Mr. Do |
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MAME Art Editor
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Reged: 09/21/03
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Posts: 4874
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Loc: California
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Woohoo!!
#387771 - 09/07/20 02:09 PM
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Re: Woohoo!!
[Re: Mr. Do]
#387772 - 09/07/20 04:29 PM
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That is a pretty big change !
For my setup I wanted to use 2 monitors, bezel in screen0 and marquee on screen1. Last night I created a small VBS script that would do the following :
NOTE : I keep my artwork files unzipped in folders under the artwork folder for this project. The end-result ZIPs are saved to the artwork root folder as a backup.
1 - detect if a default.lay exists,
2 - detect if there is a matching gamename marquee file in the marquee folder, if so, copy to artwork folder and append _marquee to the file name
3 - detect the width/height of the marquee image
4 - backup the original lay file
5 - inject a marquee element and marquee_only view into the lay file
6 - create a new ZIP file that contains all the original artwork, the marquee and both lay files (original and new default.lay)
My MAME.INI is configured for 2 screens, screen0 is auto and screen1 is marquee. Now when I launch a game I get the game+bezel in the main window and a full size marquee in the 2nd monitor. Works pretty slick.
Reading the change you posted, looks like this won't work/be needed in the future w/the removal of the marquee element. We'll have to see what changes need to be made to get the look working again.
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Re: Woohoo!!
[Re: Mr. Do]
#387773 - 09/07/20 06:08 PM
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600 files in my case. This is going to suck. At some point, I wonder if it will be possible to have artwork files calculate dimensions with algorithms so they don't all have to be manually coded? I guess that's a long-shot because you'd still have to manually calculate the game screen position/size relative to the bezel. I'd personally like to see an option where you can position an element centered on a coordinate instead of by upper left to make it easier to resize/reposition buttons and the like. A man can dream.
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I have officially retired from sucking at everything I do. Life is much easier now.
My MAME/MESS artwork files: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ABxeKgNIrKlIsyck7dx4V241NFQDWAF4
Related screen shots: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1U5IbvbVzYW97PuOOQuocvZFE_YJz7WIn
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| Mr. Do |
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MAME Art Editor
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Reged: 09/21/03
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Posts: 4874
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Loc: California
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Send PM
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> https://github.com/mamedev/mame/commit/67ec5e5b43738128a696aea19b299ee0ed8a17a0
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> Sweet!! But... man, now I gotta go through 1500 files pretty soon.
Thank you Cuavas!! I can already envision how this is going to be more flexible in the long term... well worth the wait. And for simple artwork files, this actually makes things a bit easier.
Assuming it's going to take me until "at least" the end of the month to update all current files if I start today... is the new layout system in an almost final state? Or are there still other features to take care of coming soon that I should wait for?
[ATTACHED IMAGE]
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RELAX and just have fun. Remember, it's all about the games.
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Re: And it works!!!
[Re: Mr. Do]
#387816 - 09/10/20 08:57 PM
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| Mr. Do |
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MAME Art Editor
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Reged: 09/21/03
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Posts: 4874
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Loc: California
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Send PM
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> Re: the screen shot... I thought they phased out the bezels/marquees/panels options?
> Or is this something you have to code in the lay file now?
The old hard-coded designations of bezel, backdrop, etc. are now gone. Everything is now a reference to an Element or a Group (I hope I'm not over-simplifying that). For an Element to have the similar properties of what was a backdrop, we need to add a blend mode of Add; to be similar to an overlay, we need to add a blend mode of Multiply.
From there, you can create a Collection in the View section, and then you can turn on/off a Collection within the View. This is more flexible than the old way, because now you can specifically define which layers you want to be able to be turned on/off.
And you only add in a Collection if it's required... if for example, a View just has a bezel and nothing else, then there is no need for the Collection (because that's the same as just running the game with no artwork).
For me, it was only confusing the first few minutes of getting used to it, just because I've been doing it the same way for 14 years. Once I updated just a couple files, though... piece of cake... I already love it.
See attached for the setup used for the screenshot.
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RELAX and just have fun. Remember, it's all about the games.
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Re: And it works!!!
[Re: Mr. Do]
#387818 - 09/11/20 01:49 AM
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> Thank you Cuavas!! I can already envision how this is going to be more flexible in
> the long term... well worth the wait. And for simple artwork files, this actually
> makes things a bit easier.
Yeah, the goal is more flexibility in the long run. For some examples that are already taking advantage of it with internal artwork, check out some of the following:
- irrmaze (irrmaze.lay) - pretty basic case of allowing some elements to be hidden while others are always displayed
- matahari (by17_matahari.lay) - fairly simple example besides the length, allows the user to hide everything if they really want to
- sss/shienryu (segabill.lay/segabillv.lay) - nesting, so hiding parent collection hides children and disables their toggle controls, and hiding a collection by default
- jockeyc (jockeyc.lay) - nothing more advanced than the other ones listed, but it's another example
- sentx6p (sentx6p.lay) - this one uses collections in conjunction with parameterised groups to greatly reduce the amount of XML required to show all the controller displays and allow them to be shown/hidden individually
- spdheat (spdheat.lay) - basic nesting again
> Assuming it's going to take me until "at least" the end of the month to update all
> current files if I start today... is the new layout system in an almost final state?
> Or are there still other features to take care of coming soon that I should wait for?
It's nowhere near that urgent - only internal artwork needs to be updated by the end of the month. I'm not going to remove support for these deprecated elements in external artwork for at least a year. I wouldn't rush to start updating the external artwork if I were you.
The new features from this cycle can be considered stable now, so you can start using them in external artwork. There are a couple of other layout system changes that I'd like to get done soon (hopefully for this cycle or the next one), but they won't require changes to existing layouts, just fix some issues and add some flexibility.
I'll make a Python script that can migrate simple cases and flag issues. It's going to be closer to the release or maybe even after the release. As I said, it's not urgent to update all the external artwork.
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Re: Woohoo!!
[Re: pacmame729]
#387819 - 09/11/20 02:00 AM
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> 1 - detect if a default.lay exists,
> 2 - detect if there is a matching gamename marquee file in the marquee folder, if so,
> copy to artwork folder and append _marquee to the file name
> 3 - detect the width/height of the marquee image
> 4 - backup the original lay file
> 5 - inject a marquee element and marquee_only view into the lay file
> 6 - create a new ZIP file that contains all the original artwork, the marquee and
> both lay files (original and new default.lay)
I don't see why that won't continue to work. MAME still supports multiple views in a layout file and selecting a default view on the command line of in an INI file. The only thing you'll need to change is using <element ref="..."> rather than <marquee element="..."> when generating your layout files. In any case, you'll have a year before your external artwork stops working if you don't update it.
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Re: And it works!!!
[Re: Mr. Do]
#387824 - 09/11/20 05:45 AM
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> The old hard-coded designations of bezel, backdrop, etc. are now gone. Everything is
> now a reference to an Element or a Group (I hope I'm not over-simplifying that). For
> an Element to have the similar properties of what was a backdrop, we need to add a
> blend mode of Add; to be similar to an overlay, we need to add a blend mode of
> Multiply.
Yeah, but you're burying the lede here a bit. You can now have whatever blending modes you want on whatever elements you want. It's no longer specifically tied to the arbitrary "type" of the element.
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