Author Topic: Simple Led-wiz helper app W.I.P (Read 10569 times)

mahuti · « **on:** January 24, 2006, 06:58:40 am »

I built a simple app for the led-wiz last night. You call my app from a commandline with a parameter (usually a romname) and it will copy relevant led-wiz script to the clipboard. You can download it here.

You configure it with an ini file like so; ROMNAME=LED-WIZ Command. In my case I'm calling led-wiz LWA files that I created with the led-wiz app.

[default]
PACMAN=LWZ-FLP:nobutton
MSLUG2=LWZ-FLP:3buttonneo
MISSILE=LWZ-FLP:3button
MSPACMAN=LWZ-FLP:nobutton
OTWALLS=LWZ-FLP:nobutton
OMEGRACE=LWZ-FLP:2button
RAMPAGE=LWZ-FLP:2button
DEFENDER=LWZ-FLP:defender
JOUST=LWZ-FLP:1button
DEFAULT=LWZ-FLP:blah

I made this app so that I could highlight the buttons used in a game or even make the buttons the colors of the original buttons on the fly. You can make it do anything you want, though... the parameter doesn't have to be a romname, so go nuts.

I shot a short video of it being used with Mamewan and set49way. You can view it

Be warned... it's about 9 mb. You'll see, in the front end, a default animation is called, when I go to a game, a specific layout is called. You can see in the video, when I call Missile command, I didn't have the romname correct in the ini file, so it continues playing the default anim.

I MAY put in an ERROR default anim. I wouldn't hold your breath though on that or any additional features, though. This is just a hold-me-over until somebody comes out with more / better comprehensive software that can do the same thing.

Minwah · « **Reply #1 on:** January 24, 2006, 08:05:44 am »

I've said it before that lighted stuff isn't really my bag...but I must admit that's a very cool setup

Now I need to argue with myself about whether I need this...I thought I'd nearly finished my stick panel...

JoyMonkey · « **Reply #2 on:** January 24, 2006, 08:16:29 am »

Cool! I just got my Super-Bright LEDs and gave the LED-Wiz its first try last night. Once my vision returns to normal (thems LEDs be real bright) I'll definetly give this a go!

MYX · « **Reply #3 on:** January 24, 2006, 08:30:59 am »

Quote from: Minwah on January 24, 2006, 08:05:44 am

I've said it before that lighted stuff isn't really my bag...but I must admit that's a very cool setup

Now I need to argue with myself about whether I need this...I thought I'd nearly finished my stick panel...

You know you wannit. Everyone else is doin it. Come on try it. (peer pressure)

MYX · « **Reply #4 on:** January 24, 2006, 02:15:02 pm »

You know what the seller of that video is, you hopped onto some game (whick you escaped from before it came up) and the 3 buttons went very different colors. That was cool. durring the attract mode does it refer to a script or animation preset or what? Also, I noticed that on the first game that the button pulses on and off is that an animation you asked it to do? Can you elaborate more on the deeper set up?

mahuti · « **Reply #5 on:** January 24, 2006, 02:21:23 pm »

I'm just calling ledwiz scripts that you can create with the led-wiz software. None of the animation is a function of my software.... mine just calls those files based on a parameter passed in.

With the led-wiz software you can make really elaborate animations, but they're not tied to the game. If someone ever releases a custom version of mame that works off of events then the lighting can be tied into specifics of the game.

You can make the buttons pulse or fade or turn on and off, chase, whatever you want... all in the led-wiz software LWA files. With my specific configuration, when you go back to the front-end, it defaults to a chaser pattern. When you go to a specifiic game... a file is called based on the number of buttons it uses.

KillerArcades · « **Reply #6 on:** January 24, 2006, 02:28:15 pm »

Awesome, Muhati thanks! I'll definitely give this a shot once I have my buttons and LED's.

MYX · « **Reply #7 on:** January 24, 2006, 04:46:25 pm »

Quote from: mahuti on January 24, 2006, 02:21:23 pm

You can make the buttons pulse or fade or turn on and off, chase, whatever you want... all in the led-wiz software LWA files. With my specific configuration, when you go back to the front-end, it defaults to a chaser pattern. When you go to a specifiic game... a file is called based on the number of buttons it uses.

Ok - DEFENDER=LWZ-FLP:defender <-- is the second defender then name of the LWA file?

mahuti · « **Reply #8 on:** January 24, 2006, 05:05:21 pm »

yeah... this app basically just copies those =whatever commands to the clipboard. Nothing fancy.

