Fursphere

Feature flag it. If beta version flag = true; show change log else = show new features

Why isn't the full changelog just posted in the launchbox 'welcome' message? Seems like an appropriate place for it.

@faeran It might be something with my file structure. I did it again, but this time just choose "NES" (under NES I have separate folders for each region). This time it had the expected page with 'folder to platform' alignment (however, no dropdown choices, manual entry only). Is it intended to only select a single root level folder?

What I did: Import Multiple Roms (next) Selected three folders - NES, SNES, PS1 (next) This page was blank. No options. Nothing to choose. (next) This was the media download page. I canceled out at point. In the single rom workflow - You choose folder(s), then next page you associate a platform. for multiple, I was expecting you'd choose folder(s), then the next page you'd have a grid with the folders (or individual files), a drop down for each to associate a platform, and then a third drop down option for "scrape as"

Maybe I'm not understanding how its supposed to work, but the "Import Roms - Multiple Platforms" doesn't appear to work in the current Beta 4. (never tried it before). It never gives the option to align "imported thing" (rom/folder) to "platform" Should it?

While its still possible to run a local account on Windows 11, Microsoft is sure pushing to make everything cloud connected at all times. My main cabinet is on Windows 11 now, and it occasionally on reboot tries to get me to convert to a Microsoft account. So far I've been able to skip it - but it sure is annoying. Its making me think about converting my cabinets over to Linux again.... (which is a whole different nitemare)

You're probably right!

For me, it seems like the Launchbox startup notes are always a bit out of date.

I see Beta 3 is out. What did it fix?

The crash I was having trying to 'update' retroarch using 'managed emulators' option appears to be fixed. I was able to perform the update successfully from within launchbox.

Regarding performance, I run LB/Bigbox on an old Intel i5 3750k system. Its a little slow to load up, but after it loads its fine. Biggest annoyance is that in attract-mode, you can hear it working the hard drive (spindle not SSD) as it flips through the images and videos. Very disk IO intensive application. I'm finally upgrading it to a more modern PC, hopefully this weekend, and putting LB/BB on a NVME m.2 drive. So hopefully that'll quiet things down. I guess we'll see. The metadata.xml file is a pig (429 mb on my install), so to optimize that you'd have to move to some sort of database, like SQL or something. And that adds all sorts of complexity, and will bring new problems. I understand why the developers haven't gone there. Would be nice to have the option though - "advanced users or large installs - use MySQL" (or something?). But, I'm making the assumption that that would improve things - no way to know until its tested. Anyway.. back to the current beta. I've been playing with the emulator management features in the new beta, and I'm getting lots of .NET crashes. (tried upgrading RetroArch) Not sure if its because I'm trying to manage an existing install or what. I might move/backup the existing emulators and let LB/BB take over and do a fresh retroarch install and see if that fixes things up. If / When I figure out the exact workflow that causes the LB crash, I'll post it up.

Setup separate installs for lightgun and regular. Or use difference cores and setup LB to launch them accordingly. \retroarch \retroarch-gun

Emtpy folders do take up space, just not enough to mater with today's drive capacities. (I wrote a script that looped and ate up like 500 Mbs worth of disk space in hidden folders when I was a teenager many many years ago... lol) Its all good. I was just trying to understand the thought process behind how we got here. Thanks for the background.

That makes sense. In that case, you should probably just auto-populate all of that with every install, and disconnect them from the auto-import feature. Or even make it an option on install? "Auto populate game folders with well known naming convention" (yes/no) or something. That way the behavior is clearer to the user as to the intent behind it. I have my entire game library completely outside of LB, so all those folders aren't relevant to me. Although with the auto-import feature and naming conventions I may reconsider that. I'll have to give that some thought.

From an objective point of view, what is the justification for creating 175 empty folders (Just checked my own installs) on the customers personal computer that will most likely never be used? Is there a reason they can't they be created 'as needed' when they will be used?