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3341

clrmame Discussion / Re: clrmamepro auto-minimizing problem

« on: 20 April 2009, 20:19 »

Okay, I'm looking in the program folder for clrmamepro, and I don't see any cmpro.ini. The only .ini files are stats.ini, urls.ini, and version.ini. I also tried uninstalling and reinstalling the program, with no difference.

It's being created after you successful started cmpro, used it for the first time and quit.
So since you don't have a cmpro.ini, you can't have illegal sizes for the window....which is a bit weird that the profile isn't shown for you. If you start cmpro for the first time (no cmpro.ini) you should even see a welcome prompt telling you what to do next. Maybe that window is behind of any other window of your desktop.

what you can also try is: before the start, add a "cmpro.ini" file into the cmpro root folder. The file should hold the following two lines:

[CMPRO SETTINGS]
Adv_HideWindow = off

3342

clrmame Discussion / Re: clrmamepro auto-minimizing problem

« on: 20 April 2009, 20:05 »

Hi. I am trying to run the latest version of clrmamepro, but every time I run it, the window comes up for about 1 second, then immediately minimizes to the bottom of the screen, and I can't restore it. I can't right-click it, and if I left-click it, nothing happens. All I can do is bring up the task manager and end the program. I've also tried it with older versions, and the same thing happens. This is the first time I've tried it on my new computer, and I've ran this before on my old computer with no problems. I am running Windows XP SP3 32bit. Anybody have any ideas what is happening?

Also, once I managed to click "options" before it minimized, and I thought it was ok, but then a couple seconds after the options window opened, the whole thing minimized again.

The normal behaviour is that the 6-button main window is hidden when scanner/profiler/merger/etc is opened. In this case however you will see scanner/profiler/etc instead. If you don't see such a window, the saved window positions may be corrupted. You can find them in cmpro.ini...for example:

Win_ProfilerDlgTop = 105
Win_ProfilerDlgBottom = 634
Win_ProfilerDlgLeft = 248
Win_ProfilerDlgRight = 1262


If the profiler window (usually the first window you see after start) is hidden to the bottm left, you should be able to bring it back to normal by clicking the normal windows restore button beside the [X].
If you stop cmpro, remove the upper mentioned lines from cmpro.ini and restart cmpro, the default values will be used again.

When running cmpro under MacOS/CrossOver it's recommended to set: Adv_HideWindow = off  in cmpro.ini


In general it sounds like your profile window settings are corrupted somehow....since that's the window which a) hides the 6 buttons one and is shown right after start.

3343

clrmame Discussion / Re: Updating CHD files

« on: 20 April 2009, 18:30 »

Will ClrMamePro support automatically upgrading the CHD files in the future?

No since there is no need. chdman does the job just fine and it's no big deal to write a batch file which automatically converts all chd files.

3344

clrmame Discussion / Re: Checksum analysis ignoring fix options

« on: 20 April 2009, 12:09 »

I Then I scan. If it asks to add a missing file or remove an unneeded file, I want NO.

If no fix options are enabled, it won't ask and won't fix.

But apparently I also need to go into the "Advanced Scanner Options" and then over to the "Fix Missing Options and I need to make changes here.  (reminded that why should I need to make changed for Advanced Scanner Options for fixing misses)

No you don't have to do this.

SO, why are we bothering with the VERY SLOW Avanced Scanner Options if we have aldready disabled the associated fix checkbox.

Again, you don't have to do this. I only told you that if you got the checksum analysis in CHD&Hashes enabled, it will do the analysis which can take long in some case. This has nothing to do with the standard fix/check options.

3345

clrmame Discussion / Re: Checksum analysis ignoring fix options

« on: 20 April 2009, 08:56 »

crap, yeah I forgot the "Checksums" box... but I still don't understand why any additional scanning would be triggered if the fix options are disabled? There are no checksums in the dat file besides the CRC32. We are talking the difference between HOURS and seconds.

There is no additional scanning. The "run analysis" is the part which can take long. In case of a wrong checksum for example it decompresses the file and does the analysis (like applying byte order changes to see if this solves the checksum issue etc.). The 'fix file (if possible)' writes back the file if the analysis shows that it's fixable.

3346

clrmame Discussion / Re: Move all sets remembering last paths?

« on: 20 April 2009, 06:59 »

Could you please change the move (and I would guess all the other options) unfixed, etc. so that they remember the last few paths chosen? Or at least the last chosen directory?

I put it on my list

3347

clrmame Discussion / Re: Checksum analysis ignoring fix options

« on: 20 April 2009, 06:58 »

Time depends a little bit on check-options not only fix options. E.g. if you scan for sha1 hashes (Scanner->Hash & CHD), it will decompress the archived file to memory and calculates the sha1 checksum...

For checksum analysis it will do similar if you have the "Run Analysis" option enabled. Is that disabled in your scan?

3348

clrmame Discussion / Re: Updating CHD files

« on: 19 April 2009, 18:51 »

I might have misunderstood something, but is it possible for ClrMamePro to automatically update the CHD files when it finds that it is of the wrong version?

