Launchbox ability to startup script/app on launch and kill on close

[ckp]

I submitted an enhancement ticket for this. Please vote for it if you want it:

https://bitbucket.org/jasondavidcarr/launchbox/issues/2028/launchbox-ability-to-startup-script-app-on

There are several things I need to do outside of LB/BB since LB doesn't have the ability to do some of the things I need and I have to handle it using a stand alone autohotkey script or some other program or script. I'd rather not launch my other scripts/programs at Windows startup or manually because I only want them to run when LB/BB runs. It would be nice if LB could startup your external scripts/programs and kill then on LB close as well. I have seen other front ends that have this ability.

 

Edited December 1, 2016 by ckp

[YoYo]

You could create an autohotkey script that is always running and looks for launchbox or bigbox running and then starts. Example below checks for Launchbox or Bigbox every 6 seconds, if either is running it opens notepad, if neither is running it closes notepad.

 

#NoEnv  ; Recommended for performance and compatibility with future AutoHotkey releases.
; #Warn  ; Enable warnings to assist with detecting common errors.
SendMode Input  ; Recommended for new scripts due to its superior speed and reliability.
SetWorkingDir %A_ScriptDir%  ; Ensures a consistent starting directory.

#persistent
Loop
{
Running = 0
Process, Exist, Launchbox.exe ; check to see if Launchbox is running
If (ErrorLevel <> 0) ; If it is running
    {
    Running = Running + 1
    }
    
Process, Exist, Bigbox.exe ; check to see if Bigbox is running
If (ErrorLevel <> 0) ; If it is running
    {
    Running = Running + 1
    }
    
If Running = 0 ; If it is not running
    {
    Process, Close, notepad.exe ; Close notepad
    }
Else ; If it is running, ErrorLevel equals the process id for the Launchbox
    {
    Process, Exist, notepad.exe ; check to see if Printkey.exe is running
        If (ErrorLevel = 0) ; If it is not running
            {
            Run, notepad.exe
            }
    }
Sleep 6000    ; sleep .1 minutes
}

[ckp]

Yeah I have something very similar already, which also runs some other things too like a "loading'" splash screen for LB game unzipping, but my preference is to just run these things from LB and not at any other time. But your suggestion is a good alternative.

[ekdikeo]

You could just create a .bat or .cmd file that runs the programs you need, then waits for LaunchBox to end, then kills everything else, and exits..  A little command line utility called "pskill" can assist with forcing things to close without doing it manually.

 

[Gwen]

I would like to be able to launch a selected game in BigBox automatically on startup since my Mame cabinet is a replica Starfighter cabinet.  I want to run Bigbox but have it auto-run Starfighter when Bigbox loads up.