1622 replies to this topic

[hlr53]

Happy Saturday :-)

 

So, I installed the latest PBX this AM. When I fired up PBY my Visual Pinball media folder (only media folder I have started thus far) now points over to the PBX media directory. No biggie, I will change back. 

 

However, in Options I am trying to change the Media folder back over to PBY but it doesn't change after I hit Apply/OK. It keeps defaulting back to the PBX media folder?

Edited by hlr53, 15 September 2018 - 03:45 PM.

[mjr]

However, in Options I am trying to change the Media folder back over to PBY but it doesn't change after I hit Apply/OK. It keeps defaulting back to the PBX media folder?

 

Hmm, seems to be working for me.  Could you tell me...

 

1.  When you say it defaults back on clicking Apply/OK, do you mean that the radio button immediately changes in front of your eyes when you press Apply?  Or do you mean that nothing apparently changes when you click Apply, but if you close the dialog and come back to it, it's changed back?

 

2.  Quit out of PinballY.  What does your Settings.txt file say for "MediaPath = " ?

3.  Try this:  quit out of PinballY, manually edit your Settings.txt with Notepad, change the MediaPath line to read MediaPath = Media, save the file, run PinballY, go to Options -> Folders.  What does it say now?

[hlr53]

 

However, in Options I am trying to change the Media folder back over to PBY but it doesn't change after I hit Apply/OK. It keeps defaulting back to the PBX media folder?

 
Hmm, seems to be working for me.  Could you tell me...
 
1.  Or do you mean that nothing apparently changes when you click Apply, but if you close the dialog and come back to it, it's changed back?
 
2.  Quit out of PinballY.  What does your Settings.txt file say for "MediaPath = " ?

3.  Try this:  quit out of PinballY, manually edit your Settings.txt with Notepad, change the MediaPath line to read MediaPath = Media, save the file, run PinballY, go to Options -> Folders.  What does it say now?
 

 
#1 was happening. Kept defaulting back to the PBX media directory.
 
#2 MediaPath  = nothing. I changed it to Media.
 
#3 Now points to the PBY Visual Pinball media folder but the videos are not coming up? Closed out of PBY and also rebooted.
 
Main reason I installed PBX today was to see if FX3 tables would launch individually. They did. For some reason when I try to launch within PBY, a damn Enter key at the Steam end is being injected after FX3 launch. I'll look at that later. Not a PBY problem. Probably needs a simple parameter change. 
 
Still concerned the media are not showing up?
 
Would it be better to NOT have PBY start pointing to all the PBX media [and tables] if PBX is installed after PBY?
 
Thanks!
 
--Harry

Edited by hlr53, 15 September 2018 - 10:40 PM.

[mjr]

Yes, I noticed similar....it's specifically with the dmddevice.dll included with mjr's zip. The dmdext works perfect for me with fx3....but dmddevice.dll does indedd cause VPX tables to crash when closing out. Much more so tables that are using PuP-Packs.  Going back to freezy's 1.71 dmddevice.dll, and everything works fine.

 

Outthere, TerryRed - I think I found the source of that DLL crash.  If you have a chance, it would be a big help if you could try out the update and see if it's really fixed on your machine.  (I was able to reproduce the crash on my setup, so I'm pretty sure it's gone, but it's always good to double-check.)  I want to make sure the changes I'm sending freezy are good.

 

Update here:   https://github.com/m...7.1+mjr20180915

Edited by mjr, 15 September 2018 - 11:07 PM.

[mjr]

 

1.  Or do you mean that nothing apparently changes when you click Apply, but if you close the dialog and come back to it, it's changed back?

 
#1 was happening. Kept defaulting back to the PBX media directory.

 

Do you by chance have this installed in C:\Program Files or somewhere like that?  It sounds like file writes to Settings.txt aren't working, which is a symptom of putting it in a protected folder like Program Files.

