

That was it for the weather Tom, thanks. The search function doesn't show that item when you search for weather.

Let me reiterate my question more clearly - I think I was confusing at first. How can I get GameEx to pass different arguments to an emulator based purely on the MAME game list currently being shown (as detailed in this thread: http://www.gameex.info/forums/index.php?showtopic=8213&st=0&p=60212&hl=+custom%20+game%20+lists&fromsearch=1entry60212)? This will let me make a list called 'Classic Panel' and have all the classics in there and, when used with CPWizard, will show the appropriate panel when the game is selected from that list. If the game is selected from the 'general' MAME game list or any other list that doesn't have a panel defined, it will show the default panel layout for that game. Make sense?

Awesome, thanks. I was figuring the answer you gave for the first one was the answer, but didn't realize how to do it without losing something (i.e., I'd like to keep all the art on the individual game screen). Being able to customize the text should fix it fine. Nice. However, it does mean the theme needs some user customization if it gets distributed but that's the way it's going to be I guess. I'll check that download service utility - didn't realize emumovies had manuals also. And the third item, unfortunately, doesn't control the logo zoom effect that occurs on non-game list menus. I think it's just coded to do the zoom thing...maybe.

And an aneurysm! One thing I'm trying to figure out - if I want a emulator to show something other than title screen and snap for the images, I'm thinking the only option is to just not set those graphics/art as existing for that emu, correct? I'd like to have the cart and screenshot/movie show... Also, are manual collections available that match naming conventions? Would love to have manuals on my personal setup but...not sure if it's a download and rename individually type of thing. Grabbed a bunch of arcade manuals in a torrent, but they appear to not at all be named like MAME rom names. (Also, def. need to shut off that zoom in effect...anyone know if it's possible?)

Already had two. Heheh... Honestly, love the program and the features - just hate that there's some backwards stuff with the theme system. I understand why it's like it is, just hoping to get around certain limitations someway.

Ont thing I just found out about this - doing something like 2000,0,0,0 works for most elements. For the arrows, however, be careful. I tried to do this and it throws an error when you start gameex because it's trying to draw something that it can't (that's what I got from the error code anyway) - just turn them off in the settings instead.

Got that. Next WTF is something I think that's not fixable. Either I accept it, or remove Image2 from the start page. For the MAME item, Image1 is a logo and Image 2 is a screenshot. For Last Played/Favorites/etc., Image 1 is a screenshot and Image 2 is a marquee. The issue comes from the relative size of one over the other and that they shift in position when scrolling down the list - which I really don't like. Optimally, for what I'm trying to setup, Image 1 would be the marquee and Image 2 would be the screenshot. It would also be cool if Image 1 was the logo from the system (emu) the last played game was on, but that would possibly require alternate logo's for systems to match marquee sizes or the like. I need to think on this more to determine how to get it to look good...trying to decide. The start page I'm working on 'works' now but I'm not entire happy with it and I think because of how it is (i.e., just a menu of items to go deeper into) with no real 'use' tied to it, I may have to do something a bit out of the ordinary...which I think I just got an idea for. Unrelated - is there a way to turn off or change the 'swoop in' transition that screenshots and graphics do? And I KNOW I saw this somewhere - but is there a way to have all emu's listed on the start page?

- Separate Selector Bar/Image for the Menu and for the List, just because of potential variations in formatting of the two items it's not always aesthetically possible to have the same bar work (optimally) for both elements. - Ability to right/left/center/etc. align all elements containing text (e.g., list, menu, select lines, title, list num) - ability to do vertical aligning (or at least have it centered in the 'zone' would be great also.

Tom or anyone else that may know, What is the prioritization of images selected to be shown on a screen/layout for a given module in the Image1 and Image 2 slots? I'm primarily concerned with the following modules/screens as I'm not using or going to theme for the more media oriented modules at this time (the theme will be a cab theme): - Start - MAME - MAMESelect - EMU (assuming the priority for this holds true even if using individual screens for emu's) - Emulator_select (same assumption as above) - Daphne (if diff. then mame/emu) - Favorites - Last Played - Most Played - Search (if anything)