13 replies to this topic

[scutters]

File Name: Visual Pinball - File Explorer Handlers

File Submitter: scutters

File Submitted: 07 Feb 2024

File Category: Essential Visual Pinball Files

Author(s): scutters

A Windows File Explorer previewer for Visual Pinball files (*.vpt, *.vpx & *.directb2s). 
 
When installed file previews can be seen in the Preview Pane for File Explorer and the Visual Pinball open file dialogue, previews can be toggled on/off by using the ALT+P key combination (or normal File Explorer menu options). 
 
From V2.0 the previewer also includes thumbnail and drop handlers so that Visual Pinball icon thumbnails can be customised (visible when viewing medium and larger icon sizes or the Details Pane in File Explorer & Visual Pinball open file dialogue). The details pane can be toggled on/off in File Explorer using the ALT+Shift+P key combination.
 
The use of thumbnails for icons (and/or in the Details Pane) is optional and requires user configuration, Preview Pane population is automatic.
 
Note - The preview handler is not compatible with the webp image format. If the VP screenshot (or playfield image if no screenshot is assigned) is a webp image the handler will not display a preview (sorry JP!), but as explained in the readme you can assign your own screenshot image to the table which offers advantages for performance and flexibility.
 
ReadMe.pdf is included in the download with simple install instructions and more details. Please read it!
 
Tested on Win11, but should work on Win7 (SP1) and later.
 
Thanks - Dave Kerr (SharpShell), Mike Da Spike (testing), gtxjoe (default playfield image from table template file), Noah Fentz (default backglass VirtuaPin grill image), Jarr3 for help with B2S stuff and of course all past and present VP & B2S devs!
 

Click here to download this file

[wiesshund]

expected but

also does not work if playfield image is transparent

[scutters]

expected but

also does not work if playfield image is transparent

 

A fully transparent playfield image? lol, yes that would be a problem to display.

 

Not sure if that's what you meant but the solution is probably going to be the same anyway, add whatever image you want as the preview to the the table and then assign it as the screenshot in Table Info.

 

Ideally all tables would have a suitable screenshot pre assigned on release but i don't think many (if any) do at this time. If there isn't one the handler has to go away and try to find and display the playfield image instead (as that seemed the best choice of something meaningful to display in most cases), but some playfield images just aren't as suitable to display as others.

 

(more info in the readme file in the download for anyone who's interested)

[wiesshund]

I have some with varying amounts of transparency
As expects, they do not give good results, that's a windows thing
Transparencies do not a good icon thumbnail make.

 

There are some other image formats that also do not work, but i wholly do not expect them to as windows also can not do thumbnails for those image types period

 

Take away is simply

Some things wont work, dont expect them to, windows itself doesnt like those things as far as displaying as icons

But author's can fix, of course, by simply including a normal JPG or PNG screenshot in the table.

 

Finally a use for that feature, since it has never seemed to serve a purpose previously, that was cool you thought to parse that.

 

I used to include them, but i stopped when i realized it didnt do anything.

Maybe i will start including them again?

[scutters]

I used to include them, but i stopped when i realized it didnt do anything.

Maybe i will start including them again?

 

Yes please! 

 

Btw, bit of a side note - if anyone wants the source code for something just message me for now. Just waiting to see if there's many requests or issues for a bit, after that i'll post it somewhere (tbd).

Edit- actually, there's not much code really and what there is can be viewed easily enough with jetbrains dotpeek so that'll probably do.

Edited by scutters, 03 March 2024 - 11:04 AM.

[scutters]

V2.0 is ready, just got some upload / update issues to resolve but for now it's here; https://www.dropbox....j1a12fqux0&dl=0   edit - v2 now uploaded

 

 

V2.0 adds the ability to customise the icons/thumbnails used in file explorer re-using existing front end media or assigning new (details in the readme.pdf). Can give you this kind of view in file explorer for a front end 'lite' feel;

 

 

File explorer preview pane works exactly as in V1.0 so no need to update if that's all you want to use. If you want to update then i'd suggest overwrite existing files and then re-run the Install_RunThisAsAdmin.bat.

Edited by scutters, 05 March 2024 - 04:07 PM.

[Fusionwerks]

Sounds strange, but...I was having an issue where when working with .ogg files (renaming, moving, etc) explorer would crash. After some poking around, it turned out to be this program. Disabling it made my problem go away. Is there a patch or a fix for this?