 

A test you could do to see if file writes are the issue:

 

1.  Open PinballY

 

2.  Go to the Settings dialog

 

3.  Go to the Folders page

 

4.  In the media folder box, explicitly type a full path.  Any path, doesn't matter.  Try something like C:\TEST_PATH

 

5. Save

 

6. Quit PinballY

 

7.  Open Settings.txt in Notepad

 

8. Look for the MediaFolder=xxx line.  Does it contain the path you typed?  

 

 

And remember, you can always see the exact full path that the media search is using for each game via

 

   Operator Menu ('0' key) -> Game Setup -> Show Media Files

 

So if it looks like the MediaPath setting is correct in Settings.txt, but the videos/graphics still aren't being loaded, you can look at Show Media Files to see the exact paths being searched to confirm that it's right.  No need to guess whether the problem is (1) it's just the path that's wrong, or (2) the path is right but the files aren't getting loaded for some reason.

 

 

Closed out of PBY and also rebooted.

 

Just for future reference, rebooting should never be necessary for PBY settings changes.  They're just in that simple text file Settings.txt, not in any of the places (like the registry) where rebooting would make any difference.  Quitting and restarting the programs should always be enough.  Just to save you a little time in the future.

 

 

Would it be better to NOT have PBY start pointing to all the PBX media [and tables] if PBX is installed after PBY?

 

Well, I don't think I can actually tell the order of installation.  Plus I think it would really confuse people down the road to make the "black box" that selects your folder path even more complicated like that.  People are going to start thinking the media folder path depends on the weather forecast.

 

But it does seem like a problem that you had this weird change happen just by installing another program.  Maybe the thing to do is to get rid of the automatic default that selects a folder every time you run - that's the real problem here; it was picking one default up until now, and then you installed PBX and suddenly the meaning of the default changed.  Instead, maybe it should let you explicitly point it to the PinballX media path, but never use it by default.  And then I could also add a check the very first time you run that asks something like:

 

"It looks like you've already set up some table media files for PinballX.  Would you like PinballY to use your existing PinballX media folder, or would you like to start from scratch with an empty PinballY media folder?"

 

Does that make sense?  All of the option dialog settings would remain the same, so you could switch between PinballX and PinballY media folders at any time, but you'd never have this sudden change in behavior by anything external you do.  It would only change when you specifically tell it to change via the options settings.

Edited by mjr, 15 September 2018 - 11:32 PM.

[hlr53]

 

 

1.  Or do you mean that nothing apparently changes when you click Apply, but if you close the dialog and come back to it, it's changed back?

 
#1 was happening. Kept defaulting back to the PBX media directory.

 

Do you by chance have this installed in C:\Program Files or somewhere like that?  It sounds like file writes to Settings.txt aren't working, which is a symptom of putting it in a protected folder like Program Files.

 

No       C:\PinballY for 32 bit      D:\PinballY for 64 bit. 

 

A test you could do to see if file writes are the issue:

 

1.  Open PinballY

 

2.  Go to the Settings dialog

 

3.  Go to the Folders page

 

4.  In the media folder box, explicitly type a full path.  Any path, doesn't matter.  Try something like C:\TEST_PATH

 

5. Save

 

6. Quit PinballY

 

7.  Open Settings.txt in Notepad

 

8. Look for the MediaFolder=xxx line.  Does it contain the path you typed?  

 

No      MediaFolder = Media

 

And remember, you can always see the exact full path that the media search is using for each game via

 

   Operator Menu ('0' key) -> Game Setup -> Show Media Files

 

So if it looks like the MediaPath setting is correct in Settings.txt, but the videos/graphics still aren't being loaded, you can look at Show Media Files to see the exact paths being searched to confirm that it's right.  No need to guess whether the problem is (1) it's just the path that's wrong, or (2) the path is right but the files aren't getting loaded for some reason.

 

Here is something interesting. Yesterday I batch captured 5 VPX tables and after installing the 64 bit they all displayed perfectly and no lag switching to the next table. After I installed PBX today all the game settings got wiped out to include the star ratings. To see the Media tree for any table I had to set the games up again - meaning giving it the IPDB name again. I set up a couple of tables and the media tree path is correct so not sure why PBY isn't loading them?

 

Closed out of PBY and also rebooted.