LWZ-FLP:whatever is Led Wiz's command for running a file. You can also do strait commands, but I find that just creating the files and then running them is easiest.

One thing I must note about led-wiz. If you have been using the led-wiz app for making files, you need to quit it and restart for it to properly listen to the clipboard.

If I have some time tonight, I may add more support for things like running a LWA based on MAME's CFG files so you don't have to manually enter the info in the ini file.

JoyMonkey · « **Reply #9 on:** January 24, 2006, 05:52:33 pm »

Ooh! I just realized that this little app and the LED Wiz could be used to switch my Suzo inductive joysticks from 8-way to 4-way when a 4-way game is launched.
Nice!

RandyT · « **Reply #10 on:** January 24, 2006, 06:08:25 pm »

Quote from: mahuti on January 24, 2006, 05:05:21 pm

One thing I must note about led-wiz. If you have been using the led-wiz app for making files, you need to quit it and restart for it to properly listen to the clipboard.

This is a known issue (unfortunately, only to me and those who have run across it)

I'll take a look at the WIP that I think fixes this problem and see if it is stable enough to make available.

RandyT

MikeQ · « **Reply #11 on:** January 24, 2006, 06:46:38 pm »

Randy,

You really need to hire a Director of Software. Your too busy making hardware. You need a QE team to catch these issues before your customers do and an engineering team to fix them.

All in jest, I'm amazed at how much one person can accomplish.

RandyT · « **Reply #12 on:** January 24, 2006, 10:47:49 pm »

Quote from: MikeQ on January 24, 2006, 06:46:38 pm

Randy,

You really need to hire a Director of Software. Your too busy making hardware. You need a QE team to catch these issues before your customers do and an engineering team to fix them.

All in jest, I'm amazed at how much one person can accomplish.

Heh. Fortunately Lisa turned out to be a natural born solderer, so she builds 85% of what goes out the door. She also packs the orders. I do the 100% pre-ship QC, Customer Service and Hardware and software design. We work pretty well together.

But it's folks like you, Mahuti, Tiger Heli, SirP and others, who grab the ball and run with it, are the ones that really help to bring it all together so more people can enjoy what we build.

It sure would be nice sometimes to say, "here, fix this!" to someone that wasn't me

RandyT

mahuti · « **Reply #13 on:** January 25, 2006, 02:40:46 am »

I've made the app capable of reading the CFG file from MAME. I'm not exactly sure what I'm going to do with that at this point though. I need to think about how I can execute on that to do something slick. A few things come to mind... any suggestions (keep it simple, please)

MikeQ · « **Reply #14 on:** January 25, 2006, 09:19:12 am »

Muhati,

Are you using C or VB? If you'd like to get rid of the clipboard interface and talk directly to the LEDWiz without need to run the LEDWiz control panel, I can help you hook up the LEDWiz.dll.

Also, I have code to parse the .LWA files and generate the appropriate calls the LEDWiz.dll.

Let me know if this is something you want to do.

Later,

Mike

KillerArcades · « **Reply #15 on:** January 25, 2006, 09:41:17 am »

Woohoo! It's so awesome to follow this and see the progress everyone's making already. I'm stoked to get going on my CP, I just finished the layout and color schemes last night.

RandyT, I definitely would like to use two LED.WIZ's simultaneously. So, whatever I need to do to get them ordered and all that, just let me know.

Thanks everyone for you work so far, this is gonna be friggin awesome!

SirPoonga · « **Reply #16 on:** January 25, 2006, 10:16:50 am »

Quote from: mahuti on January 25, 2006, 02:40:46 am

I've made the app capable of reading the CFG file from MAME. I'm not exactly sure what I'm going to do with that at this point though. I need to think about how I can execute on that to do something slick. A few things come to mind... any suggestions (keep it simple, please)

You mean the cfg files that are in xml format that contain control information?

mahuti · « **Reply #17 on:** January 25, 2006, 11:16:38 am »

Yeah. That.

Re: coding language that i'm using...

Heh... I'm a flash developer, so technically I'm using ActionScript through Macromedia Flash with special calls and using Northcode's SWFStudio 3.0 to compile it into an EXE. They don't have an SDK for plugins for the current version of their app yet, though, so I can't write anything to hook into a DLL at this time until they release that new SDK. I can run an executable with parameters no problem, but I can't hook strait into DLLs.