[scutters]

Sounds strange, but...I was having an issue where when working with .ogg files (renaming, moving, etc) explorer would crash. After some poking around, it turned out to be this program. Disabling it made my problem go away. Is there a patch or a fix for this?

 

That does sound strange, the handler dll gets registered against file types by extension and .ogg isn't one of them. I suppose it's possible that one of the GUIDs used in the registration isn't globally unique but that seems very very unlikely.

 

I've tried to reproduce your issue but have not been able to, so any more info you can give would be great. E.g.;

• What version of windows
• What application is associated with the ogg file type on your system as the default application to open those files
• Were you using V2.0 or V1.0 of the dll, and what functions were you using (details pane or preview pane visible etc)
• Was anything logged in windows event viewer at the time of issues
• Were the ogg files in the same folder location as vpx or b2s files

Thanks

Edited by scutters, 11 March 2024 - 07:28 PM.

[Fusionwerks]

well to be honest, i downloaded the file handler, but I found that i really didnt use it, or need it, so i wasnt do anything with it. its cool though.

what i was doing was working with some.ogg files for an original table. I would download them from the artists dropbox and they would lock up file explorer if i tried to move them or rename them. It was even doing this with past .ogg files that i used on another table months ago, and i KNOW i renamed them and had no problems.

anyway, i was poking around and looking for answers on google and it suggested to delete the Web Media Extension package. I did that and no difference. Then i hit on a suggestion to look at using a shell extension viewer to see what was going on behind the scenes. Thats when i saw the vpx file handler in the list and remembered that that was all i have loaded since i started having problems. I disabled it and the problem went away. I re-enabled it and had the same problem.

They mentioned something about 3rd party file extensions can cause problems when reading the .ogg metadata and causing an error. IDK its above my head.

• What version of windows - windows 10
• What application is associated with the ogg file type on your system as the default application to open those files - just using windows media player
• Were you using V2.0 or V1.0 of the dll, and what functions were you using (details pane or preview pane visible etc) - probably version 1 since i downloaded it the same day you posted it initially, and i was not using it
• Was anything logged in windows event viewer at the time of issues - i did not look at any logs
• Were the ogg files in the same folder location as vpx or b2s files - No

thats all i can really tell you.

Edited by Fusionwerks, 11 March 2024 - 08:14 PM.

[Fusionwerks]

i believe this is a one off problem. It might be my computer, i wouldnt put too much effort into fixing something that only one person has problems with...

[scutters]

i believe this is a one off problem. It might be my computer, i wouldnt put too much effort into fixing something that only one person has problems with...

 

Tbh, don't think there's much i can do without being able to reproduce it.

 

I can see how the web media extension package could cause an issue with ogg files as it would be associated with them, but the VP handlers aren't... in theory file explorer shouldn't even be touching the VP handlers for ogg files unless there's something odd going on with your file associations in the registry somewhere (probably in locations like HKCR\.ogg\ShellEx or HKCR\vpx_auto_file\ShellEx). So i'm inclined to agree that it's a one off issue specific to your setup (or maybe it just needed a reboot after disabling the windows media extensions package?). If anyone else does see the issue then it'll probably need some registry digging and running something like procmon to see what windows is trying to do.

Edited by scutters, 12 March 2024 - 07:37 AM.

[scutters]

For anyone updating from a previous version having issues copying files it'll be because windows has the VisualPinballPreviewHandler.dll file open and locked.

To unlock and update;

1. Unregister the old version using Uninstall_RunThisAsAdmin.bat
2. Reboot
3. Copy new files across (not ThumbnailPathOverride.ini if you have set paths for thumbnails)
4. Run Install_RunThisAsAdmin.bat

And you should be good

[jpsalas]

I have started updating my tables to adjust them for VPX8 (mostly reflections and flashers), and updating the physics (mostly the flippers), and I also will add a screenshot, like this one:

 

 

I guess the size is ok. It is not very big 480x853, but for explorer should be big enough

 

But I won't update my tables until VPX8 is released in case I need to adjust something more.

Edited by jpsalas, 04 May 2024 - 02:13 PM.

[scutters]

Quick tip if you want to view ini files in the preview pane too;

 

Open regedit

Navigate to Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.ini

Add New String Value named PerceivedType

Set PerceivedType value to text

 

(this may well already be set on your pc, for some reason it wasn't set on one of mine. If you already see ini file previews then it's already set)