eatkinola

Hi @Jason Carr. I get the following error when trying to use the new API call to GetAllParents(). Would you please check it out when you have time? Unable to cast object of type 'System.Collections.Generic.KeyValuePair`2[System.String,Unbroken.LaunchBox.Data.Parent]' to type 'Unbroken.LaunchBox.Plugins.Data.IParent'. I'm trying to adapt my plugins to the new nesting scheme.

This theme uses @eatkinola's plugin to display video. Maybe he can comment on what may be going on. I spent the morning trying to duplicate this and haven't been able to. Which versions of Windows do you guys use? Thanks for the report; it has to do with the plugin. I can reproduce it as follows on a platform view: (1) select a platform that has no platform video or game videos and it will display a slideshow of game fanart, (2) select next a platform that does have a platform video and it will demonstrate the problem @alnyden mentioned. Since I can reproduce it, I can fix it. I've got a lot on my plate at work now, though, so It'll be 2-3 weeks before I can get to this but I'll fix it.

Nice, you beat me to it! Glad it's working for you.

You have to create the ResourceOverrides, along with any PNGs you want to use. Just place them within the directory structure, and name them appropriately so the plugin can find the PNGs. Let's say for example you just want to add a platform banner for Tandy: ...Ao.Bigbox.Themer.v3_8 - ResourceOverrides - Images - Banners - Platforms - Banner-Platform-TANDY.png Since you're adding a platform, you also need to make sure this platform is defined in the Ao.Bigbox.Themer.v3_8.dll.config file. You can also override PNGs for existing platforms, categories, etc. by just placing the PNG in appropriate directory as described.

Updated for testing - posted via pm to those of you who offered to test. Thanks again! New things: Configuration file architecture, which facilitates per-emulator, per-core (retroarch), and per-platform overrides Pause menu buttons are now functional - Resume, Save/Load State, Quit, Manual (view PDF manual) Multiple save/load states are supported (depending of course on the emulator's support for this) PDF manual is included, can be accessed via the pause menu Still in the early stages but making progress; more to come...

Yes very early stages but there is a version for testing. Will loop you in, thank you very much.

Thanks, that'd be a big help. I'll loop you into the pm. Based on the initial feedback, I hope to have an update in 1-2 weeks.

Yes, you could specify any png file for the bezel. Planning to allow per emulator/core, per system, and per game overrides.

Never used RL. What does the pause menu look like? Does it do more than pause, resume, save/load states and quit game?

Thanks for the link. Those videos by @dragon57 look nice, and I should be able to include them in nostalgia if okay with him. It'll take me a few weeks at least because I've got a project in the works for my day job, but I'll get it done.

Okay I have something ready for testing. It's still an early version and not fully functional, but I'd appreciate some testing on Win 8/10 (I use Win 7). I'll pm those who expressed an interest in testing. Here's a demo photo taken with my phone (ALT+PRNTSCRN won't capture this control); it's a low quality photo but it shows an image overlay over dolphin, and dolphin is in a perfectly usable state. So far I've only tested with dolphin and retroarch. There is a fade-in launch screen (currently bare bones), and you can pause/resume a game. The buttons on the pause menu aren't yet operational but will be (save/load states, resume, quit, and view manual). I interact with the emulator using AHK (internalized by the plugin so you don't need to worry about setting it up separately). Basically, the plugin captures the emulator process and grabs its window, then places this window in one of my own. The plugin can then apply overlays, capture input, and send input via AHK to the embedded emulator window.

Glad you like the theme. You can download platform and playlist videos in LaunchBox. Goto Tools -> Download Platform/Playlist Theme Videos. As for game videos: you can get those from emumovies, which is easy if you're an emumovies member since you can just link your emumovies account to LaunchBox and download these movies along with other game metadata. If you're not an emumovies member, you should still be able to download many (all?) of the game videos but it'll be much more time consuming. Which playlists? I've already implemented many of these, but not sure if there are new playlists since I last looked. I don't use mame playlists so don't really keep up with them, but I can add more if needed. Look here to see the playlists I've already included in Nostalgia: ..\LaunchBox\Themes\Nostalgia\Views\Images\AVLF\Playlists

Yes I forgot to mention a PDF manual viewer. I do plan to add that. I already have a viewer ready to go and will add that button to the pause menu.

