mamewah layout order

[btoddkelley]

I am struggln' to get mamewah 1.5 to put the eum's in the order I choose. I tried adding numbers to the front of the ini files such as 005mame, 010daphne, 015visualpinball, 025atari2600. No matter how I change the name mamewah puts them in the following order: mame, atari, dpahne, visualpinball.
     At first I though mamewah was having trouble with the multiple digits so I switched to a 2 digit system, (02mame, 05 daphne ect) The same thing occured. The ini and layouts are in the correct order in the windows folder.
Any thoughts?

Thanks
Todd

[papaschtroumpf]

it's somewhere in the docs I think. try a dash after the number: 0-mame, 1-daphne, ...

[Minwah]

I am struggln' to get mamewah 1.5 to put the eum's in the order I choose. I tried adding numbers to the front of the ini files such as 005mame, 010daphne, 015visualpinball, 025atari2600. No matter how I change the name mamewah puts them in the following order: mame, atari, dpahne, visualpinball.

Are you sure they are in that order?  Maybe the emulators have changed order but the lists displayed are wrong - did you rename the files in the \files folder too?

[btoddkelley]

I didn't display any lists. I was using the default layout that shows the emulator name at the top. (And yes I changed the name in the inifile!). I have not tried the "-" but I will.

Thanks
Todd

[Minwah]

I didn't display any lists. I was using the default layout that shows the emulator name at the top. (And yes I changed the name in the inifile!). I have not tried the "-" but I will.

It shouldn't matter really, but I have mine like this IIRC:

1-mame.ini
2-fusion.ini
3-zsnes.ini

[btoddkelley]

Min:

Is it possible to leave gaps for future emulators such as:

01-mame
05-daphne
15-visualpinball

Also, do I need the "0" as a place holder?

Thanks
Todd

[Minwah]

Wierd

The emulators are be sorted based on the whole string (eg 01-mame), so if you have emulator no's >10 then you should use the leading 0, eg:

01-mame.ini
13-fusion.ini
24-zsnes.ini

I just noticed that I don't explicitly sort these names, just rely on the order they come out from 'Dir' - for me they always come out in alphabetical order...I wonder if this might vary between OS (I use XP)?  What OS are you guys running?

[papaschtroumpf]

Sorting of numbered string was changed betwen 98 and XP so that 10 comes after 9, not between 1 and 2,  but adding the leading zero should make it OS independent.

[btoddkelley]

I am running XP pro. I will try the dash tonight. Thanks for all the input.
Todd

[btoddkelley]

I re-named as follows:
02-Mame
05-Daphne
08-Visualpinball
11-Atari2600

The order is
Mame
Atari2600
Visualpinball
Daphne

Darneds't thing I have ever seen. It like mamewah decides the order!!!!
Any help is appreciated.

Thanks
Todd

[jcrouse]

This is odd. Todd and I talk on a regular basis and I'm lost. As you know I have many emulators. I use a two digit prefix, 01mame, o2atari2600, 03atart5200 and so forth. I also use Windows XP Professional (on three seperate machines) and have never experienced any of this. I will run some test and reply back.

Later,
John

[jcrouse]

Well, Todd, MinWAH, I set it up EXACTLY like Todd in his above post and it works perfectly for me. I cycled through them and they cycle in the correct order. If I remember back when XP first came out the was something in a MS KB article about file name order in Explorer and how these were handled by the OS. I'll spend a little time on the web and in MS's kb looking around. THis needs to be resolved.

Later,
John

[jcrouse]

Well, here's a somewhat interesting kb article: http://support.microsoft.com/Default.aspx?id=319827

John

[btoddkelley]

I tried the registry hack with both values and mamewah does the same thing. The ini files are sorted in the correct order in the windows file if that helps.

Thanks
Todd

[btoddkelley]

Gonna love this!

I cahnged the names to
aaamame
aabdaphne
aacvisualpinball
aadatari2600

The listed in the same order as before!!!

mame
atari
vp
daphne!

What am I missing???!!!

Darned frontend is bound and determined that order is the one for my cab!!!


Todd

[biron]

i have the same probs as todd. i am using win98SE.

