Hi, ...

I've tried to create a new icon which looks like the icon of the first D-Fend app. Nothing special only new colors.

Respond = Thanks for an icon, that have 1x1 to 256x256, and colors better than gray scale, ...

I have use your icon, in my "Vista x64" [Desktop - games] shortcut" section. The third = 3 version.

I hope than the D-Fend programmer, will like it, even if it look like the old D-Fend icon.

Again thanks, for the icon, ... 😀

----------------------------------------------------------------
Sylvain St-Amand

Icon (1)

Hi T.B.,
I like your icons very much and would like to add one of them to the next release of D-Fend Reloaded if you give me your official permission to do this.

I like all 4 icons. So has anybody any arguments why one is nicer than the other ones; or in other words: What icons do you (=all) thing is the nicest ?

Long and short path names

Windows is making the short names in the order you created the folders. This means if you have created "Commander Keen 2" first an then "Commander Keen 1". Windows will do "Commander Keen 2" -> "COMMAN~1" and "Commander Keen 1" -> "COMMAN~2". Because Windows uses come cache for the translations deleting and recreating not always solves this. DOSBox does not use the Windows-API function for getting short pathnames (this would be easier for frontends but would result in different short names when useing the game directory structure on different plattforms). DOSBox is creating the short names in lexiographical order. This means (in the example above) "Commander Keen 1" will always be "COMMAN~1" and "Commander Keen 2" will always be "COMMAN~2".

Until D-Fend Reloaded 0.4.1 I was not aware of this and used the Windows-API function for making short names. D-Fend Reloaded 0.5.0 trys to use the DOSBox order. If you, hydr0x, are really using the current DFR version (the bug reported in your PM should in fact also be fixed since 0.5.0) please tell me the exact names of the folders where DOSBox and D-Fend Reloaded are using different shortnames. (Perhaps the sorting algorithm still differs from DOSBox to D-Fend Reloaded.)

Icon (2)

Can any of you recommend me some (free / open source) editor for loading this icons. I would also like to add the new icon to the DFR logo in program info dialog. But most image editors just tell me they can't open the ico files. The good old Delphi 7 image/icon editor can open the icon files but doesn't like the 256x256 resolution.
(BTW: Anybody found the easteregg in DFR yet ?)

Alexander wrote:

Icon (1)

Hi T.B.,
I like your icons very much and would like to add one of them to the next release of D-Fend Reloaded if you give me your official permission to do this.

Sure, no problem. (Erlaubnis erteilt! 😉)

Alexander wrote:

Icon (2)

Can any of you recommend me some (free / open source) editor for loading this icons. I would also like to add the new icon to the DFR logo in program info dialog. But most image editors just tell me they can't open the ico files. The good old Delphi 7 image/icon editor can open the icon files but doesn't like the 256x256 resolution.
(BTW: Anybody found the easteregg in DFR yet ?)

I'm using these apps: (Both are freeware)
IcoFX
Greenfish Icon Editor Pro

Hi, Alexander!
About image viewer: may you also close viewer window by ESC-key?

Hi, no problem, already implemented.
Three more issues to fix and then we can have a first beta version of 0.6.0 (hopefully this week).

So I'm a bit lost as to where to turn here:

I'm pretty good with dosbox, and I recently got D-Fend Reloaded for use with dosbox on my flash drive - I'm very happy at how easy it is and how it does relative pathing from a flash drive. But I'm having an...unusual problem:

When I load Dosbox and/or programs from D-Fend Reloaded, I can't seem to get sound effects/SB Sound working in games.

When I manually boot dosbox myself from the same install, it works fine.

So naturally I went digging through the config files, and AFAIK there are no differences - I've duped every relevant option to sound and nothing worked. I even manually added the Set blaster commands to the autoexec for the game I'm booting and I still get no sound, using identical options and an identical install of the game.

Possibly relevant is that when Dosbox boots (manually, via me), it does the set blaster variables on the command line even though it isn't in the dosbox.conf file - I'm assuming it's just hardcoded into dosbox to do that based on the sound device settings. However, when I boot dosbox either via the dosbox entry in D-FR or via the direct game entry, neither one executes those parameter sets via command line. And if I manually add them, sound fx (non-midi - midi music works) still doesn't work.

Any ideas why this is happening and what D-FR is doing differently here?

Feel free to redirect me if this isn't appropriate to ask here, but I figured asking a question specific to a frontend in the general help area was not appropriate.

Thanks!

Try checking the actual values, like type "SET" to check if BLASTER is set,
type "sbtype" to check if soundblaster emulation is enabled etc.