 

Just for future reference, rebooting should never be necessary for PBY settings changes.  They're just in that simple text file Settings.txt, not in any of the places (like the registry) where rebooting would make any difference.  Quitting and restarting the programs should always be enough.  Just to save you a little time in the future.

 

Good to know and I figured as such but it's a habit since the DOS 1.0 days.

 

Would it be better to NOT have PBY start pointing to all the PBX media [and tables] if PBX is installed after PBY?

 

Well, I don't think I can actually tell the order of installation.  Plus I think it would really confuse people down the road to make the "black box" that selects your folder path even more complicated like that.  People are going to start thinking the media folder path depends on the weather forecast.

 

But it does seem like a problem that you had this weird change happen just by installing another program.  Maybe the thing to do is to get rid of the automatic default that selects a folder every time you run - that's the real problem here; it was picking one default up until now, and then you installed PBX and suddenly the meaning of the default changed.  Instead, maybe it should let you explicitly point it to the PinballX media path, but never use it by default.  And then I could also add a check the very first time you run that asks something like:

 

"It looks like you've already set up some table media files for PinballX.  Would you like PinballY to use your existing PinballX media folder, or would you like to start from scratch with an empty PinballY media folder?"

 

Does that make sense?  All of the option dialog settings would remain the same, so you could switch between PinballX and PinballY media folders at any time, but you'd never have this sudden change in behavior by anything external you do.  It would only change when you specifically tell it to change via the options settings.

 

Really needed. Let the user decide and opt out. 

 

Anyhoo, I really enjoy doing this testing and purposely keep it bare bones so I don't get mad :-)

 

As an aside I think the new voice feature in PBX is cool. For me it would probably wear thin after awhile. The colored DMD animation displaying PinballX on startup is pretty cool except when the letters go white. QUITE BRIGHT when one has a real DMD. About friggin' blinded me.

 

I'm on a tablet so hard to quote correctly. I pretty much suck at it on a regular PC.

Edited by hlr53, 18 September 2018 - 08:44 PM.

[mjr]

 

8. Look for the MediaFolder=xxx line.  Does it contain the path you typed?  

 

No      MediaFolder = Media

 

Okay, so it sounds like PinballY is failing to write your Settings.txt file when you save settings from the Options dialog.  Does that seem right?

 

Is it writing the log file (PinballY.log)? 

 

 

One more thing:  Remember that each copy of PinballY.exe will use its own folder as the anchor folder for all of the relative paths.  I hope that the C:\PinballY vs D:\PinballY of your 32/64 split isn't creating confusion here when you're looking at files.

 

 

 

Here is something interesting and bad! Yesterday I batch captured 5 VPX tables and after installing the 64 bit they all displayed perfectly and no lag switching to the next table. After I installed PBX today all the game settings got wiped out to include the star ratings.

 

Okay, first, don't panic - I don't think anything actually got lost or deleted or overwritten.  It's just a matter of where the files are coming from.

 

There are two things going on here.  One is that you added PinballX, the other is that you installed 64-bit.  The fact that you did both at the same time is making it all the more confusing, I think.

 

Thing 1.  Your star ratings are in the PinballY path in the file GameStats.csv.  This got misplaced (not lost!) because of the 32/64 change.

 

If you installed 64-bit in a different folder from 32-bit, you now have two separate GameStats.csv files.  That's why they're not appearing from the 64-bit version.

 

If you intended to just switch over from 32-bit to 64-bit, you can simply copy the file from the one folder to the other, and that will restore all of your old settings.

 

Thing 2. Your table bibliographic data (Title, Manufacturer, Year, etc) are in the Table Databases folder.  This got misplaced because of the PinballX default folder business.

 

The Table Databases folder works EXACTLY LIKE THE MEDIA FOLDER.  So all of the nightmares you've been having with the media folder after the PinballX installation apply to the Table Databases folder.

 

 

Solving all of this:

 

To really fix this, we need to figure out why your Settings file can't be updated.  But in the meantime, assuming you can write it with Notepad and *those* changes aren't also getting mysteriously flushed down the Windows toilet, you can get all of your old Table Database files back as follows:

 

Table Databases:

 

1.  Edit Settings.txt manually

 

2.  Set the line starting with TableDatabasePath to TableDatabasePath = Databases.  That will set it to point back to your PinballY folder.