No. It only detects the different versions and tells you if you have to update or downgrade. In any way you have to use chdman.exe to update your chds.

3349

clrmame Discussion / I'm not an artist....

« on: 15 April 2009, 22:11 »

...but I quickly made this:

http://mamedev.emulab.it/clrmamepro/images/new_style.bmp

...you might want to download it and load it in About->(PopupMenu)->Change Buttons.....

3350

clrmame Discussion / #0016 - double roms

« on: 15 April 2009, 18:26 »

MAME tries to name the files after their name and location of the original PCB. This can result in different filenames for identical files in different sets. If they don't share a parent/clone relationship this doesn't play a role. Now what happens when this happens within a parent/clone relationship.

By default, clrmamepro acts like this: different names - different roms.

So if you have something like:

pacman\rom1.bin      crc 0x12345678
pucmanjp\rom1jp.bin crc 0x12345678

within a parent clone relationship and you fully merge the sets you will have 2 files in there which are byte-wise identical.

A waste of disc space? Well...since MAME loads by crc/sha1, you don't actually need the files twice...MAME doesn't care about naming anyway....clrmame does. clrmame is strict. In days of terabyte HDs it's questionable if you really have to care about some bytes..

MAME itself added something to define that the files are identical. These are the so called merge-tags and they tell clrmamepro which 'alternative' name is also allowed:

rom name="mds-te_2b_a.bin" merge="mds-te.2b"

When clrmamepro uses this information it's not that strict anymore and detects if double roms can be avoided. By default usage of this tags is disabled. The reason for this is: I personally like the strict way better since each rom listed in the datfile can be found with the correct name in the sets and in the past merge tags were buggy in MAME's xml output.

You can enable the usage of the rom merge tags in profiler->options->Parse rom 'merge' tags.

By the way, disks (chds) also have merge tags...and surprisingly this option is enabled by default (otherwise you'd need some of the beatmania chds twice or even more...this *IS* a waste )

3351

clrmame Discussion / #0015 - chds in rompath root

« on: 15 April 2009, 18:14 »

An - imo - ugly way to store chds is to keep the chd files themselves in a rompath root. Why ugly?

1) it's against the general MAME loading scheme of rompath\setname\file 1... n (rompath\setname.zip for compressed sets)

2) you don't have any connection to the set itself. In case the name matches the setname like area51.chd it's ok....but you normally don't know directly to which game 765uab02.chd belongs.

Some years back MAME allowed chds on root level...then it was fixed (it was defined as a bug). When MAME introduced the new chd 4 format lately, this storing method was reenabled.

In case you're using this (which I personally don't recommend) you have to tell clrmamepro so. In Scanner Advanced you will find an option to allow chds on rompath root level.

3352

clrmame Discussion / #0014 - system default paths and systems

« on: 15 April 2009, 18:08 »

System Default Paths are a way to split up sets by 'bios' usage.

So for example you want to keep your Playchoice10 sets in a different folder than neogeo ones.
In MAME you got roughly 43 different systems and of course a huge amout of sets which don't use a bios at all. These non-bios ones are collected as system 'Standard'.

In clrmamepro you can define a path on our harddisk for each of the systems. Open the 'Systems' dialog which is accessible in Scanner, Rebuilder or Merger. You will see a list of BIOS Descriptions, setname and an assigned path. By double-clicking this last column you can browse a path.

System Default Paths are not necessarily rompaths. In most cases they match your rompaths though.

Hitting Auto-Detect SysDefPaths will try to find the best-fitting rompath name for the system default paths.

Move Sets will run through your rompaths and moves the sets to their belonging system default paths.

In front of the BIOS descriptions you also see a checkbox. Enabling/Disabling can be used to enable/disable all sets belonging to this BIOS/System, i.e. they are ignored during scanning/rebuilding/merging.


Rebuilding To Sytem-Default-Paths: Well, in rebuilder you can specify system-default path usage as rebuilder destination(s). So the rebuilder can split up your sets by systems.

Scanner: Well, in this case we talk about rompaths = system default paths. Now there's one thing to know: Fix-missing adds files and in case of system-default-paths usage you have to tell clrmamepro that you want to split up your sets by systems.

In the scanner advanced dialog you find 3 system default path options:

1) Detect Sets in Wrong SysDefaultPaths - this will list a warning about set xyz is in a wrong system default path. You have to manually move it to the correct one (or use the System->Move Sets button).

2) CHDs use SysDefault assignments - when a chd is wrong placed and moved to the correct place, you can use this option and clrmamepro will use the system-default-path information as new place

3) Use SysDefault paths for fix missing - the most important one for system default path usage. Fix missing got several rules to find the correct place to add found missing files. If you use system-default-paths, you have to enable this to get added files correctly placed.

3353

clrmame Discussion / Re: Bug in processing of symbol "`"

« on: 14 April 2009, 18:38 »

ok I checked the current cmpro and don't find any issue with "?" and "`" and "'" in datfiles (both, xml and deprecated format).

Send me the datfile in question and a more clear description what does not work for you. "`" gets replaced with "'" during datfile parsing...

So...currently I don't see any issue here.