Thoughts on what the launch and pause screens should look like? Pause: Was thinking to keep it simple with Save, Load, Play/Resume, and Quit(Game) buttons; along with a current screenshot of the game and "Now Playing". I'll support multiple languages but will focus on English first.

Yes I think it would be easier. Thanks -- I didn't think so either, just wanted a quick sanity check.

What do y'all think about BigBox launching multiple games at the same time? Personally I don't see the reason in doing so; it might only be confusing especially if you intend BigBox to run in "kiosk" mode. Having multiple games running at the same time will also make coding the plugin more complicated. It's probably doable, but I think it'd be better to have the plugin block attempts to launch a second game when another is already running.

Thanks, Jason. On second glance it's not as bad as I thought. I wonder if the beta was updating the XML files in the background for awhile after install. Anyway, I fired up BB 8.8-beta1 again today and the plugins seem to be working fine for the most part. I did notice IPlatform.Category now always returns an empty string, where it used to return for example "Console" for platform "NES". I am curious as to how nesting will work in BB. I've not yet wrapped my head around that, but it's great you're adding such nice features all the time.

Thanks, Jason. Any major changes to the plugin API to support this feature? I noticed some functions of my plugin library stopped working with the new beta, so I figure there must be changes to how the API works. Any new interfaces/methods, or perhaps just changes to the guts?

Backups are in my opinion a must. I use FreeNAS in a raid mirrored setup, and every week another Linux box powers up and incrementally backs up the NAS using rsync. It's efficient, and while not an off-site backup it gives me plenty peace of mind. I've had an off the shelf NAS crap out on me in the past, and even though it was internally mirrored both copies were toast; painful. I'll not make that mistake again.

That'd be great, glad there is interest. I'll keep working on it and let y'all know when I have a version to test. I'll probably start a group message to share the DLL when it comes to that.

Thanks for the tip. I'm able to get the emulator window (so far tested with RetroArch and Dolphin), and that's how I add the overlays for Dolphin and send commands to the emulators like pause, save, etc. I'll look into the RA stuff for emulator states. Awesome, would certainly appreciate your testing it. It's still at an early stage, but I think I do have the basic mechanisms worked out. Once I have something worth testing, I'll be sure to let y'all know. Please keep me posted if y'all think of any other suggestions.

Too much use of translations might also cause problems with scaling. Now if you want to design your them for a very specific resolution, don't worry too much about that. But if you want it to work across multiple resolutions (e.g., look similar on an HD vs 4K display), I do encourage you to look into using Grid elements. You can nest grids within grids, and you can use relative sizing for rows and columns, e.g., tell columns 1-3 to use 20, 20, and 60% of available width (which is determined by the parent of the grid). For grids, look into the use of "*" (star) sizing.

I suspect it is because you are relying on the Margin property to position your control on the screen. This will not scale well at all for different display sizes or DPI settings. Much more reliable than Margin (or Padding) is to layout your view using Grid controls, which may be nested.

@Jason Carr: Unfortunately, the IsInGameDetails binding does not update when navigating from the games list to games details. I've included an example below. Maybe I'm still overlooking something, but if not would you please consider repairing this binding? It'd be even better if this binding was also accessible from within child elements such as the TextListViewModel used in GamesViewModelBase. In the example, the yellow IsGameMenu custom flag is a kluge I use to get the info I need -- though it's a theme-specific fix and does not work in themes with more games views than the text list view. @faeran is trying to use some of my controls in his theme, and I'd like to fix this for him (and just get rid of that kluge which would make me feel better :).

@EduInmigrante: Found a solution, and in the process I'm adding multi-language support. It'll take me a while to finish this, but I'll let you know when it's done.