They have excellent customer service, and they'll bend over backward, but even if they were to help me out on it, I wouldn't even know where to start to ask them to help connect to a DLL since I have no background in traditional programming. I know their plugins can be built on C/C++ or V, but again... that doesn't do anything for me.

mahuti · « **Reply #18 on:** January 25, 2006, 01:11:31 pm »

OK. So, I have a few bugs to work out, but I'm able to do the following;

1. display special layouts based on an [overrides] section (same as the [defaults] above
2. display xbutton.lwa (1button, 2button, 3button) file based on how many buttons are mapped in a game's CFG file. Since not everyone maps every button, I'll have to work to combine this with controls.dat info and the default config. Mostly put this in to test. I plan on adding support for controls.dat tonight.
3. Read config options on where your mame's CFG file is located, etc.

I'm not going to release this quite yet because right now it's a visual mess since it's not running in stealth mode for testing purposes... and it just needs a bit more time so that I can add in controls.dat and a few additional configuration options. HOWEVER, it is progressing.

mahuti · « **Reply #19 on:** January 25, 2006, 01:12:41 pm »

OH, and if you've already created DEFAULTs... they'll still work in the new version.

SirPoonga · « **Reply #20 on:** January 25, 2006, 01:56:16 pm »

Quote from: mahuti on January 25, 2006, 01:11:31 pm

2. display xbutton.lwa (1button, 2button, 3button) file based on how many buttons are mapped in a game's CFG file. Since not everyone maps every button, I'll have to work to combine this with controls.dat info and the default config. Mostly put this in to test. I plan on adding support for controls.dat tonight.

boogie man · « **Reply #21 on:** January 25, 2006, 04:45:31 pm »

Hey guys, I have been playing around with my led wiz for about 3 or 4 days now and have been trying to learn how to program in visual basic 6 ( notice I said learn, I know nothing of programing but the led wiz was what I needed to make me want to try) and what I would like to do is have a folder with lets say 10 animations in it and automatically play each one with an adjustable delay between each one, ( I am using the led wiz on an ice cream truck to control undercarriage lights and other lights on the sides, yea I know seems strange to me to) but I dont know where to start, I have the .ocx file I downloaded from the forums but bottom line is I dont know what to do with it, basically where do I start. thanks for the time.

mahuti · « **Reply #22 on:** January 27, 2006, 01:36:35 am »

UPDATE:

I've been doing a little work this week on my crapplication. It will probably be renamed when I release a new version next monday.

Anyway, It now can read your config file and light up the buttons without having a layout file. If you have 5 keys mapped to P1_BUTTON1, they will all display with the same color. If your keys are mapped to different buttons they will be different color. Currently the colors are hard coded. I'll be adding some additional configuration options later.

When I release a new version on monday, it may not have all the auto-display stuff in... but it will at least be able to figure out whether the game is 3 buttons, 2 buttons, etc and use a .lwa file to display the results either based on your configuration or based on number of buttons listed in controls.dat. I'm not solid on what I can release on Monday yet, but it will be cool.

My beta version currently can pull in info from several sources, CFG files, Listxml, ini files. I just need to start combining and comparing all of them. Meanwhile I have to make sure that my code doesn't bloat... nobody wants to lose a bunch of time waiting for their led app to wake up. If the feature set gets too bloated, I may have to set it up to only look at the ini files when you request it to, rather than all the time. I'd like this to be pretty sprightly.

Santoro · « **Reply #23 on:** January 27, 2006, 02:15:59 pm »

sweet.

mahuti · « **Reply #24 on:** January 27, 2006, 03:12:27 pm »

Just realized today that I could use Mamewah to call my app as App1_Executable... to show the button config while still in MAMEwah (like you might use Johnny5 to show what buttons something uses)

I was also wondering the other day how I could shut of my buttons without shutting off the computer. I made a "ledsoff.cfg" and threw it in MAME's cfg files and I set APP2_executable to run that specific file. In the future I'll just make it a -parameter option so you don't have to add another file.

These LEDs are gonna make my cabinet a LOT more usable.