3354

clrmame Discussion / Re: Bug in processing of symbol "`"

« on: 14 April 2009, 06:07 »

ver. 1.26

Incorrectly made ziping of file "Commodore Amiga - Demos - Music - Mel A'Dee (19xx)(Megahead)(AGA)" during build. Used original tosec .dat 2007-03-14. Problem was in apostrophe symbol, wich is used in original tosec.

OS: WinXP

"`" is reserved and internally used for romsubfolders. Use "'" instead in datfiles.

on the other hand, "`" should be replaced with "'" during datfile parsing...I will have a look.

3355

clrmame Discussion / Re: Bug in processing of symbol "`"

« on: 10 April 2009, 14:57 »

ver. 1.26

Incorrectly made ziping of file "Commodore Amiga - Demos - Music - Mel A'Dee (19xx)(Megahead)(AGA)" during build. Used original tosec .dat 2007-03-14. Problem was in apostrophe symbol, wich is used in original tosec.

OS: WinXP

"`" is reserved and internally used for romsubfolders. Use "'" instead in datfiles.

3356

clrmame Discussion / #0013 - rebuilding prestrings

« on: 09 April 2009, 08:33 »

Let's open up the rebuilder advanced dialog. At its bottom you see a 'Dest. prestring' check and editbox. So what's this all about?

In general, the rebuilder takes any file (or file in archive) from the source, matches it against the database (hash + size compare) and creates all instances at the destination.

To keep it simple (and ignore system-default-paths for now), the file is created the usual way:
destination_path\set_name\rom_name (where set_name can also be an archive...).

No back to that advanced rebuilder option. With the destination prestring, the creation path changes slightly:
destination_path\<prestring>set_name\rom_name.

So you got the chance to modify the setname. You can also use "\" in the prestring which results in folders. You can also use variables (e.g. %m = manufacturer) as prestring. The variables are listed as tooltip of the prestring edit box.

An example: Let's assume your rebuilder destination is "d:\temp\" and you want to rebuild some MAME files to folders specifying the year and then the manufacturer.
As destination prestring you enter:

%y\%m\

so you get something like:

d:\temp\1985\capcom\commando.zip
d:\temp\1987\[Seibu Kaihatsu] (Taito license)\cshooter.zip
d:\temp\1987\capcom\1943.zip


The %A, %a, %Z, %z variables can be used to sort sets by their first character/number.

3357

clrmame Discussion / Re: Feature Request

« on: 07 April 2009, 09:00 »

you trust torrents more than dats? Shame on you

3358

clrmame Discussion / #0012 - Download roms

« on: 06 April 2009, 11:55 »

Downloading roms? Sounds a bit hmm...well...something to discuss...
Anyway, clrmamepro got some mechanism to download files and let them automatically rebuilt them to your collection. What is needed:

1) urls.ini
2) a download folder

1) In urls.ini (or better use urls01.ini ...urls10.ini to avoid overwriting your changes with the next update), you can define a site alias, a pre and a post string. Let's have a look at the official urls.ini which lists an entry for MAWS and CAESAR:

CAESAR; http://caesar.logiqx.com/html/emus/multi/mame/; .shtml

There are three parts separated by ;. First one is an alias (which will be shown later in the frontend), a pre (http:....) and a post string (.shtml).

So what does this pre/post string stuff do?
In the scan results popup menu you got the menu items WWW Open. Via "Set URL" you can select one of the alias names. If you selected a missing set you will also see something like 'Open <setname> @ <alias". clrmamepro will build an url by taking the prestring + setname + poststring. As an example if you selected "puckman", it will open http://caesar.logiqx.com/html/emus/multi/mame/puckman.shtml
In this example it will open the

Now to the downloading....in the same menu you also see download options to actually download the constructed url. There are also options to rebuild the downloaded files automatically afterwards.

2) download folder: In settings you can define a download folder root path. This path (your_root\profile_name) is used for these download operations.

A good example for downloading files is for Mr Do's artwork collection. Add an entry in urls01.ini like this:

MrDo; http://www.arcadeflyers.com/artwork/; .zip

....and you can download the missing artwork files without the need to visit his page and grab the files manually. (However you should visit his page since he's doing a great job).


For "Download" ftp and http urls are allowed...for "Open" operations everything your system allows...

3359

clrmame Discussion / Re: SKIN!

« on: 06 April 2009, 10:38 »

if I know how to change it...sure.....however Simone (Datworkshop) set this up for me....

3360

clrmame Discussion / Re: Feature Request

« on: 06 April 2009, 07:04 »

I hope other people will find this idea of great use, I sure do!

I tend to not run clrmame over an updated dat alot of times, so I am sure that I have alot of unneeded files possibly floating around. I would like to be able to take a torrent file and use it as a dat file. Scanning the folder where the files were located would be short and fast to show unneeded items.

Is this silly? I know I could get an updated dat and scan it, just thought this might be a shortcut.

MageMaster

Actually I don't understand your request. Sounds like you're only rebuilding new files from "update packs" to your collection without doing a single scan on it?
I don't see a problem removing unneeded files with the scanner.