 

3.  Remember what I said above about installing the 32 and 64 bit versions in separate folders?

 

Star ratings, favorites:

 

1.  Copy GameStats.csv over from your 32-bit folder to your 64-bit folder.

Edited by mjr, 16 September 2018 - 03:23 AM.

[TerryRed]

 

Yes, I noticed similar....it's specifically with the dmddevice.dll included with mjr's zip. The dmdext works perfect for me with fx3....but dmddevice.dll does indedd cause VPX tables to crash when closing out. Much more so tables that are using PuP-Packs.  Going back to freezy's 1.71 dmddevice.dll, and everything works fine.

 

Outthere, TerryRed - I think I found the source of that DLL crash.  If you have a chance, it would be a big help if you could try out the update and see if it's really fixed on your machine.  (I was able to reproduce the crash on my setup, so I'm pretty sure it's gone, but it's always good to double-check.)  I want to make sure the changes I'm sending freezy are good.

 

Update here:   https://github.com/m...7.1+mjr20180915

 

 

I haven't tested on my cab yet...but I'm using it (dmdexe.exe and dmddevice.dll) on my PuP-Pack creating PC...there hasn't been any crashing all night.

 

I'm only using the 32 bit files.

 

What out there actually uses the 64 bit files for freezy?

[Outhere]

I will test tomorrow

 

Yes, I noticed similar....it's specifically with the dmddevice.dll included with mjr's zip. The dmdext works perfect for me with fx3....but dmddevice.dll does indedd cause VPX tables to crash when closing out. Much more so tables that are using PuP-Packs.  Going back to freezy's 1.71 dmddevice.dll, and everything works fine.

 

Outthere, TerryRed - I think I found the source of that DLL crash.  If you have a chance, it would be a big help if you could try out the update and see if it's really fixed on your machine.  (I was able to reproduce the crash on my setup, so I'm pretty sure it's gone, but it's always good to double-check.)  I want to make sure the changes I'm sending freezy are good.

 

Update here:   https://github.com/m...7.1+mjr20180915

 

[hlr53]

 

 

8. Look for the MediaFolder=xxx line.  Does it contain the path you typed?  

 

No      MediaFolder = Media   I tried again this morning but no luck writing to settings.txt

 

Okay, so it sounds like PinballY is failing to write your Settings.txt file when you save settings from the Options dialog.  Does that seem right?

 

CORRECT

 

Is it writing the log file (PinballY.log)? 

 

NO. I checked media search only 

 

Log.MediaFiles = 1

Log.SystemSetup = 0

Log.MediaCapture = 0

Log.TableLaunch = 0

Log.RealDMD = 0

Log.DOF = 0

 

Sunday, September 16, 2018, 10:02:02 AM: Session started

PinballY 1.0.0 (Alpha 20), build 6585 (x64, 20180913-2215)

 

Sunday, September 16, 2018, 10:03:02 AM: PinballY session ending

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

One more thing:  Remember that each copy of PinballY.exe will use its own folder as the anchor folder for all of the relative paths.  I hope that the C:\PinballY vs D:\PinballY of your 32/64 split isn't creating confusion here when you're looking at files.

 

NO    I've been dealing strictly with the 64 bit since I installed Friday. 32 bit completely out of the picture. PBX was installed Saturday.

 

 

Here is something interesting and bad! Yesterday I batch captured 5 VPX tables and after installing the 64 bit they all displayed perfectly and no lag switching to the next table. After I installed PBX today all the game settings got wiped out to include the star ratings.

 

Okay, first, don't panic - I don't think anything actually got lost or deleted or overwritten.  It's just a matter of where the files are coming from.

 

There are two things going on here.  One is that you added PinballX, the other is that you installed 64-bit.  The fact that you did both at the same time is making it all the more confusing, I think.

 

Thing 1.  Your star ratings are in the PinballY path in the file GameStats.csv.  This got misplaced (not lost!) because of the 32/64 change.

