Hiding Windows and the Mouse Pointer

[jukingeo]

Hello all,

I am still in the throws of setting up MALA and now something else came up, of which I did manage to find half of the solution out on my own.

Problem #1 [Solved]  When making a game selection and Mame is booting up, Mala shows the Windows environment.  I didn't like this and wanted to find a solution right away.  Luckily a solution did present itself in the searches and I found that going into the mala.ini file that you need to change the "windows state" setting to "0".

windowsstate=0

That solved most of the problem, but there is still something annoying that is left behind and that is the mouse pointer.  After making a game selection, there is now a nice "starting..." box.  However, about a second or so just before the game starts, the dreaded mouse pointer (hourglass) shows its ugly head.

Now normally when setting up a mame box I would just disconnect the mouse afterwards, BUT since you need to right click and use the mouse to make system changes in Mala, disconnecting the mouse isn't an option.

So now my question is, what do I do to get rid of the dreaded hourglass/pointer?

Thanx,

Geo

[Ummon]

Look in the wiki - 'hiding windows'

[jukingeo]

Look in the wiki - 'hiding windows'

I took a peek and it mostly goes over getting rid of everything "on boot up".  For me seeing Windows on boot up doesn't really bother me, as if I have guests over the game would be running anyway.  I would just boot up directly to MALA.  However, from THAT point in, I would like the arcade experience to be as real as possible, so no trace of Windows.

I have MALA set to the point that it pretty much hides Windows, but just for that second (or so) just before the game rom kicks in, you do see the hourglass for the mouse pointer.

Sure I can disable the mouse entirely, but the reason why I don't want to do that is because MALA needs the mouse to get into the administration settings.

One thing I did get out of reading that wiki was being able to make icons "invisible" or change them altogether.  Since it is only the hourglass I am seeing, then that is the only icon I have to change.  Perhaps I can change it to something non recognizable as Windows.   a small black square would be cool because they would "blend in" with the dark background.   If it is noticed, it would be taken as "part of the boot up" of a game.


Edit:

I managed to find a very small fine cross hair "+" and put that in place of the hourglass.  Because it is black, it is now barely noticeable.  Every so often I do see it come up (when it isn't on a black background), but really I only know about it and it certainly doesn't scream "WINDOWS OS HERE".   So I am good .    But on a dedicated MAME system, I would look into using a totally "invisible" cursor for the hourglass so this way it is isn't seen at all.

Oh!  In case anyone else is interested download this:

http://andy.junkdrome.org/devel/tcl/invisible.cur

Put this in your Windows=>Cursor folder and then go into Control Panel => Mouse.  Go down the scroll list for your current cursors and find the one that says "BUSY".  That one is the trouble maker.  Click "browse" and then look for the new invisible.cur file.  Click on it, save the settings and BOOM, your done.  No more hourglass in MALA.

[Ummon]

Okay. I went and looked. For my 'MAME-specific emu', I don't get the behavior you illustrate above. However, if I have other mame versions in 'other emus', then I do when loading games.  Understand?

[system01]

I would highly suggest InstantSheller (http://www.gameex.net/Community/InstantSheller/tabid/73/Default.aspx).  You pick the shell program (MaLa.exe), pick the boot image if you want to, and hit GO.  It does all the work for you.  If you don't like it you can pick 'Undo Changes' and everything goes back to just the way you had it.  I use this, and then 'on MaLa exit' points to explorer.exe.  When I ever have to make changes I plug in a kbd and hit Alt+F4 (exit app) and it gives me an Explorer window.

The only drawback is that once you exit MaLa, all you have is a little, single-pixel, black dot for a cursor.  A bit of a PITA, but worth it to hide it and still keep it maintainable.

[jukingeo]

Okay. I went and looked. For my 'MAME-specific emu', I don't get the behavior you illustrate above. However, if I have other mame versions in 'other emus', then I do when loading games.  Understand?

