BBC Micro

[Krakerman]

Anyone know which emulator to use for emulating the BBC Micro? I looked at BeebEm, but it doesn't have a way to exit the emulator and having GameEx (ESC) works, but it doesn't shutdown the emulator for some reason as it will still be running. That emulator doesn't appear to have anyway to close it down as I tried Alt+F4. Also doesn't have a command line for fullscreen, but you can do a alt+enter to go fullscreen. Just curious if anyone has it setup on their GameEx system at all.

Also M.E.S.S doesn't autoload and run games using that emulator. That is why I liked Beebem. Well I sent an e-mail to the author and maybe he will implement it in the next release of Beebem.

Also is an attached image I found for the BBC, but it needs the white background to be transparent as well if anyone wants to clean it up

[fRequEnCy]

I looked at BeebEm, but it doesn't have a way to exit the emulator and having GameEx (ESC) works, but it doesn't shutdown the emulator for some reason as it will still be running.

So then it doesn't work? LOL.

I havent tested in GameEx but tried reading the help files as usual.

There doesn't seem to be a switch for fullscreen (not that I came across) but there is a solution. If you look in the Preferences.cfg file located in the UserData directory of your emulator install, there is an option to set to fullscreen which then works when running from command-line. The setting is:

FullScreen=01

Now if you run from command-line, your command-line should be as follows:

BeebEm.exe -Prefs "C:\Program Files\BeebEm\UserData\Preferences.cfg" "[ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE]"

Note: The location of my Preferences.cfg file may differ from yours, so just use your location for that part.

Now for exiting the emulator, since not at my machine can only give advice since I can't test in GameEx but it will/should work with this solution. If GameEx doesn't work by sending ESC, then it may be because it is used in the emulator. You could try to disable that key in the settings or IMO, I think it would be best to exit the correct way to exit the emulator. Create and advanced config and setup theses keys to exit:

Alt+f x

I have exited successfully with those keys. Alt+f brings up the file menu and x is the key to exit. It's the best solution I could come up with, but it works.

[Draco1962]

Here ya go - png file with alpha! BTW, I am still using GIMP (Open source equivalent to Photoshop). I have barely scratched the surface of what it is capable. Comes in both 32 and 64-bit flavors and is free!

[Krakerman]

WOW! That worked great and the ESC key works perfect on exiting Beebem and going back to GameEx as it shutsdown like it should. Works now in Fullscreen and I managed to config the joystick to work as well. Thanks for fixing the image as well So you are using GIMP eh, I'll have a look at it as I've been using Paint.net, but how do you get rid of the white and make it transparent is it easy? Can you explain so I won't have to keep bothering all of you to fix the images I post (I do appreciate the help that all of you do for me by doing that thou)

Thanks again!!

[Draco1962]

WOW! That worked great and the ESC key works perfect on exiting Beebem and going back to GameEx as it shutsdown like it should. Works now in Fullscreen and I managed to config the joystick to work as well. Thanks for fixing the image as well So you are using GIMP eh, I'll have a look at it as I've been using Paint.net, but how do you get rid of the white and make it transparent is it easy? Can you explain so I won't have to keep bothering all of you to fix the images I post (I do appreciate the help that all of you do for me by doing that thou)

Thanks again!!

There are quite a few tutorials for the program. The main thing to remember is most images are single layer, so you will have to add an alpha channel for the transparency. There are several selection tools that are quite useful - fuzzy select (great for the initial croping of the areas surrounding an image (if a solid color), Magic Lasso whic allows doe more free-form trimming, and color select (great if there is a a lot of one color to be rid of - but have to be careful if colors in image are close to colors surrounding. Once you get a handle on it, cleanup is relatively fast with a good image with decent contrast between subject and background.

Will be glad to help as much as I can. Celly uses Photoshop (as does Vsilvalopes) and both are quite skilled from what I have seen so I am sure either will jump in occasionally. I was going to use Photoshop, but have been on an open-source kick as of late (migrating from MS Office to OpenOffice. I won't go so far as converting to Linux (I'm a Microsoft kinda guy and used to dealing with it - warts and all).

[Krakerman]

The author of Beebem wrote me back and said he will implement the fullscreen cmd line option and a keyboard shortcut to exit the emulator in the upcomming release.

Not that we need it anymore as your method worked great.

[fRequEnCy]

The author of Beebem wrote me back and said he will implement the fullscreen cmd line option and a keyboard shortcut to exit the emulator in the upcomming release.

Not that we need it anymore as your method worked great.

Well that's good news! Will still be beneficial as it will be easier to deal with in the future for users who want to use that emulator. Thanks for the news!

[Krakerman]

If anyone is interested in trying the emulator look here: http://www.mkw.me.uk/beebem/