8.0-beta-1 Released

[jayjay]

25 minutes ago, shinra358 said:

snip

That's good to know. I did read that windowed mode can lower the resolution. As im not really bothered about the whole resolution thing it didnt seem much of a problem to me. Admittedly Iv only tried it on 2 games, duke nukem forever and need for speed shift, just to see if the script would work. But sounds like I might actually need to play the games. I always do things half assed.

I did try one of these borderless window app things but, again doing it half assed, didn't work out well. I'll give gedosato a look. Thanks.

Maybe its about time I got a second screen for my pc. Its hard to justify spending the cash on something I dont really need. Especially when I could spend the cash on another hdd instead or a new gfx card or... i could go on.

[ALIE]

Good update ?

[shinra358]

21 minutes ago, jayjay said:

That's good to know. I did read that windowed mode can lower the resolution. As im not really bothered about the whole resolution thing it didnt seem much of a problem to me. Admittedly Iv only tried it on 2 games, duke nukem forever and need for speed shift, just to see if the script would work. But sounds like I might actually need to play the games. I always do things half assed.

I did try one of these borderless window app things but, again doing it half assed, didn't work out well. I'll give gedosato a look. Thanks.

Maybe its about time I got a second screen for my pc. Its hard to justify spending the cash on something I dont really need. Especially when I could spend the cash on another hdd instead or a new gfx card or... i could go on.

i use a drawing tablet for my 2nd screen if that helps. I also use it for ds, wii u , and 3ds emulation.

Edited January 9, 2018 by shinra358

[alnyden]

Thanks for the new features.  I feel mixed about the new PDF reader though.    It looks good, but I am missing some features from Sumatra.  Is there currently a way to navigate a PDF with page up and down controls?  Personally I prefer this as it's much faster than scrolling.  Would having the option to use Sumatra be possible?

[usuallee76]

Awesome! Version 8.0, exciting stuff! Thanks for all your hard work. When will we have another poll for the most requested new features? My picks are never the most popular, but they are a lot of fun anyway, to see what others in the community are interested in the most, and actually sometimes it's a case of not knowing I wanted that until I saw it :-)

[Jason Carr]

15 hours ago, utopicide said:

FYI, after deleting the plugins folder and installing 8.x beta, the Plugins folder (just the folder itself) has been re-created, but it is now empty (no Unbroken DLLs or any other files). Not sure if that's what you expect, given your statement that the framework DLLs get overwritten with each new version. It appears that the beta is not installing the plugin framework, unless there's some weird edge case bug that's preventing it in my case. I only deleted the Plugins folder before installing the beta, but I can't delete everything and make a completely clean install, because I have a ton of customization in e.g. the Data folder.

(Edit: corrected "I only deleted the Plugins folder before deleting the beta" to "I only deleted the Plugins folder before installing the beta".)

The actual plugin framework DLL that is used resides in the LaunchBox\Metadata folder. Technically, that Unbroken.LaunchBox.Plugins.dll file shouldn't be duplicated into the plugin folders, though it probably still works if it is (and I'm guessing some plugin authors probably are duplicating it).

15 hours ago, shinra358 said:

I get this bug with pc games that can't be closed with the bigbox gamepad close hotkeys (for example: Resident Evil 4 UHD):

"loading game" window cut off glitch.

Occurs when returning from said game to bigbox.

 

Also, maybe the update download speed may not be a isp issue because the website is going very very slow as well. Every other site is working fine. Is the bandwidth of the site connected to where the updates are downloaded from?

I've seen that one before as well with some odd Windows games. I've already looked into it as best I could and ended up labeling it a Windows/WPF glitch and moving on. Sadly, it's not something I'm likely to be able to resolve without resorting to a hack that makes everything less smooth for games that don't have the same problem.

The downloads and the website do come from the same place, so if things are slow with the app downloads, then the website will be as well. That said, everything is nice and quick for most users, so all we can do is blame it on the Internet. The only thing we could do to speed things up for people at this point is to have mirrors all over the world (which is a bit out of our capabilities at the moment).

[Jason Carr]

14 hours ago, Typhon said:

The PDF reader does not seem to support SymLinks, and that breaks functionality on my setup. I already have all of the manuals sorted in folders for RocketLauncher, and it is not practical to copy all of the files for disk space reasons.

I can confirm that copying the PDF to the appropriate folder works as expected, but I get this when I try to open a SymLinked PDF file:


Do you have any idea why my SymLinks are not working? They work fine when I have them open with a regular PDF reader.

This would be a Chrome issue. Apparently Chrome does not support symlinks when loading a file from disk. The only thing we could do is to resolve symlinks before loading up the PDF; I'll see if there's an easy way to force them to resolve.

