Looking for Beta testers 1.62g (Finished)

[dungbeetle46]

cool, your a champ Loadman

[Kayden]

Buttons look to work for me. 
The only problem I can find is that I tried to play music in Jukebox mode and it seems to have locked up.

This also reminds me of my other wish to be able to add a directory and populate recursively for the background music instead of adding them one album at a time.

[loadman]

Buttons look to work for me. 
The only problem I can find is that I tried to play music in Jukebox mode and it seems to have locked up.

This also reminds me of my other wish to be able to add a directory and populate recursively for the background music instead of adding them one album at a time.

Thanks for Testing.

Is the Jukebox problem related to the JoyStick +12 buttons enhancement?  or are just mentioning a random error you came across while testing?

I will add you music request to the list

[csa3d]

I have an older version of Arzoo's Ledblinky installed.  I've noticed that when Mala first starts up, that none of my buttons light up until I push up or down to trigger the "next game" event, which then tells Arzoo's plugin to light up the proper controls.

Is there an event that Mala should trigger upon startup to basically reselect the last selected game, therefore lighting the controls upon startup?  Is this something the LedBlinky plugin needs to handle?

Thanks
-csa

[loadman]

I have an older version of Arzoo's Ledblinky installed.  I've noticed that when Mala first starts up, that none of my buttons light up until I push up or down to trigger the "next game" event, which then tells Arzoo's plugin to light up the proper controls.

Is there an event that Mala should trigger upon startup to basically reselect the last selected game, therefore lighting the controls upon startup?  Is this something the LedBlinky plugin needs to handle?

Thanks
-csa

That should work on start up. The Plug-ins get the a 'EventPlugins.SendGameSelectEvent'

I am at work right now so I can't confirm this is still happening.

have you tried an older version of MaLa?

You probably should check with Arzoo as well

[bsweet0us]

OK Guys...

For anyone with a Joystick/ Gamepad/ etc with more than 12 Buttons this is for you to test please, as I don't have the hardware to test it.    (well one with more than 12 buttons anyway)

For beta testers with 1.62f don't bother downloading this as the Joystick expansion is all I have done.

Download latest beta here:
http://www.malafe.net/files/download/MaLa162g.zip


Note to all:  If you can recreate a crash/freeze please send the log (in verbose mode to me) 
Send Bugs reports to :    bugs@malafe.net

Thanks For reporting everyone 

Testing the new beta with a control pad that has 14 buttons (and an analog stick) and all seems to be working well for buttons 1-14.  This is strictly on the gaming side of MALA (scrolling gamelist, switching emulators, launching games) but I've run into no problems as of yet.

Thanks for the extra button support loadman!

[Kayden]

Buttons look to work for me. 
The only problem I can find is that I tried to play music in Jukebox mode and it seems to have locked up.

This also reminds me of my other wish to be able to add a directory and populate recursively for the background music instead of adding them one album at a time.

Thanks for Testing.

Is the Jukebox problem related to the JoyStick +12 buttons enhancement?  or are just mentioning a random error you came across while testing?

I will add you music request to the list

I have no idea if it's related, this is the first time I've tried the option.  I'll try it again tonight with both versions.

I have an older version of Arzoo's Ledblinky installed.  I've noticed that when Mala first starts up, that none of my buttons light up until I push up or down to trigger the "next game" event, which then tells Arzoo's plugin to light up the proper controls.

Is there an event that Mala should trigger upon startup to basically reselect the last selected game, therefore lighting the controls upon startup?  Is this something the LedBlinky plugin needs to handle?

Thanks
-csa

Arzoo told me not lighting the first is by design.  It also doesn't light the game you land on when you go to the next game list.

[curtis-r]

Just started the beta.  Unzipped Mala 162g.exe & replaced my prior mala.exe.  Apparently there are no other files needed for beta. 

Result: crashes almost immediately, though background music plays.  There are 2 error windows, but one is obscured by the other.  The visible one "Unexpected error. Mala will terminate now".  The other error I can only make out "Other emulator emulator config-".  Log:

[Kayden]

I didn't replace my current Mala.exe.  I left the beta one named mala162g.exe (or whatever it is) and everything worked fine.