 

If you installed 64-bit in a different folder from 32-bit, you now have two separate GameStats.csv files.  That's why they're not appearing from the 64-bit version.

 

If you intended to just switch over from 32-bit to 64-bit, you can simply copy the file from the one folder to the other, and that will restore all of your old settings.

 

Thing 2. Your table bibliographic data (Title, Manufacturer, Year, etc) are in the Table Databases folder.  This got misplaced because of the PinballX default folder business.

 

The Table Databases folder works EXACTLY LIKE THE MEDIA FOLDER.  So all of the nightmares you've been having with the media folder after the PinballX installation apply to the Table Databases folder.

 

 

Solving all of this:

 

To really fix this, we need to figure out why your Settings file can't be updated.  But in the meantime, assuming you can write it with Notepad and *those* changes aren't also getting mysteriously flushed down the Windows toilet, you can get all of your old Table Database files back as follows:

 

Table Databases:

 

1.  Edit Settings.txt manually

 

2.  Set the line starting with TableDatabasePath to TableDatabasePath = Databases.  That will set it to point back to your PinballY folder.

 

3.  Remember what I said above about installing the 32 and 64 bit versions in separate folders?

 

Star ratings, favorites:

 

1.  Copy GameStats.csv over from your 32-bit folder to your 64-bit folder.

 

 

No need to copy the CSV over. It was all in the 64 bit. TableDatabasePath = Databases fixed this. Still no media coming through.

 

I noticed VP 10 doesn't have a System3.MedaDir setting like 9 and 9.2? I added it but the media still isn't being displayed.

 

# VP 10

System3 = Visual Pinball X

System3.Class = VPX

System3.Exe = 

System3.TablePath = Tables

System3.Parameters = /play -"[TABLEPATH]\[TABLEFILE]"

System3.DefExt = .vpx

 

# VP 9.2

System2 = Visual Pinball 9.2

System2.Class = VP

System2.MediaDir = Visual Pinball

System2.Exe = VPinball921.exe

System2.TablePath = Tables

System2.Parameters = /play -"[TABLEPATH]\[TABLEFILE]"

System2.DefExt = .vpt

 

Also tried an explicit path MediaPath = D:\PinballY\Media\Visual Pinball X which didn't work. Set it back to = Media

Edited by hlr53, 16 September 2018 - 02:23 PM.

[Outhere]

No crashes 

I also I'm only using the 32 bit files

 

Side note

I did notice with freezy dll,

I'll use medieval madness as an example.... The playing field will show up right away and start flashing and the DMD takes about 8 seconds to kick in...

With the Dll from this (dmdext-v1.7.1-mjr20189015-x86) the playing field shows up right away but does not start Flashing...

but after about 8 seconds the playing field starts flashing and the DMD kick's in at the same time...

I used medieval madness as an example because Out of a dozen games that I tried this was the one with the longest delay - The biggest difference between the 2 dll's
...

[mjr]

 

Is it writing the log file (PinballY.log)? 

 

NO. I checked media search only 

 

Okay, let's try something really simple.

 

You said you had the 32-bit version installed on C:, and you installed the 64-bit version on D:, right?

 

Could you try just moving the whole thing to somewhere on C:?

 

I'm thinking that we just have a permissions problem where the program isn't being allowed to write files on D:.

[mjr]

I haven't tested on my cab yet...but I'm using it (dmdexe.exe and dmddevice.dll) on my PuP-Pack creating PC...there hasn't been any crashing all night.

No crashes 

I also I'm only using the 32 bit files

 

Great - thanks for trying it out!

 

 

What out there actually uses the 64 bit files for freezy?

 

You need the 64-bit DLL for 64-bit PinballY, but that's probably about it.  I don't think there's anything else 64-bit in the pin cab ecosystem at this point.  I expect that will change down the road as more people move to 4K.

 

 

Side note

I did notice with freezy dll,

I'll use medieval madness as an example.... The playing field will show up right away and start flashing and the DMD takes about 8 seconds to kick in...