I only have Mame loaded up with Mala...no other emulations are on board.  I AM using the background music player though, so this way when you are browsing in Mala, it access my mp3s and plays some music. When you make a selection, even with the "hide Windows" setting active, the hourglass shows up (wherever the mouse was last) for about a second to 1.5 seconds just before the game launches.

It does seem that there isn't a program solution, so I decided to go the straightforward route and just attack it from the top.  The hourglass is the offending icon, so I found an "invisible.cur" file on-line and applied it to JUST the hourglass: Problem solved!  Granted this is just a band-aid, but it gets the job done and I don't loose the full functioning of my mouse when I edit MALA.

So unless a more permanent solution presents itself, I can live with this.

I would highly suggest InstantSheller (http://www.gameex.net/Community/InstantSheller/tabid/73/Default.aspx).  You pick the shell program (MaLa.exe), pick the boot image if you want to, and hit GO.  It does all the work for you.  If you don't like it you can pick 'Undo Changes' and everything goes back to just the way you had it.  I use this, and then 'on MaLa exit' points to explorer.exe.  When I ever have to make changes I plug in a kbd and hit Alt+F4 (exit app) and it gives me an Explorer window.

The only drawback is that once you exit MaLa, all you have is a little, single-pixel, black dot for a cursor.  A bit of a PITA, but worth it to hide it and still keep it maintainable.

Hmmm, what I would be looking for on a permanent level is something that hides everything altogether, but doesn't affect Windows, when I return to it.   This method you describe seems like it is going to do more harm than good.

The trouble here with Mala is that you really need the mouse interface to make changes.  This was NOT the case for me with MameWah.   However, while I DO still like that front end, Mala offers a much faster set up curve and it is extremely easy to alter the cabinet orientation.  This was NOT the case with MameWah.   MameWah was 'so-so' in terms of a setup curve for horizontal screens.  You did have to do some work, but it wasn't so bad.  But setting up for verticals is a deal killer.  I only did it once.  All my other MameWah installations I just told my friend to use a big a** monitor and keep it horizontal.

So in terms of set up alone, Mala wins out.   But there are just a couple minor annoyances, such as this hourglass thing.  But overall no biggies.

Geo

[system01]

Im a bit confused.  Are you setting up a cab, or just running it on a PC?  If youre running it on a cab, you would set all the settings and software up first, then hide everything at the last moment.  You say you want a permanent solution, but still want Windows to remain unchanged.    What do you still want windows for?

I find that I never need the MaLa options anymore.  I guess if you want to change layouts a lot or something.  Unless Im missing something, I never understood why people insisted on putting mouse controls to their trackballs.

BTW, InstantSheller has an undo button on it.  I went back and forth many times trying to get the bootscreen to look right with no damage to WinXP.  Might be worth a try to see exactly what it does.  At least check out the main dialog so you can see what options you have.  I think you might be making this more complex than it needs to be.

[jukingeo]

I am still test running everything on a PC...so yes, I do need Windows fully operational.

[system01]

Gotcha.

I think you'll still save yourself a ton of headache though if you worry about the cursors and stuff last.   

Also, if its any help, you can set up MaLa on a different machine and then copy the entire folder over to your cab.  Just try to keep paths similar.  For me it was quite cumbersome to sit with a keyboard in front of my cab for two hours at a time.

[jukingeo]

Gotcha.

I think you'll still save yourself a ton of headache though if you worry about the cursors and stuff last. 

Very true.  I may have something more permanent in mind later on.  But just for the sake of testing, I know that little trick of using an invisible hourglass cursor is working like a charm.  

Also, if its any help, you can set up MaLa on a different machine and then copy the entire folder over to your cab.  Just try to keep paths similar.  For me it was quite cumbersome to sit with a keyboard in front of my cab for two hours at a time.

Yeah, I was counting on that as well.  Both Mame and Mala do not alter the system registry so I figured they would be just an easy copy over.

Geo