KillerArcades · « **Reply #25 on:** January 27, 2006, 03:44:14 pm »

Hey, mahuti, forgive me if this was already talked about but, with your app, can you control the outputs such that say outputs 1&2 have a setting while in the FE menu, and another setting while actually in gameplay? Specifically, I use mamewah, and I'd like to assign an LED to a "start game" button and have it pulse while in mamewah's FE menu selecting a game, then once in the game, I'd like to set that button to "off".

?

mahuti · « **Reply #26 on:** January 27, 2006, 04:15:40 pm »

Yeah. I currently have it working this way. Even the version I released can do that, but you'll have to have a bat file call the app like so;

ECHO ON
c:\Arcade\bledwiz\bloodywiz.exe %1
cd\
cd arcade\mame\mame97\
mame %1
// This part's for setting it back to the "default" layout on MAME exit.
c:\Arcade\bledwiz\bloodywiz.exe default
exit

KillerArcades · « **Reply #27 on:** January 27, 2006, 05:54:54 pm »

perfect!

mahuti · « **Reply #28 on:** January 27, 2006, 06:43:53 pm »

I went ahead and threw up my most recent roughly stable version for you weekend experimenters.

Read the Readme file. There are a number of caveats.

Version 1 is stable and shouldn't wreck you
Version 2 has issues with things noted in the readme. ESC is your friend.

Download it here

I won't be around this weekend, so you're on your own.

mahuti · « **Reply #29 on:** January 30, 2006, 02:59:12 am »

Updated this a bit.

1. Now supports 0 button games correctly.

2. For 1,2,3 button games, the leds now pulse (will make this an optional feature in the future along with LED color configuration)

3. Removed support for LWA override files for the time being from version .02. I'll add it back in soon. You can still download vs. .01 however, which ONLY supports LWA files. Since I'm working on doing more auto-config stuff I'm going to concentrate on non-lwa file stuff for the time being.

Download it at the same link mentioned above.

mahuti · « **Reply #30 on:** January 30, 2006, 12:11:59 pm »

Added support back in for LWA override files in a new version. Unfortunately it's a hack, so you'll hear an error tone when running this. I can't get the led-wiz to stop running loops of LWA files without the hack. If you want override files use this new version.

Version .202 click here

Version .2 (no LWA files)

Version .1 (only LWA files)

Also, please note, as the led-wiz software gets firmed up a bit, I'll continue firming up my software.... unless sombebody comes out with something better (not hard

) Also, most of the support is built in for the controls.dat, I need to get an additional component taken care of which may take some time to do right. I'll keep you updated on that.

mahuti · « **Reply #31 on:** January 31, 2006, 11:33:08 pm »

Version .218 uploaded.

Get it here.

LWA + Overrides. No longer an error tone. Still only supports P1 buttons at this point. My priority is adding in support for controls.dat. Once that's in, I'll be adding in support for additional controls.

mahuti · « **Reply #32 on:** February 02, 2006, 01:24:47 am »

Good news. Rewrote this thing from the ground up today. It will now support all controls types for all players, buttons, joysticks, dials, etc. Also supports all led types (regular and RGB). Supports multiple controls & control types mapped to one LED with simple configuration. Example, you can map both KEYCODE_X and P1_JOYSTICK_LEFT to LED 18, anytime either is configged, led 18 will light. Still supports override LWA files.

Still haven't added support for Controls.dat.... I don't have the right XML parser for that yet. It will be a pretty simple process to add once I get a good XML parser set up.... especially now that this is a little more flexible.

I don't have a build out for this yet, but it's coming soon. Just need to take out some of the hard-coded test stuff before I publish. A few days....

Toonces · « **Reply #33 on:** February 02, 2006, 01:52:39 am »

Excellent! I am looking forward to trying it out!

Toonces

SirPoonga · « **Reply #34 on:** February 02, 2006, 11:03:50 am »

Quote from: mahuti on February 02, 2006, 01:24:47 am

Still haven't added support for Controls.dat.... I don't have the right XML parser for that yet. It will be a pretty simple process to add once I get a good XML parser set up.... especially now that this is a little more flexible.

What programming langauge are you using?

Silver · « **Reply #35 on:** February 02, 2006, 11:10:23 am »

Yeah if its VB6 or something you are using, you can use MSXML to parse the XML controlsDAT file. Although I strongly suggest using the SAX parser component, not the DOMDocument model. Its much faster, easier and does not use huge amounts of memory. Just a thought anyway...

