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FE question/idea...
radiator:
first, sorry if this is a dumb question, I have no idea when it comes to programming/FE creation;
basically, what I'm wondering is, when a FE displays details about a selected game (joystick type, year, screen type etc) where does it get this info from? Is it taken from the actual ROM file (the header...or something).
Well, wherever it gets the info from, is there anything in the same place that says how many buttons a game uses?
If so, could a FE be re-written, with a function allowing it to look at how many buttons a game uses, then display a picture for each combination (1, 2, 3, 6 etc etc)??
ie:
would be displayed if the game uses 4 buttons
would be displayed for 6 button games...
etc etc.
...with the end-user being able to create his/her own pictures in place of the originals (obviously, everyone uses different joysticks, the above pics show drawings of my setup (j-stick, 8 button layout))
Howard? Minwah?
any ideas?
I'd love this feature, if there's a way of doing it (other than going through every game to find out how many buttons it uses, then editing the screenshot/marquee (or whatever), and inserting your joy/button pic below......too time consuming)
DinoRoger:
I am about to build my led control for lighting the buttons on my control panel and was thinking the same think. I use GLaunch as my front end and it has an option to run a file before loading the rom. I am going to try and build a code index that wil lactivate certain LED lights on my led control board when a batch file is ran. This may take allot of work but I enjoy this kind of stuff. You can use the same think to run an program that will show a picture on the CP when a rom is launched. There are utilities that will even convert bitmaps into EXE for easy viewing. Other front ends may have the same option to lauch apps before running rom to. With GLauch u have the abaility to specify all these details per rom.
radiator:
the LED thing sounds great! how are you wiring it up, through the parallel port?
www.bit-tech.net has a really great Electronics section in it's forum just in case you run into any problems...there's a guy there called ZapWizard, he's bound to be able to help you out (he works for AMD, and is an electronic genius!)
;D
Tiger-Heli:
U mean like this? 8)
http://www.mameworld.net/emuadvice/controls/controls.html
Tiger-Heli:
In case my earlier reply didn't do what you were looking for . . .
--- Quote from: radiator on May 06, 2003, 05:33:12 pm ---first, sorry if this is a dumb question, I have no idea when it comes to programming/FE creation;
--- End quote ---
Me either, but I've used EmuLoader extensively.
--- Quote ---basically, what I'm wondering is, when a FE displays details about a selected game (joystick type, year, screen type etc) where does it get this info from? Well, wherever it gets the info from, is there anything in the same place that says how many buttons a game uses?
--- End quote ---
Generally, it gets it from parsing the MAME listinfo file. I think (often inaccurate) button info is in there, but most FE's don't use it.
--- Quote ---If so, could a FE be re-written, with a function allowing it to look at how many buttons a game uses, then display a picture for each combination (1, 2, 3, 6 etc etc)??
--- End quote ---
Could be done. Problem is number of buttons is only half the story, you need to know what each button does, whether you are used in combination or not, etc., but it's a start.
--- Quote ---I'd love this feature, if there's a way of doing it (other than going through every game to find out how many buttons it uses, then editing the screenshot/marquee (or whatever), and inserting your joy/button pic below......too time consuming)
--- End quote ---
It's pretty much a manual process at this point. EL will use the same image for clones, so once you had all the parent games covered, you would be complete except for unique clones, and you could just rename images once the basic was defined (for example, 2-buttons punch, kick, and 2-buttons fire, bomb).
The controls.dat file will help whenever it's released as well.