I have tried the number system 01mame, 02snes etc etc, and i have tried with letters. And windows always sort them correctly. but in mamewah, when I chose 'Change Emulatar' thay appear in a different order. no matter what their name is.

seems to be a strange problem..

[screaming]

Gonna love this!

I cahnged the names to
aaamame
aabdaphne
aacvisualpinball
aadatari2600

The listed in the same order as before!!!

mame
atari
vp
daphne!

What am I missing???!!!

Darned frontend is bound and determined that order is the one for my cab!!!


Todd

  What, exactly, are you renaming?  You're renaming the .ini files in your ini/ directory and deleting the files in your files/ directory before you start MAMEWAH, right?

  Also, make sure you do your renaming with the "Hide file extensions for known file types" (in Tools->Folder Options->View) option turned off.

-Steve

[wj2k3]

Works fine for me by just changing the initial letter on the .ini files.

   stella.ini
became
   astella.ini (also tried  1, 1- 01- etc)

I did nothing to the files directory  or layout directory, so obviously they did not display on screen correctly but when I went into the menu to to Select Emulator... they were listed in the correct order by ini file.  They were also ordered correctly wen advancing to Next and Previous emulator using hot keys.

I am using Windows XP Pro with service pack 1.

Hope this helps to narrow down the problem.

[biron]

Here are some detail info about my order problem...

i Have the following mame ini-files:
01mame-1.ini
01mame.ini
02cps1.ini
03cps2.ini
04neogeo.ini
05model2.ini
06zinc.ini
11nes-1.ini
11nes.ini
12snes.ini
15sms.ini
16gens.ini
17jaguar.ini

(see picture..)

but when i cycle thru the emu lists within mamewah they appear in this order:
CPS1
Model2
Mame
Neogeo
CPS2
SegaMasterSystem
Atari Jaguar
Zinc
Nes
Super Nes
Sega Genesis

As you see this isn't the same order as the ini-files! (it doesn't matter if i cycle thru the emu lists, or if i go thru the 'Change emulator' menu, they came in this strange order anyway..)

The OS is Microsoft Windows 98SE (Swedish Edition). I and am using the latest Mamewah1.52 (+patch).

I have tried to delete all the files is the /files directory and start all over. but with the same result.

(the screenshot is from a swedish version of XP pro )

thanks for any help or ideas..  

[screaming]

Here are some detail info about my order problem...

  Great detail work, Biron!  I have a couple suggestions for you:

  1) I found the MS Knowledgebase article that talks about the file sorting problem in older versions of Windows. Can you check to see if the Symptoms here happen to you?  If so, maybe the Resolution will work.

  2) In what order do they come out in if you were to open a MS-DOS Prompt, navigate to your mamewah\ini directory and type 'dir'?  Do they come out in the same order as they show up in MAMEWAH? Minwah stated he's not actually sorting the emulator list, but relying on the 'dir' output. I'll be willing to bet 'dir' is sorting by date or by byte order on the disk or something equally wacky.

  3) This one kind of ties in with #2 above.  Try moving all the files in mamewah\ini into another temporary directly, then copy the files back one-by-one in the order you want them to show up in MAMEWAH (first the 01mame.ini, then 01mame-1.ini, then 02cps1.ini, etc). It shouldn't have any effect on the files in mamewah\files, but if it's convenient, delete those files after you copy the ini files over and before you start MAMEWAH, then regenerate your lists.

  I hope this helps!

-Steve

[screaming]

Min,

  Maybe in some far-off future version of MAMEWAH it's best to actually specify the emulator order in a .ini file somewhere?  Something like:

layout_order              mame;cps1;snes;gens

(where mame correlates with a mame.ini, mame-1.ini, etc)

That would avoid expensive sort routines for such a small detail. That would also let me build by N64 list and .ini files but not have them show up in my emulator list until I get my adapter (if it's not in the list it doesn't show up!)

-Steve

[biron]

well well well.. now we (steve) have found the problem!  

 I did like you said and checked the directory in a dos-prompt. their i saw the strange order again!

 Then I moved all the emu ini-files to another directory and then moved them back, one by one, in the correct order (first 01mame.ini, then 02cps1.ini etc).
then i did one more 'DIR' command in the ini-directory, and now it is in the right order!!  

thank you  Steve!  

i must say this were very strange, but now the problem is solved i guess.