[Kayden]

Ok, after retesting the Jukebox, 162 seems to lock up as soon as I try to play music.  My music is on a mapped drive to another machine, but it does work for the background music.

On 1.05 the Jukebox doesn't even work.  I switch to it and it displays one of my game lists with the actual game count, but the menu is empty except for Play all and Add to Playlist.  Neither seems to do anything.

[system01]

Just started the beta.  Unzipped Mala 162g.exe & replaced my prior mala.exe.  Apparently there are no other files needed for beta. 

Result: crashes almost immediately, though background music plays.  There are 2 error windows, but one is obscured by the other.  The visible one "Unexpected error. Mala will terminate now".  The other error I can only make out "Other emulator emulator config-". 

When I used 106f in my 105 "playground" I was getting some weirdness.  I ended up making a whole new folder and letting 106 make new INIs and everything, and everything worked fine.  Then I copied 105 into that new folder so I could compare the two.

[loadman]

Just started the beta.  Unzipped Mala 162g.exe & replaced my prior mala.exe.  Apparently there are no other files needed for beta. 
Result: crashes almost immediately, though background music plays.  There are 2 error windows, but one is obscured by the other.  The visible one "Unexpected error. Mala will terminate now".  The other error I can only make out "Other emulator emulator config-".  Log:

Cool,

I got your log thanks. I had not tried music for a while

Sounds like I should check the Muzac section Again. Maybe this is an opportunity to upgrade MaLa to use the latest bass.dll.    I will ponder.

The 'Other Emu' window is an expected error as it needs to upgrade the file to cater for definables in 'other emu. 

Thanks for reporting ;-)

Ok, after retesting the Jukebox, 162 seems to lock up as soon as I try to play music.  My music is on a mapped drive to another machine, but it does work for the background music.

On 1.05 the Jukebox doesn't even work.  I switch to it and it displays one of my game lists with the actual game count, but the menu is empty except for Play all and Add to Playlist.  Neither seems to do anything.

Not concerned with Juke on 1.05 as I know that had issues like the ones you described,

but in 162 when you say it does not work?  What do you mean?  What do the log say in verbose mode?

It just worked for me so I am confused about that.    .  However I did find a Bug trying to quit MaLa while Jukebox was running 

 I am trying to determine if you have found a bug or you are not sure how to use the JukeBox.

Thanks for reporting

[LATER] When I went back to the JukeBox it stopped working for me too    OK good news is I am able to reproduce the fault 

One thing you could please check for me is the voulme in MaLa SoundsAndMusic-BackGroundMusic, I found mine was left at ZERO as a fade up failed. Please check this

[MuchLater] I think I fixed that bug but I can't post a new beta yet as I am half way through  implementing the 2nd Video window option.

[Kayden]

My background music isn't at 0.  When in my games list, I have my BG music on, it's at about 20-30%.

I don't know if this is related, but since switching to 162g, my sticks occasionally go postal.  When quitting a game, I get a message from the u360 map program that says it couldn't communicate with one of my sticks, when I click OK to go back to the game menu, one of two things happens, either the stick works fine, or it scrolls up or down the game list insanely fast.  If it scrolls, the only reliable way I can stop it is to close Mala.  Replugging the stick seems to work about 50/50; sometimes it stops scrolling and sometimes it stops scrolling until it's rerecognized and then starts scrolling again. 

I never once had this issue with 1.05 and since I can close Mala and reopen it with it coming back fine, I don't think it's an issue with my sticks.

[loadman]

I don't know if this is related, but since switching to 162g, my sticks occasionally go postal.  When quitting a game, I get a message from the u360 map program that says it couldn't communicate with one of my sticks, when I click OK to go back to the game menu, one of two things happens, either the stick works fine, or it scrolls up or down the game list insanely fast.  If it scrolls, the only reliable way I can stop it is to close Mala.  Replugging the stick seems to work about 50/50; sometimes it stops scrolling and sometimes it stops scrolling until it's rerecognized and then starts scrolling again. 
I never once had this issue with 1.05 and since I can close Mala and reopen it with it coming back fine, I don't think it's an issue with my sticks.

