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Frontend feature req: Display image when emulator paused
unclet:
Ok, clearly I did not read your recommendation correctly ..... can I pled insanity :dizzy:
I will look into the AFK script as well as IrfanView .... thanks for explaining everything twice for me :angel:
I am going away on vacation and will not be back for 4 days, but I will put this on my list of things to look into ...... just after finishing up my jukebox software ..... thanks again for setting me straight.
Tiger-Heli:
--- Quote from: unclet on March 15, 2007, 09:30:40 am ---Again, I see your point, but since I think this is rather an easy addition to any frontend, I decided to throw the idea out there ...... Actually, I am hoping to convince Swindus (MALA creator) to put this feature request high on his list. If not, then I will just keep showing the kids printed copies of the key mapping images, since I do not plan on switching frontend now ..... spent a lot of time configuring everything to work with MALA .... and I am happy with MALA a lot.
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Again, at the risk of coming off as a know-it-all jerk, which is not my intent - your original request was for a front-end to enable this. Your comment above states that you have Mala configured the way you want it and don't plan to change to something else. That doesn't give any frontend authors besides Swindus much incentive to develop a feature that likely only you will use.
I can't code MALA, but again, I am fairly certain you can get the current version of Mala to do what you want using AHK. (I just looked at Mala's setup web page and it looks like it has a "Custom Command Line" feature. You would simply modify this to launch a batch file that runs the AHK script and then launches MAME to start the game. (Or other emulator).
If you don't understand what I suggested, reply back and I will try to explain better how to get it to do what you want.
unclet:
I guess I just came up with the subject line based on the topic we were talking about when I decided to move the topic out of Paige's thread into this post. Not really a request from me to have other frontend developers to make this feature for me since I plan on staying with MALA, although others might have shown interest ..... until they discover the AFK script stuff you are referring to.
Hey, is the AFK script a standalone script or is it part of Johnny5 ..... I need to look at Howard's site and read what you receommend evetnually ..... thanks.
Tiger-Heli:
--- Quote from: unclet on March 15, 2007, 11:22:36 am ---Ok, clearly I did not read your recommendation correctly ..... can I pled insanity :dizzy:
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Apparently you were typing at the same time I was. No problem.
--- Quote ---I will look into the AFK script as well as IrfanView .... thanks for explaining everything twice for me :angel:
--- End quote ---
No problem. First thing is to decide how you want this to work! I.e. do you want the emulator to display your hints immediately when paused or do you want it to pause normally and then you have to move a joystick to display your image.
Things that I am not sure of, but I think we can find workarounds for:
1) As I said, MAME had timing issues when calling Johnny5 immediately on pausing. Johnny5 does a lot of stuff, so it takes a while to render an image and then to exit again. Calling IrfanView should be much quicker, so it might not have the timing issues that MAME does. And other emu's might not have these issues at all. (I don't currently have my system set up to use these scripts anymore, but I do have static images of my layouts, so I can set up a test of this and see if timing issues exist, but no promises that I'll have that working before you are ready to do it yourself.
2) I set my script (Method 5) up to display the image when F7 was pressed, but don't remember for sure if I had a check in there to only have F7 activate it when MAME was paused. (You wouldn't normally press it anyway during a game, so it didn't matter in my case, but if you wanted pause and joystick left to activate it, you wouldn't want the layout popping up each time you moved the stick to the left). I think I had it set up where it was only active when MAME was paused, but it's been a couple of years since I did any development or work with it.
3 and 4) My method 5 is set up so the same key is used to display the image as to go back to the pause screen. So it would be - Pause button pauses emulator, Joystick left (or right) displays image, Joystick left (or right) again returns to pause screen. Pause unpauses emulator. If you wanted left to display the image and right to remove it rather than left-left, I would need to get Howard C to look at what needs to be changed on the script. Similarly, if you go with Method 4 (Pause immediately brings up the image) we will need Howard C's help for the emulators that use a different key to unpause the emu.
Personally, I like Method 5 for similar reasons to what leapinlew said: 1) If I am in the middle of a firefight and need to leave or don't know what the controls are and pause the game and an image pops up, I no longer know that a fireball is coming down from the left, so I need to move right to duck it, and I will end up losing a life. 2) Is probably a bit easier to implement and avoids MAME timing issues, although we still may need HC's help for emu's that use different pause/unpause keys. I have no problem with asking him for help, but want to get further along to make sure this works for you before we involve him in this.
--- Quote ---I am going away on vacation and will not be back for 4 days, but I will put this on my list of things to look into ...... just after finishing up my jukebox software ..... thanks again for setting me straight.
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Take your time, and let me know if you get stuck along the way!
Tiger-Heli:
--- Quote from: unclet on March 15, 2007, 11:51:33 am ---Hey, is the AFK script a standalone script or is it part of Johnny5 ..... I need to look at Howard's site and read what you receommend evetnually ..... thanks.
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AHK - AutoHotKey, not AFK.
It is standalone. The AHK script takes care of monitoring keypresses, pausing MAME and calling Johnny5 when P is first pressed, then exiting Johnny5 and unpausing MAME when P is pressed again, etc., then exiting from memory when MAME quits. That is the reason that it is so simple to modify the script to simply call IrfanView to display your image full screen rather than calling Johnny5.
The main advantage Johnny5 gives you is that if you change your key assignments in MAME, it will automatically pick those up and you don't have to create new static images. (Also saves HD space by doing so, but that's usually not much of a concern anymore.
One caveat - I wrote my pages a couple of years ago using Beta 14 or something of Johnny5. Several of the frontends have changed how they support batch files since then (Emuloader has), and HC has released an updated version of J5 that I am not sure works the same way as the one I used to develop the page, but the basic concepts remain the same. (Doesn't really affect you now as I don't cover Mala and IrfanView still works basically the same way.)