Quick Rotation Question

[GoYouSalukis]

Is there a way to get MALA to rotate back to horizontal after every game? I'm using the startcom to rotate the screen.

Also, I put a reference to my roatation exe in the MALA exit options to rotate back to horizontal when MALA exits, but it doesn't seem to get called. Are arguments allowed along with the EXE?

Thanks,
Justin

[DaOld Man]

Here is the development thread for startcom.
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,91842.0.html

You may find your answer there, if not post back and we will see what we can do.
Also, your question about Mala exiting, I dont think you can pass arguments with the program to run on exit, however you can call a bat file that can call your rotation exe with the argument it needs to turn your monitor.

[TopJimmyCooks]

The beauty of Mala is you can have a horizontal and vertical layout so you don't have to rotate back to horizontal upon game exit. 

That being said, like DaOldMan mentioned, you can rotate back to horizontal on Mala exit not by arguments but by calling a bat file.  I have it set up to rotate  to horizontal upon mala exit, rotate upon startup to horizontal, and always start mala in horizontal.  can give more detail on this if you need it.

[GoYouSalukis]

Thanks guys,

I should have thought of the batch file. I do have a horiz/vert layout setup right now, but it seems like the slick ones are all just horizontal.

I appreciate the help!

[mike boss]

The beauty of Mala is you can have a horizontal and vertical layout so you don't have to rotate back to horizontal upon game exit. 

That being said, like DaOldMan mentioned, you can rotate back to horizontal on Mala exit not by arguments but by calling a bat file.  I have it set up to rotate  to horizontal upon mala exit, rotate upon startup to horizontal, and always start mala in horizontal.  can give more detail on this if you need it.

I don't know about this roatition of monitor stuff, however I've seen it on a few projects.
Assuming a set up was using this, say I had my main games list "All Games" then my "Vertical Games" list, it can be set up so when Mala displays my vertical games list it switches to a vertical layout ? (and assuming I had the software/hardware my monitor would rotate)

[mike boss]

Any other info on this ??
I was playing around with MaLa today and some of the amazing options I've never tweaked (amount of games scrolled/jumping letters in the gameslist using control panel buttons). I noticed you can use a button  to generate an orientation switch. However what I still need to know is can MaLa be configured to switch layout upon switch ?

[mike boss]

No other info on this ?
Doing as many layouts as I have, I know how to make the layout switch going from MAME to "X" (for example).
But how do you get MaLa to change layouts when  you switch orientation ?

[DaOld Man]

In the Mala Layout editor, you assign different layouts for horizontal and vertical.
Is this what you mean, or am I once again out in the weeds?

[mike boss]

Ideal would be when I switch to a list of vert games the layout changes along with it.
So I have layout 1  - HORIZONTAL , then when I goto my vert list, layout 2 - VERT would show up alongside the monitor rotation.

Thanks all

[Le Chuck]

I don't think Mala can do that out of the box. If you set all vert games as a separate Emulator then you might be able to but I don't recall being able to auto flip rotations like that.

An easy work around would be a variation of the award winning TRON in game switching. When the vert list appears the Monitor rotates and the layout changes to vert. The tricky bit will be keeping it from rotating back when you start the game. Tricky but not difficult. Let me know if that is what you're after and I can go more in depth.

Oh, and if there is a simpler solution somebody please jump in.

Edit for clarification: if you're wanting to do this without rotating the monitor then you would just need to make a verticle layout for a horizontal oriented monitor and set that as a skin for that list in MALA, but that would look kinda funny IMO.   

[TopJimmyCooks]

Mala is set up differently than you're thinking.  The way Mala wants to work is this:
Make two layouts:  horizontal and vertically oriented.
Game lists:  you can have a separate vert gamelist if you wish but you would be able to browse all lists in either H or V layout.
when you select a game with vert metadata it will rotate to vert if needed.
when you exit the game the display stays V and the V layout comes up.
Upon selecting an H game it will rotate and return to the H layout on game exit.

I don't think it's setup to rotate while in mala upon gamelist change, natively in MaLa.  However, as LeChuck mentioned this type of thing can be done with AHK and scripts if you really want it.  IMHO the native way is better - less rotation and you're never watching Mala spin- just the game or your Loading splash screen. 

My game lists have no separation between H and V, the rotation is automatic upon game start as required.  If you had to manually switch your display orientation, by all means separate lists would start to make sense. 

[mike boss]

Anyone have a video of this ?

[Le Chuck]

Of what specifically?  The auto rotation or the orientation switching? 

[TopJimmyCooks]

my link to the cab build in my signature has a video - the rotation part is at the end of the video but it shows it in operation. 

[BadMouth]

To elaborate what TopJimmyCooks posted earlier, Mala layouts have a Horizontal and Vertical version contained within the same mll file.
When you are making a layout in the layout editor and switch to vertical, you aren't changing the type of layout.
You are working on the vertical setup for the same layout.  If you switch back to horizontal, everything is still as you left it.
If you switch between orientations while in Mala, it will switch between the two setups you made within the same layout file.
They don't have to look the same. 
DaOldMan's plugin has Mala switch it's orientation to match the monitor orientation when necessary. 

I made my layouts square so they appear the same no matter which way the monitor is oriented. 
The background images are actually not the same. 
The horizontal one has black bars on the sides, the other has them top and bottom.
It doesn't appear to the user to ever switch regardless of orientation.

I originally started out having the appearance different for each orientation,
but found it disorienting to have the placement of things shift when the monitor rotated.

[mike boss]

Ok cool.
I'm going to play with this.
Thanks !

I have a customer who's set up (from what I understand) is like the "SwitchCade."
The monitor itself physically moves when playing vertical games.
My customer would like a vertical layout for when the monitor is in the vertical state.

I think I've grasped this. I'm going to play around.

Where do I get DaOldMan's plugin ?

[TopJimmyCooks]

plugin is called startcom at malafe.net, plugin's section. 

[mike boss]

Ahhh.................I saw that plugin............stupid me I was looking for plugin by "DAOLDMAN."
No wonder !

Thanks all............I think I have the info I need.
I'll need to do a quick test making the one MLL file with both horizontal and vertical layout built in.

[mike boss]

Working on my Fix It Felix layout, and as BadMouth said you can indeed set up a vertical and horizontal set up for each layout.
This is perfect and I think solves the issue a few people had mentioned.
My FIF Jr layout has both the horizontal and vertical contained in the same layout.

This is awesome !

[DaOld Man]

Ahhh.................I saw that plugin............stupid me I was looking for plugin by "DAOLDMAN."

Sorry about that. I think I used my real name of the mala plugin.