PinballX Enhancements/Features Requests

[Rainman]

Can you not just do it as a custom system? How does HyperSpin do it?

It can be added, but then again, it would be impossible to run it without keyboard... anyhow.. here'e how HyperPin is doing it.

As we all know, hyperpin is using FPlaunch to launch the tables. Now, the latest mod version of fplaunch is Fplaunch 1.295 WIP 10 adds support for jukebox.

Please head over to http://vpuniverse.com/forums/topic/315-fplaunch-1295-wip-10/ and download the latest fplanch. Then take a look into the file fplaunch.ahk and just search for dwjukebox (or jukebox) then you'll see a few lines of code that handles the processing of a .bat file (also included in the zip) which is just a basic batch file containing code to run the actual dwjukebox.exe software.

Now, part two... In order to actually be able to show the jukebox in PinballX table list and blend nicely into the interface (and start it) , one has to make a .vpt file called jukebox.vpt and delete all the script code in it. The newly created vpt table is added to Visual Pinall.xml database just like a regular table. Then it can be selected in PinballX table menu. Selecting the file, the launcher parses the instructions and instead running the .vpt table (which acts only as a fronted puppet) runs the batch code.

hope this helps! Thanks in advance

[Tom Speirs]

I still cant see why it just can't be added as a custom system and using an xpadder profile or script.

[Tom Speirs]

PS: You can setup custom systems/emulators in PinballX. Its not all hard coded.

[Tom Speirs]

PS 2: Maybe someone will help you with it hopefully but the functionality should already be in PinballX.

[horseyhorsey]

It can be added, but then again, it would be impossible to run it without keyboard... anyhow.. here'e how HyperPin is doing it.

As we all know, hyperpin is using FPlaunch to launch the tables. Now, the latest mod version of fplaunch is Fplaunch 1.295 WIP 10 adds support for jukebox.

Please head over to http://vpuniverse.com/forums/topic/315-fplaunch-1295-wip-10/ and download the latest fplanch. Then take a look into the file fplaunch.ahk and just search for dwjukebox (or jukebox) then you'll see a few lines of code that handles the processing of a .bat file (also included in the zip) which is just a basic batch file containing code to run the actual dwjukebox.exe software.

Now, part two... In order to actually be able to show the jukebox in PinballX table list and blend nicely into the interface (and start it) , one has to make a .vpt file called jukebox.vpt and delete all the script code in it. The newly created vpt table is added to Visual Pinall.xml database just like a regular table. Then it can be selected in PinballX table menu. Selecting the file, the launcher parses the instructions and instead running the .vpt table (which acts only as a fronted puppet) runs the batch code.

hope this helps! Thanks in advance

Like Tom says, all you need to do is make add it to custom system. Create an xml and you will see it in your menu. If I get a bit of time today I'll take a look.

[Rainman]

OK guys thanks for the input... so basic approach would be this: I need to create a folder inside Database and Media called Jukebox and then try to connect PinballX to the custom batch file that starts the jukebox.exe file?

[Darkmeteor]

I would like to be able to edit all of the text that is displayed in PinballX, that is the "featuring xx tables" and all the menu items when choosing a table. I tried looking in files and folders and I can't find anything to edit that, so it is hardcoded in the executable I suppose.

[horseyhorsey]

Got myself some time to play some pinballx and got thinking when I looked in the information tab.

I don't know about anyone else but I was thinking that it would be really good to build a database like mame info from IPDB. All this information & trivia for table can then be shown in the information tab.

http://www.ipdb.org/search.pl?any=dracula&search=Search+Database&searchtype=quick

[Lyanheart]

Since I've been playing a lot of old EM tables lately, I've found myself annoyed that many of them don't have a high score feature. Some have a little "sticky note" somewhere that records high scores. So I'm wondering if a high score tracking feature could be added and dispalyed/edited from the Table Info screen. I've started a little discussion about high scores on these EM tables on vpforums also to toss some ideas around. I'm wondering if something could be added to the script of the VP tables to export the score to a text file when the game ends, and this could be displayed by the frontend.

[evilantal]

excellent call horseyhorsey on the info database!

also...some options on where the year/manufacturer/system info is displayed (center, bottom right, bottom left, upper right, upper left). And maybe the size?

[spootdev]

Got myself some time to play some pinballx and got thinking when I looked in the information tab.

I don't know about anyone else but I was thinking that it would be really good to build a database like mame info from IPDB. All this information & trivia for table can then be shown in the information tab.

http://www.ipdb.org/search.pl?any=dracula&search=Search+Database&searchtype=quick

I have a partial db (sqlite3) of this for a project I'm working on. Having a full one isn't a bad idea.......I'll look into full db dump eventually.

[greatflash]

Just a quick note.

A database is in the works that holds all the info and trivia including the theme of the table along with its type, players, designer, year, etc.

This will be integrated in some way with PBX at some point, all going well.

[horseyhorsey]

AWESOME news!

[punter1]

Now that Flyer is on playfield and Instructions are on backglass, combine them into one menu item so they are displayed at the same time.