[Jason Carr]

14 hours ago, kmoney said:

Great job @Jason Carr on the addition of the PDF Viewer. I have been using Rocketlauncher successfully for viewing my  pdf manuals in the Pause menu. All my pdf manuals are in folders named after the rom name. Would it be too difficult to add a feature of searching in folders named after the rom name? In this folder I also have walkthroughs for some games in pdf format as well. If not thats fine but it would be cool if I could view and navigate them in BigBox as well.

Sadly I'm hesitant to add yet more complicated logic to the file parsing mechanisms for performance reasons. Sorry for the let down there, @kmoney.

13 hours ago, ckp said:

I'm really hoping 1 or 2 of the items on Lordmonkus' "little things" list will be tackled for this release. I'm most interested in those things.

 

I may tackle something from the list, but since almost none of them are really "small" things most of it will have to wait for the next poll.

[Jason Carr]

13 hours ago, Typhon said:

Hard links work, but I'd prefer to not go to all that trouble.

Is it possible to disable the built in PDF reader, and have it work the way it did prior?

Currently, no. But I can see how we should add an option to disable it. I'll add that to my list.

6 hours ago, bundangdon said:

I'm still, really hoping for #1 and 2 on my (original) list

Posted July 2, 2017 (edited)

1. The option to allow the selected title in the basic vertical rom list (BigBox) stay centered (instead of scrolling all the way down or up)

2. The ability to use custom box images (in bulk) for various platforms/systems when there are no images available. (instead of using the generic 'rubik's cube' bigbox image that appears in its place). I've mentioned this idea a few times before and it got a lot of positive feedback from other users.

Yeah, #2 specifically is high up on my list as well. We'll get there.

[Jason Carr]

5 hours ago, AVissie said:

I agree with the idea that it would be nice for when a game is launched that the appropriate manual opens as well for that specific game. For instance game on one monitor and manual on a second monitor if you have one. Also an idea for further down the road for the PDF Viewer, if you have walkthroughs or strategy guides for games, then you can change an option to decide between the different options, what should be displayed for each game

Yup, agreed. We may or may not get that far for 8.0, but yes, if you have two monitors it certainly makes sense to use one of them to display the manual.

5 hours ago, xmas said:

I also have requested couple of list on Lordmonkus' "little things".

1. Windows shortcut files - Thank you so much for this feature. I'm 100% satisfied without any issues. So much convenient!

2. Image Download from Wikipedia ID- Some works but some are still not.

3. drag  & drop image straight from Web Browser - This is very useful feature for rare rom's images not in database. So after googling, we can drag&drop to image editor directly.

4. IMAGE EDIT*** - Personally, this is the high priority feature that should be implemented.
    a.  1 Click Left mouse - Highlight the current picture
    b.  DEL key - delete highlighted picture
    c.  Arrow key - (highlighted/selected picture) previous, next picture
    d. Double click - Popup Image Edit Window. Like wirtual82 mentioned, it would be nice to have simple crop/resize option.

5. PLATFORM CATEGORY- only 1 platform category is expanded after close and reopen LB. For example, even If I expand all platforms (Arcade, Computer, Consoles, Handhelds), when I restart the LB, it only remembers last selected platform and all the rest platforms are collapsed. LB should remember all expanded category.

6. Arrange by - LB should also remember each "arrange by" sorting per platform. For example, I would like to keep NES games sorted by FAVORITES. And Windows Games by RELEASE DATE.

7. OVERLAY ICONS - LB currently have 5 check box at edit window: Favorite, Completed, Broken, Portable, Hide

There should be overlay icons on top of grid pictures when box is checked. (Also in BigBox).

If I completed the game and checked "completed",  there should be an overlay icon or mark on the picture.

Per the "small" things list, I do keep up with that list, so no need to post them here. Most things are not small to implement, but I will be putting many of the items on the upcoming poll.

[Jason Carr]

3 hours ago, jayjay said:

Am interested in seeing if you can come up with something. Iv been trying something similar with windows games. But trying to force an application to open over the top of some games results in the game crashing. The only thing I have managed to come up with is putting the game in window mode. And adding a script to additional apps to maximise the game with no title bar, gives the appearance of full screen. Some games, as an example: assassins creed revelations, don't have windowed mode so cant do anything with it.

 

Maybe if you can magic us up something, you could explain how it works?

This is the exact reason why implementing any kind of an overlay would be a nightmare. Not even Rocket Launcher can do it for everything, and of course they've studied it for years and hacked it all together as best as possible. The only thing that *might* work is switching full screen to Big Box and back to the game, which would be tricky enough. But we won't be attempting any kind of an overlay over games, because it's impossible to make it work properly for everything.