Might need FatFingers help here.    I don't have Ultrasticks

The only thing I changed in that area was increasing the buttons supported from 12 > 32.

have you checked all the Button mapping for Joysticks in MaLa?

[Kayden]

The mapping is the same as it's always been.  I just get an error saying it can't communicate with the stick and then it's either fine or insane.  I'll do more playing in 1.05 to see if it's a problem with my stick.

[fatfingers]

Hmmm....I'm afraid I don't have much to add here.  It sounds like maybe you could try reinstalling the drivers for the sticks, but I'm not sure that will help either. 

 

[csa3d]

I used to use the FatFingers plugin, but have found that using the u360 support in LedBlinky to actually work better.  With the Fat Fingers plugin, I would get erratic scrolling issues as well.  I think what the issue is there, is that his plugin calls the external command line executable distributed by ultimarc to do the remapping while the LedBlinky uses the .dll directly.  Something having to with code leaving Mala and taking action inside an external .exe seems to trip up Mala (in my opinion).  I had found similar issues with launching other externals, such as .bat files, and what I'm guessing might be part of the problem with Mrotate2.exe

I could be on crack, but that's my best guess.

-csa

[Kayden]

Thanks, I will definitely keep that in mind.

[NelsonPJ]

For what it's worth, I've been using beta 1.62g for about a week and have had no problems.  I'm using MAME preview videos from the recent  Emumovies torrent (SQ), and they display with no issues.  I'm also switching between a few other emulators (fusion, zsnes, nestopia, Virtual Pinball, Future Pinball) with no major problems.  Occasionally I've got a problem with Visual Pinball where PinMAME doesn't properly launch, but I think that's really a Visual Pinball problem.  I'm using the VP-Launch 5.1 wrapper that hasn't been updated in a while, so maybe that's the issue (although it's much better with the wrapper that without!)

I've been so impressed with Emumovies that I paid for FTP access yesterday, and as soon as I get my password I'll download and test Mala with videos for the other emulators.

This is on a 2.8GHz P4 with 2 gig RAM and WinXP SP3 (a recent upgrade from my old 933MHz P3 that seems so slow now!).

[dungbeetle46]

Occasionally I've got a problem with Visual Pinball where PinMAME doesn't properly launch, but I think that's really a Visual Pinball problem.  I'm using the VP-Launch 5.1 wrapper that hasn't been updated in a while, so maybe that's the issue (although it's much better with the wrapper that without!)

Nelsonpj
I use visual pinball and had the same problem, change the wrapper to closemul and you shouldnt have any more problems
cheers

[drventure]

A possible issue with the 1.62g version

Here's the log. I get crashes pretty consistently using this particular layout. Note that there are no custom sounds with this layout, but the debug log seems to indicate that the problem is with playsound.

I reverted back to the standard MALA layout, and everything worked fine, so I'm guessing it's something about my layout still.

Here's what's interesting. if I DISABLE the UI sounds (under the sounds tab in the config), the problem gets +far worse+. Strange, but it seems consistent.


2009/05/10  21:12:10.99   Info: Changing Layout
2009/05/10  21:12:11.00   Info: Loading layout: O:\Darin\mame\Mala\Layouts\No18Arqadium\No18Arqadium.mll
2009/05/10  21:12:11.81   Info: Show Main Form
2009/05/10  21:12:14.23   Info: Loading game list: O:\Darin\mame\Mala\Gillian's Favs.mlg
2009/05/10  21:12:14.75   Info: Loading game list: O:\Darin\mame\Mala\Non-Alternating Games.mlg
2009/05/10  21:12:16.33   Error: Object Class: TTimer, Object Function: PlaySound, Exception Class: EOutOfResources, Exception Message: Not enough storage is available to process this command.

2009/05/10  21:12:16.36   Error: Object Class: TTimer, Object Function: PlaySound, Exception Class: EOutOfResources, Exception Message: Not enough storage is available to process this command.

2009/05/10  21:12:16.39   Error: Object Class: TTimer, Object Function: PlaySound, Exception Class: EOutOfResources, Exception Message: Not enough storage is available to process this command.