If its not vb, sorry for butting in!

mahuti · « **Reply #36 on:** February 02, 2006, 11:54:47 am »

(Among other things) I'm a Macromedia Flash developer, so I'm using ActionScript & Flash. The Flash is then compiled into a C++ app by NorthCode SWFStudio. ActionScript can parse XML, but it's a bit slow on bigger documents. While I could probably parse Controls.dat with a negligible speed hit, I'd like to plan for the future, so I'll be using an external XML parsing tool (which will be embedded in my app). I had previously planned to modify a small / quick XML parser given to me by PacManFan and incorporate that, but it won't compile correctly (in a newer version of visual studio.) Until I get around to either;

a. updating PacManFan's code,
b. having someone with an older copy of Visual Studio compile my modded app
c. finding a different simple XML reader tool that can accept command line parameters and output to STDout.
or d. removing the errorring portion of PacManFan's code

I won't be able to put in the controls.dat stuff. I already have the code to pull in the nodes & stuff from controls.dat or listxml, I just need a simple / fast XML parsing tool. In tests with the precompiled version of XMLParse that PacManFan built for me I was able to pull out requested info from the 23mb Listxml and use it in less than a second, so I know it'll work. Now that most of the rest of the app is about where it should be, I won't have any further reasons to put off putting in the time to get that portion working, though. So it should happen in the next week or two.

Anyway, my apologies for not being a "real" programmer. I should just go ahead and officially learn C++ or Visual Basic. They're all basically the same as ActionScript and PHP and stuff anyway. Most modern programming languages are fairly similar and everytime I look at something new, I laugh at how I usually "get" most of it. Anyway, I usually don't need C++ since I don't even work on a PC, so therefore have almost no use for it. Too bad the new Macintels don't have support for dual boot, or WINE hasn't been updated to run windows apps natively on the new machines yet. Too bad I'm too cheap to buy an additional PC.

I never really intended that my app should be the end-all... I figured some body else would come out with something better. Until then, though, I'll keep workin on my stuff... I need it for my cab and I don't wanna wait for someone else to get around to it.

mahuti · « **Reply #37 on:** February 06, 2006, 12:20:18 am »

I'm finishing up testing this new "reads all controls" version. I'll be uploading it tomorrow.

I'm still thinking about how to best configure the coloring of the leds. Once I upload this new version, any feedback would be great. Most programs suffer from a lack of the programmer's imagination, rather than the lack of a programmers skill. This is no different... I could code it 100 different ways... I'd like to make sure the one I pick is the one that makes the most sense.

mahuti · « **Reply #38 on:** February 06, 2006, 11:00:06 am »

The new version has been uploaded. This reads all configged controls for all players, has configurable colors and works with all led types. Still need to add support for controls.dat though... currently working on that in earnest (finally).

http://mahuti.com/arcade/SetLedWiz.zip

Still trying to think of the best way to set up support for multiple players, etc.... Currently the app just looks down a list and assigns the first control it finds with the first color. I KNOW that's not optimal. Before I get into coding support p1 vs p2 vs p3, etc controls, I've been trying to think of the real-world ways in which this will get used.

KillerArcades · « **Reply #39 on:** March 07, 2006, 11:58:15 am »

Hey there, Mahuti,

I've been offline for a bit, but was just getting up to speed with where you're at. Any update?

If you're still looking for a bit of feedback on how to handle p1 vs p2 vs p3 vs p4, etc. Here's a real-world example of what I'm looking to do with my control panel. I'm about a week out on starting all my wiring and configuring. I get my artwork this week, will glue all that down (found a local print-shop that will give it a nice lexan type laminate without much extra cost, so I can skip the night mare of cutting and trimming plexiglass!!! HOORAY!), anyways, here's a jpg of what my color configuration's going to be (attached to this post).

Not sure if that's what you were really looking for, but what I plan on is using single color LED's, but having multiple buttons/diff color LED's for P1 button 1 (upper and lower controls on my layout, in case that's not obvious). I'll have a 8-way P1 joystick and on the top, I have a 4 way P1 joystick. I'd want both button 1's to light up, but with different colors. So, all I really need is an "on/off" signal, not a voltage setting by color, like it sounds like you were hardcoding.

I've got too many LED's and only one LED-WIZ, so I'm not doing RGB LED's, etc..

Anyways, I'd love to get an update of where you app is at. I'll be downloading whatever you've got by the end of next week and let you know where I end up with it.


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