MaLa v1.0 RC3 available

[swindus]

Improvements
- Added the ability to rotate videos in realtime. Now it is possible to display attract videos on rotated screens (90, 180, 270).
- Added the ability to execute commands before and after emulator execution.
- Added a sub folder search for rom files of non mame emulators.
- Added more placeholder for the emulator command line: rom path, parent rom name and rom extension.
- Complete rework of the 'Most played game list' handling. Now available for each emulator.
- Complete rework of the game list tab in the options dialog. Removed all editing stuff. Added a button to lauch MalaGamelist with the selected game list.
- MalaTree and MalaGamelist can be started with command line parameter: Open these apps from the options dialog to edit the tree or a game list with one click.
- Added the ability to add/remove games to/from game lists from the popup menu.
- Names of roms are temporary saved and loaded again after refreshing the main game list.
- Added the ability to update all game properties of all existing game lists for an emulator with values from the main game list.
- Added an optional message box to show the programming of a keyboard encoder.
- Added display of pre/post commands execution to the starting dialog.
- Added emulator command line presets.
- Added a add/remove by description content (include and/or exclude) function to MaLaGamelist
- Added more GUI sounds: quit game, emu switch, attract mode/screensaver start, orientation switch.
- Added a more generic way to launch control panel viewer like CPViewer, CPMaker or Johnny5.
- Added an option to disable the internal jukebox if you want to use an external one.
- Added a function that tracks the selected game list for each emulator and the selected game of a each game list. So the last selected game list and game will be reselected when switching back to an emulator.
- Added a manifest to all applications so they use WinXP controls now.
- Added a new placeholder for text displays and lcd screens: play count.
- Added a property to the layout to hide the game list text display.
- Added more options to the definable naming: rom + 1, rom + 2, rom - 1, rom - 2. This allows to display a marquee picture list of games for example.
- Added an alternative shutdown method (shutdown.exe)
- Some more smaller improvements.

Bugfixes
- Wrong listing of game list files when using more then 10 emulators.
- Focus problem when using game start on MaLa start.
- Path of video files for other emulators not saved.
- Not possible to edit LEDs greater 16.
- Access violation in MalaLayout, MalaTree and MalaGamelist when saving a new file.
- Names of games not saved after loading a name file.

Changes
- The file format of the game lists and the emulator settings has changed.

http://mala.arcadezentrum.com/download.html

[unclet]

A lot of improvements were made  ..... looks great.   This is really a very nice front end which seems like it does as much as MameWah does plus tons more stuff..... also the GUI interface allows it to be extremely easy to setup and manage.

I believe everyone should try this application out plus donate towards this project .....

Thanks again for your hard work .....

[Quarterhorse]

A dumb question....

but if I want to upgrade to this newest version (my MALA version is about 3 months old)...do I need to delete the previous version and start fresh with this install, or extract into mala and replace files that way....

[swindus]

Due to some improvements you have to start with a fresh install. The file format for the game lists and non MAME emulator settings (mala.mle) has changed to implement some of th new features. I hope these are the last big file format changes ...

But you should be able to use all your layouts and other files again.

[unclet]

I can verify that the RC3 version is jammed packed with features and installing this new version is well worth it .... even if you must reconfigure each emulator.    Not really a big deal, since MALA is all GUI driven. 

[loadman]

even if you must reconfigure each emulator.    Not really a big deal, since MALA is all GUI driven.

  So true..  after beta testing many versions  I have set-up from scratch many times   

[swindus]

Added an emulator preset page to the MaLa webpage. Download or submit emulator command line presets.

The following emulators are covered by the current file:

[Quarterhorse]

I'm liking it so far....still setting up my mala tree and tweaking. 

Any new layouts on the horizon?  I'm wanting something really retro or galaga based...

[unclet]

Remember you can convert any of the existing MameWah layouts into Mala compatible layouts by downloading the MalaLayout Converter from the Mala homepage.....  works great .... I am using all of the layouts available from John's CPViewer site .... those are the best (in my opinion) and also keep a constant theme for all the emulators I configured.

Again, I would recommend that everyone try MALA since it is very easy in many ways and has a lot of features as well.

Of course, if you like it, I would also recommend pressing the Donate button on the MALA homepage .... to say thanks ....