controls.dat viewer

[papaschtroumpf]

Howard, I'm finally getting to trying out the controls.dat viewer and I'm not sure how to handle devices that have multiple functions, for example my trackball could also be considered a mouse and I also use it as a "spinner". do I need to create a label for all 3? Same with my joystick: it emulates the arow keys so does joystick reer only to analog joysticks? I feel like 'm missing something.
Thanks

[Howard_Casto]

I suggest you look at the skinner and the very limited docs that come with the viewer.  It doesn't make any difference what the actual control is, just the input you use to interface with mame.  The k key is still just the k key regardless of if it's mapped to a joystick, button, analog stick, trackball, ect in mame.  The viewer just needs to know that it's the "k" key and that's it... it'll read the ctrlr files you use to remap keys and take care of the rest.  

 (Assuming you've set that up in the options.  If you haven't or don't use ctrlr files then the viewer is essentially useless to you.)  

Now optical controls are different as the viewer can't read remapping (this isn't supported in ctrlr files)  but via fudging you can do it specifically (like a trackball)  or more generically (like mouse inputs)  read the fudging doc for details.  

Hope that helps.    

[papaschtroumpf]

I can't seem to get it working. I made a layout that reflects my CP, but when I type:
     D:\johnny>Johnny5.exe 1941 -lof chriskade.lof
I get your sample CP instead.

If I put in the full path:
D:\johnny>Johnny5.exe 1941 -lof D:\johnny\layouts\chriskade.lof
I get run-time error '52', bad file name or number.



Also, everytime I load the layout file in the editor the font is back to being large.


I guess I'm confused about your comment about the app being useless without ctrl files: I use default mappings and mame works fine for me, and when I try the command line above,  P1B1 and P1B2 are properly labelled as "fire" and "loop" so the app seems to be working without CTRL files (am I missing something?)

Thanks for  your help. I'll read up on CTRL files after the kids are put to bed.

[Howard_Casto]

No.... in the beta the use of custom layout files is broken.  Sorry, but that's why I don't have a support site ready yet... still a wip and it still has issues to be fixed.  

It's when you remap keys your going to need ctrlr files. (like mortal kombat, which you have to remap every key to play properly) If you use ctrlr files to remap it the buttons will shwo up in the proper, remapped order.  If not then they will still look mixed up, even though you might have remapped them within mame.  

[papaschtroumpf]

OK, that's cool, I'll play with this a little more in the meantime and give you feedback.
Here's what I've got so far:

- font gets back to default size when you reload the layout file
- it's somewhat hard to grab the right label when multiple labels overlap
- it'd be nice to see the bounding box for the currently selected label
- a per label font size would be nice (I'd like the title bigger than button labels)
- there should be an option to exit immediately if no label was found (game not in controls.ini)
It'd be nice to be able to edit the layout in a zoomed window. I work on my main machine at 1600x1200, so my 800x600 layout for my mame machine is kindof tiny (yeah, I know, I could temporarily resize my desktop on my main machine)
- the label keycode dropdown box should remember what the last selection was and go back to it by default: if I insert a "joystick button 1", there is a good chance that my next label will be "joystick button 2" so that way I don't have to scroll through the whole thing again.
-get Frosy to do a version of his controls anti-aliased on a black background instead of a white one (or can someone please tell me how I can antialias it myself properly in photoshop? there is a faint while "halo" around the buttons in my layout)

I think that's about it for now... great little app, I'm looking forward to using the next version.