Synchronise game saves over the network with bigbox shell when the system shuts down

[Sbaby]

Hi everyone,

I'm having an issue with synchronizing game saves between my arcade cabinet PC and my living room PC, and I was hoping someone could help. Specifically, I need to sync emulator save files (like nvram, hiscore, ecc), as well as PC game saves, to have the same progress on both computers.

I've created an AutoHotkey script that works perfectly when I run it manually or place it in the BigBox startup folder. Its job is to back up and synchronize game saves over the network.

However, my goal was to have it run automatically every time I shut down the system using BigBox in "Shell" mode, to ensure I don't lose any saves.

I've tried two approaches, without success:

1. Task Scheduler: I created a task that triggers "On event" with event ID 1074 (which corresponds to shutdown). Unfortunately, the script doesn't seem to run in time.

2. Group Policy Editor (gpedit.msc): I tried setting the script as a shutdown script under Computer Configuration > Windows Settings > Scripts (Startup/Shutdown). Here too, the script doesn't launch correctly.

The problem, in my opinion, stems from the fact that BigBox, when operating as a Windows "Shell," handles the shutdown event in a specific way. It seems that when the shutdown button is pressed, Windows first disconnects the network and only then executes the shutdown scripts. Since my script needs an active network connection to function, it fails every time.

Has anyone else encountered a similar issue? Is there a way to "capture" the BigBox shutdown event and run my script before BigBox itself initiates the Windows shutdown procedure?

Thanks a lot for any suggestions!

Edited Sunday at 01:48 AM by Sbaby