I remember back in the day with Windows 98 and my Voodoo 3 2000 card, any time you tried to leave or minimize the game, the games would just crash lol. At least we're doing better than that these days...

[Jason Carr]

1 hour ago, alnyden said:

Thanks for the new features.  I feel mixed about the new PDF reader though.    It looks good, but I am missing some features from Sumatra.  Is there currently a way to navigate a PDF with page up and down controls?  Personally I prefer this as it's much faster than scrolling.  Would having the option to use Sumatra be possible?

I will probably add separate page up and page down and zoom controls yet, yes. I will also be adding an option to disable the built-in PDF reader so you can use your existing solution, but I won't be adding a specific option to use Sumatra.

[Jason Carr]

1 hour ago, usuallee76 said:

Awesome! Version 8.0, exciting stuff! Thanks for all your hard work. When will we have another poll for the most requested new features? My picks are never the most popular, but they are a lot of fun anyway, to see what others in the community are interested in the most, and actually sometimes it's a case of not knowing I wanted that until I saw it :-)

The new poll will most likely go up shortly after 8.0 comes out. The last feature I have to implement is Retroarch Netplay, which is planned for 8.0.

[damageinc86]

I think that even if it's impossible to overlay on every game out there, perhaps a percentage would be better than nothing?  I know even RL might run into a problem every now and then, but my success with their menu overlaying on top of a game has always been in the majority, with a game crash or problem being in the minority.  I think it's worth being open to, and not just scrapping because it's impossible for ALL instances. Many things are impossible to account for every scenario and every game, we might not even have launchbox if that sort of concern was payed attention to. ?

[Landcross]

4 hours ago, Hexxxer said:

Bigbix does this already. Each theme determines the set resolution in their themes configuration file.

Oh wow! Why did nobody told me this before!? 
How long has it been in there?

It doesn't work with the default theme btw, when I set force16x9 to true it automatically reverts back to false without actually forcing anything to 16x9. But that might be on purpose, to keep the default theme... well... default.

In any case, that's one thing of the wanted list. 

[Jason Carr]

5 minutes ago, damageinc86 said:

I think that even if it's impossible to overlay on every game out there, perhaps a percentage would be better than nothing?  I know even RL might run into a problem every now and then, but my success with their menu overlaying on top of a game has always been in the majority, with a game crash or problem being in the minority.  I think it's worth being open to, and not just scrapping because it's impossible for ALL instances. Many things are impossible to account for every scenario and every game, we might not even have launchbox if that sort of concern was payed attention to. ?

The issue isn't just a lack of 100% coverage, it's also the development hell involved. Initial implementation would take weeks, and then every time a new version of Windows came out, it would be a crapshoot whether things would stay working. So it's not something that we're likely to tackle any time soon.

[Jason Carr]

1 minute ago, Landcross said:

Oh wow! Why did nobody told me this before!? 
How long has it been in there?

It doesn't work with the default theme btw, when I set force16x9 to true it automatically reverts back to false without actually forcing anything to 16x9. But that might be on purpose, to keep the default theme... well... default.

In any case, that's one thing of the wanted list. 

Yeah, the default theme files are overwritten on startup, so it's impossible to change anything in the default theme. However, what you can do is duplicate the default theme to another folder and then change it.

[neil9000]

Hi @Jason Carr i have been downloading some recorded hyperspin themes from emumovies today which i have placed in the "Theme" folder inside of the relative platform video folder, i have then checked the "Prefer theme videos" in the Bigbox options, but they are not showing for me as i still get the standard gameplay video snaps, bug? or have i missed something?

Thank's.

[Jason Carr]

43 minutes ago, neil9000 said:

Hi @Jason Carr i have been downloading some recorded hyperspin themes from emumovies today which i have placed in the "Theme" folder inside of the relative platform video folder, i have then checked the "Prefer theme videos" in the Bigbox options, but they are not showing for me as i still get the standard gameplay video snaps, bug? or have i missed something?

Thank's.

I've never heard of that being an issue @neil9000. Maybe you can compare the file names to the game titles to see if they match up?

[jayjay]

I have tested my amateur script over 64 xbox360/ps3 era games. 51 games work. 2 Games work in window mode. 9 games wont work but do have window mode so might work that way, haven't tested. 1 game refuses to acknowledge any script and no window mode. 1 Game always crashes no matter what I try. And as you say about win98 games, I would imagine these figures would get worse the further back we go. I know you and the rocket launcher guys can do better than my amateur skills. But my personal opinion is if I was a paid for app, like launchbox, I wouldn't go down this avenue. 

 

Anyway thanks for the reply.