With the Dll from this (dmdext-v1.7.1-mjr20189015-x86) the playing field shows up right away but does not start Flashing...

but after about 8 seconds the playing field starts flashing and the DMD kick's in at the same time...

I used medieval madness as an example because Out of a dozen games that I tried this was the one with the longest delay - The biggest difference between the 2 dll's
...

 

Very strange - the differences between the two DLLs are really tiny.  Just some bug fixes that really, really shouldn't affect startup time.

 

When you say "the playfield starts flashing", are you talking about Visual Pinball, PinballY, something else...?

 

TerryRed, did you see any difference like that?  Or anyone else who's tried?

[Outhere]

"the playfield starts flashing", --- What I mean is the playing field flashes all the lighting like normal

[mjr]

"the playfield starts flashing", --- What I mean is the playing field flashes all the lighting like normal

 

Okay, but in which program?  Visual Pinball?  PinballY?  Something else?

[Outhere]

Sorry --- Visual Pinball? - no front end

 

"the playfield starts flashing", --- What I mean is the playing field flashes all the lighting like normal

 

Okay, but in which program?  Visual Pinball?  PinballY?  Something else?

 

[mjr]

Sorry --- Visual Pinball? - no front end

 

Okay, I can look at that and see if I can see any difference on my end.

[mjr]

 

Sorry --- Visual Pinball? - no front end

 

"the playfield starts flashing", --- What I mean is the playing field flashes all the lighting like normal

 

Okay, but in which program?  Visual Pinball?  PinballY?  Something else?

 

Outthere - doesn't look like it's any different either way when I try it.

 

Could you try a little test on your machine for me?

 

1.  Fire up MM in VP with the new version of the DLL loaded

 

2.  This is where you're seeing the 8-second delay (correct me if I'm wrong)

 

3. Press F1

 

4.  Un-check "Use external DMD"

 

5.  Click OK

 

6.  Press F3

 

7.  The virtual DMD window should disappear, and the game should restart

 

8.  What kind of delay do you see this time?

 

You can A/B test it by switching back and forth.  When "Use external DMD" is disabled, DmdDevice.dll won't be in the mix at all, so you should be seeing the native VP/VPinMAME startup time after pressing F3.  When you switch back and forth, do you see the 8-second delay come and go reliably according to whether the DmdDevice window is appearing or not?

 

One more question:  which version of VP is this in?  VP X or VP 9.9.5 or something else?

And actually, I should ask:  are you using a real DMD device?  That might be the difference between our setups if so - I'm only testing with virtual.

[hlr53]

 

 

Is it writing the log file (PinballY.log)? 

 

NO. I checked media search only 

 

Okay, let's try something really simple.

 

You said you had the 32-bit version installed on C:, and you installed the 64-bit version on D:, right?

 

Could you try just moving the whole thing to somewhere on C:?

 

I'm thinking that we just have a permissions problem where the program isn't being allowed to write files on D:.

 

 

Deleted 32 bit on C and copied 64 bit over to C\:PinballY from D. Deleted PBY from D drive - no change

 

Deleted PBX using RevoUninstaller Pro to remove registry vestiges - no change

 

Using downloaded 64 bit bit PBY installer, ran it and used the Repair button - no change

 

I will probably just do a new 64 bit install tomorrow/this week and call it a day. When you make the changes I can reinstall PBX  and we can test out again.

[mjr]

Deleted 32 bit on C and copied 64 bit over to C\:PinballY from D. Deleted PBY from D drive - no change

 

Deleted PBX using RevoUninstaller Pro to remove registry vestiges - no change

 

Using downloaded 64 bit bit PBY installer, ran it and used the Repair button - no change

 

I will probably just do a new 64 bit install tomorrow/this week and call it a day. When you make the changes I can reinstall PBX  and we can test out again.

 

Okay... I think the first thing here is that we've got to figure out why the Settings.txt file writes are failing.  I think I'm going to have to build an instrumented version for you to see what's going on there; you should be seeing all sorts of error boxes come up when those writes are failing, and you're not, so something is really bizarre here.

 

Once we figure out why you can't write settings, we can look into the media problems.  For now let's take one thing at a time.