[Sir Cheddar]

I'm starting to switch over from my heavily modified HP installation to pbx and would like to request two things:

1) An option to disable the info bar at the bottom or an option to make it not display the table description

2) An option to disable the table description in the (very useful) information area

The reason I ask for this, I misused the table descriptions in my XML file to change sorting to my preference.

I sort all recreations by manufactoring year and month. The originals are sorted by type (Bowler, Music Template, Pinball Game recreation), then alphabetically. Everything has a letter in front so I can skip up and down by 5 years.

So my descriptions look funny. And they are missing all blanks and special characters. I got rid of everything that isn't alphanumeric while hunting for an bug in HP.

d0199410RedAndTedsRoadShowWilliams

d0199411TheShadowBally

e0199501MaryShelleysFrankensteinSega

e0199502BaywatchSega

e0199503DirtyHarryWilliams

e0199503StargateGottlieb

You get the idea

[Tom Speirs]

Ill consider it but you know you can add custom lists to PinballX, right?

[Sir Cheddar]

Thank you for considering it

Custom lists are an useful feature but (assuming alphabethical sorting by description can't be disabled) I can not do with them what I can do with my current config now - going seamlessly from EM to EE to SS.

If you sort alphabetically "Big Daddy (Williams 1963)" goes next to "Big Bang Bar (Capcom 1996)". They don't belong together.

Tables like "Gorgar (Williams 1979)" and "Rolling Stones (Bally 1980)" are a much better match, but you won't see them together if you filter by decades.

[SEALen]

I would like to be able to edit all of the text that is displayed in PinballX, that is the "featuring xx tables" and all the menu items when choosing a table. I tried looking in files and folders and I can't find anything to edit that, so it is hardcoded in the executable I suppose.

Yes, this would be very usefull. Especially if you'd like to translate to another languge.

[Gilrock]

Just tried out PinballX and it looks pretty nice. It seems to enter and exit my tables a little cleaner than I had been getting. The only bummer is having to reimport all my media but luckily my pin is fairly new and I don't have a ton of tables yet.

I see several others asking for different filter options in the menu and that's why I was looking at this thread. I wanted to be able to filter down to only VP or FP tables. My suggestion would be to make the menu XML driven to let each one of us customize the filters for what we want. Like have something like this...not sure if this is even XML but something close to that for us to customize:

<Menu Item>

<Title>FP Tables</Title>

<Filter>System</Filter>

<Value>Future Pinball</Value>

</Menu Item>

<Menu Item>

<Title>VP Tables</Title>

<Filter>System</Filter>

<Value>Visual Pinball</Value>

</Menu Item>

<Menu Item>

<Title>80's Tables</Title>

<Filter>Year</Filter>

<Value>1980</Value>

</Menu Item>

Thanks,

Gil

[Gilrock]

Small request (Love the FE btw) . When the FE looks into the "tables" folder, is there any way it could look in sub folders also? I like to keep the tables in their own folder when the come with other stuff. Rules, read me file, music, textures....etc.

Thanks

I like to second this request as something really needed. FP tables like to have a boatload of associated files and I'm reluctant to move them all up into the Tables level.

Gil

[Tom Speirs]

You know PinballX does support zips so you could zip them up. It will automatically extract the files.

[Gilrock]

You know PinballX does support zips so you could zip them up. It will automatically extract the files.

Nope I didn't know that. I've only used the program a couple hours. I can use that technique for now but I'm betting Future Pinball is not going to like that method if I need to run a table directly in FP. I just discovered Future Pinball yesterday and spent like 5 hours figuring out bug workarounds and tweaks to get it up and running. So for now I'm constantly running tables in FP removing HUD's from the playfield and fixing table alignments. But I really appreciate this tip....I'll start zipping them up after I think I'm done messing with a table.

Nice job on the program...I dropped you guys a donation.

Thanks,

Gil

[Tom Speirs]

Thanks for the donation. I am going to add support for launching/testing games from the game list manager in the future so that will help test and setup tables in the future.

[Tom Speirs]

Nope I didn't know that. I've only used the program a couple hours. I can use that technique for now but I'm betting Future Pinball is not going to like that method if I need to run a table directly in FP. I just discovered Future Pinball yesterday and spent like 5 hours figuring out bug workarounds and tweaks to get it up and running. So for now I'm constantly running tables in FP removing HUD's from the playfield and fixing table alignments. But I really appreciate this tip....I'll start zipping them up after I think I'm done messing with a table.

Nice job on the program...I dropped you guys a donation.

Thanks,

Gil

Ive just released 1.55 which allows launching of tables from the game list manager using the same method as the front end. This should be very useful for testing and setup.

[Gilrock]

Hi Tom. Thanks for the update. The only other thing I ran into yesterday was when I drop a new table in the FP Tables directory it wouldn't show up in the list when trying to add it as a new game unless I closed and reopened the program. You could get fancy and let the interface be a drop target for the table.

Thanks,

Gil