2009/05/10  21:12:17.37   Info: Showing taskbar
2009/05/10  21:12:17.39   Info: Showing taskbar
2009/05/10  21:12:17.44   Info: Showing taskbar
2009/05/10  21:12:17.84   Error: Object Class: TfrmMain, Object Function: CropStringLength, Exception Class: EOutOfResources, Exception Message: Not enough storage is available to process this command.

2009/05/10  21:12:18.31   Info: Showing taskbar
2009/05/10  21:12:18.34   Info: Screensaver: ScreenSaver Form Destroyed

[loadman]

Interesting.

Have you tried loading the layout into the editor and re-save under s a different name?

Send me the layout (juts the .mll) if you still have issues.

[wooowman93]

would it be a possibility to be able to make snaps, marquees and other dynamic images rotate in the layout

[loadman]

would it be a possibility to be able to make snaps, marquees and other dynamic images rotate in the layout

They do when you you rotate the layout...

[TheShanMan]

I think he means display them at an angle, like rotated 30 degrees for instance.

[wooowman93]

ya like he said

[cmoses]

Just a question - but has any thought been given to having a horizontal game list?

Actually using the marquees instead of a list, but have the go left and right instead of up and down?

[system01]

Just a question - but has any thought been given to having a horizontal game list?

Actually using the marquees instead of a list, but have the go left and right instead of up and down?

That's not a bad thought.  However, is this possible if you make a free-aspect vertical layout and batch-rotate your marquees... playing it horizontal?

[loadman]

Hi All,

Sorry I have not been all that responsive on the forum lateley

. Work has been long hours again. 

Might not be working on Mala again until another 7 days.

I appreciate all the feedback I am getting with the beta version,

I am copying and pasting relevant postings to a separate list for me to check /fix.

Thanks   

[TheShanMan]

That happens loadman. Don't worry about it - we don't want you getting overwhelmed or burned out! We'll be fine in the meantime.

[Ummon]

Yeah, take some time to play some games.

[zophar707]

Please take your time. My pc went boom the other day  so it will be a few weeks before i rebuild a new one.  Just using my work one to get on to the forums at the moment.

Keep up the good work 

[R0UNDEYEZ]

Sounds like you have some cool features planned for the new release.. thank you for all your time you invest into the coding and helping all us mala users here on the forum!  like some others have said don't get all burned out.. take some time play some games and enjoy the thing that makes you come to this forum in the first place. arcade games.

[slsimon]

Thought I would download the latest beta release for testing.  I can't get Mala to load.  Below is the info in the error log.  Thanks for any update. 

2009/05/24  20:25:52.57   Error: Object Class: TTimer, Object Function: Ctrl1Down, Exception Class: EAccessViolation, Exception Message: Access violation at address 00634220 in module 'MaLa162g.exe'. Read of address 000000A0
2009/05/24  20:26:47.31   Error: Object Class: TTimer, Object Function: Ctrl1Down, Exception Class: EAccessViolation, Exception Message: Access violation at address 00634220 in module 'MaLa162g.exe'. Read of address 000000A0
2009/05/24  20:27:36.21   Error: Object Class: TTimer, Object Function: Ctrl1Down, Exception Class: EAccessViolation, Exception Message: Access violation at address 00634220 in module 'MaLa162g.exe'. Read of address 000000A0

I will keep on playing...  Thanks, Shane

[loadman]

I am back! 

[dungbeetle46]

about bloody time, I dont know, slacking off, taking it easy, what a life,
good to see you back Loadman

[SGT]

I am back! 

Well its about %@*#&@! time!  Hasn't been the same around here!

[csa3d]

It's infectious.. you couldn't stay away if you wanted to 

-csa

[DaOld Man]

Welcome back Loadman.

Now I need a vacation! (See what you started?)

[NelsonPJ]

I've been using Mala 1.62g for a few weeks, successfully playing Emumovies SQ videos in my layouts.  The videos loop continuously when a game is selected, which is really cool.  However, I'm wondering if there's a setting to stop playing the videos after a certain amount of time (like a "sleep mode"?).  I looked through the preferences and couldn't find anything.

I've got my monitor to turn off after 15-30 minutes of inactivity, and I'd really like to set the preview videos to turn off after a similar amount of time.  Thinking about it, the videos could probably stop playing after 5 or 10 minutes of inactivity.