EDIT:  screenshots!

[wj2k3]

Try adding the line:

set dircmd=/o:n

to your autoexec.bat (or create one if you don't have one)

This should make the DIR command use alphabetical order.

Tested on XP Pro using /o:s to sort by size and /o:n to sort by name and it changed the way DIR displayed files in the command window but didn't affect MAMEWAH.

[screaming]

Try adding the line:

set dircmd=/o:n

to your autoexec.bat (or create one if you don't have one)

This should make the DIR command use alphabetical order.

Tested on XP Pro using /o:s to sort by size and /o:n to sort by name and it changed the way DIR displayed files in the command window but didn't affect MAMEWAH.

  In Windows XP you'd set this up as an environment variable. To do that, right-click on My Computer and select Properties.  Click on the Advanced tab and then Environment variables Select New from the User variables and set DIRCMD as the Variable and /o:n as the Variable Value. Then click OK three times.  The next time you open cmd.exe it will take effect.

  Your tip should work for Windows98 though, but I don't know if it will affect MAMEWAH or not.  In fact, I don't even know if this will affect MAMEWAH in Windows XP!  Want to try it out and let us know? It might be something to add to the MAMEWAH FAQ if it works.

-Steve

[wj2k3]

Actually, in XP you can do it exactly as I said.  I know because I did test it as my post states.  

I did it that way because that is the was how Micro$oft kb said to and so that it more than likely would work for the people who posted they have 98.

Plus, I didn't know how to do it your way so thanks for the tip!

Note:  I had to restart my computer for your changes to take affect. (or is it effect?)

As far as trying it out, I did as previously posted.  I just tried it out again using your method.  It affects how the files are listed in the Command Prompt window but no affect within MAMEWAH, atleast for me.

BUT...  I can change the order of my emulators by simply changing the name of the INI files in any one of the ways previously suggested.  They all work.  This is not the case for  biron or btoddkelley.  Since theirs seem to be ordering by last modified, maybe this will work for them....

Note:  I have Service Pack 1, I wonder if Service Pack 2 has anything to do with it.--  Nevermind, bison is running 98.  

[screaming]

well well well.. now we (steve) have found the problem!  

 Minwah, I'm sure he meant you-Steve

-Steve

[btoddkelley]

I am looking forward to trying this when I get home. I am running XP pro. Do you know what folder I will find the autoexec.bat file? I remember way back in the windos 3.1 days seting up an autoexec, but it has been a while!
Todd

[wj2k3]

Open a Command Prompt window

Navigate to c:\

type "edit autoconfig.bat" + ENTER

You may want to use the method Steve#2 mentioned as it is more of an XP method.  I believe there is a setting that may allow XP to ignore an autoexec.bat file.......

[Minwah]

I've been watching this thread - it's got pretty interesting!

screaming: the layout_order option is quite a good idea (JCrouse suggested something similar).  For now though I think I will just add a sort in - this should resolve the problem.  To exclude your N64, for now, just add a character onto the extension - eg n64.inix...

[screaming]

I believe there is a setting that may allow XP to ignore an autoexec.bat file.......

  Yeah, I didn't investigate it too hard but I couldn't get either an autoexec.bat or autoexec.nt (suggested by a KB article) to work. I seem to remember a checkbox or registry setting to turn that open off somewhere. The environment variable works flawlessly though, and I didn't have to reboot.  I just closed the Command Prompt and opened a new one.

-Steve

[Minwah]

For now though I think I will just add a sort in - this should resolve the problem.

Done...please let me know if it doesn't fix the problem in the next release, I'm pretty sure it will tho

[btoddkelley]

Well.........I tried the XP soultion,(environmental variables) I tried copying the files into the ini folder one by one, and I tried editing the autoexec.bat file. They are still in the incorrect order!!!!!!!!!!

Min, can I get a copy of your beta!!!??

[Minwah]

Min, can I get a copy of your beta!!!??

Sorry, atm no  Usually you could, but I am in the middle of some major stuff.  However I will probably make this one a public beta to speed up the release (& hopefully reduce bugs)...