Ok, I'll check that when I get a chance later tonight - I didn't know I could check them like that (well, I think I did, but it's been soooo long since I had to do it - before Dosbox was around, heh) that'll at least help narrow it down slightly.

Thanks!

Hi illuminerdi,

your problem sounds really unusual - at least I can't imagine in what way DFR should be able to inhibit DOSBox from playing sounds.

if you are really sure sound is activated for the profile (is activated by default but anyway) and the IRQ, port etc. settings are right, I would suggest to try the following steps:

1. Create a conf file for the profile you want to start: Click File|Export|Create conf-files. Click "None" (=unselect all games), select the profile in which the sound is not working and create a conf file for it.
2. Manually start DOSBox with this conf file.

If the sound is working with the conf file something strange is happening. If the sound is not working with this conf file, compare it with your (working) conf file. (In particular the sections [mixer] and [sblaster].)

The conf file create via the export function (or also via text profile menu, the context menu of the profile list or via the profile editor) is exactly the same DFR uses to when calling DOSBox.

So it turns out the problem was the pathing structure. When D-Fend loaded the game, it was mounting C as the game's directory, rather than mounting C as root for the flash drive the game is stored on. The game would load, but because it's pathing had changed, it couldn't properly load the datafiles because the game has to be explicitly told the path of the game's resources (it's weird - you'd think that would preclude the game itself from loading). So the game would play, but with no sound.

For reference, the games were Quest for Glory IV and Gabriel Knight. In retrospect, it was a bit silly of me to test games using the same engine.

I'm going to test my pathing structure later today when I take my flash drive to work, so hopefully it'll work properly in portable mode (which is why I like D-FR). If not, I might be back with more questions. Thanks for all the help!

illuminerdi, my installation of Quest for Glory IV CD works fine under DOSBox with or without D-Fend.
Set pathes in resource.cfg/win to be relative:

1resAUD=.
2resSFX=.
3patchDir=.;.\patches 

and run game from it's folder.

Hi everybody,
I've just released the first beta verion of the upcoming 0.6.0 release of D-Fend Reloaded. A description of the new features and the download links are available as usual on the beta download page.

Because of the already grown number of known bugs in version 0.5.0 I would like to finish 0.6.0 as soon as possible (that's also why I've moved some feature request to my todo for 0.7.0.) At the moment I'm planing to release a string complete second beta version in about two weeks and the final 0.6.0 release in the first half of october.

Windows and DOSBox are using different ways of making short path names from the real path names (like "PROGRA~1" from "Program files"). D-Fend Reloaded 0.5.0 and 0.6.0b1 are trying to make short path names the same way DOSBox is using. But in some very rare situations this is not working right at the moment. I will try to improve the algorithm in beta 2.

(From the DFR website)

I'm a bit confused with all this. I've been using long name folders since when I first started using DOSBox, under Windows XP, and except for the few games that expect to be installed in an exact location (i.e. C:\WINGS), I've never encountered any problems.

How is that possible? Are there people out there using accents or stuff like that?

EDIT: BTW, just noticed that for some reason this last beta fixes the listing problems I mentioned on page 15. Thanks for that.

the only difference is when you have folders which have the first 6 characters the same.
dosbox makes the ~1 and ~2 sorted on alphabet, while windows does it on creation date.

@Alexander

Thanks for the release, I'll try to do some testing with it. Really looking forward to final and especially 0.7 😜

Hi, Alexander!

Testing 6b1:
1. After minimizing main window and restoring it, DFR loses window position and moves to screen bottom.

2. Not hidden tooltips. As I understand ListView control use it's own hintwindow and does not acccept vcl calls. Only solution I see is to set showhints to false and provide your own hint CM_HINTSHOW processor. I done that once when I needed hint for listview with changed font/charset. You may get it at
http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=Other.Detail&id=1295
code is in c++, but I think you may use it (it utilize VLC staynard hint processing). If you want - you may use it (moduke: _frmMain.cpp)

3. ScummVM SavePath: 'Use game folder' option goes wrong. As you copy value from main scummvm.ini - this path is used. If it is absent current folder is uses (capture folder in DFR). You may add savepath= to game section with the same value a path.
And, please, move values gameid, platform and description to game section.

4. Running external editor (and media viewers) path filename in quotes. Notepad gathers all args to filename, Wordpad does not.

5. Quick Starter - this is suggestions only. For media files (files you may play with internal viewer/player) add menuitem 'open in standard ...' as in screenshots tabs. (and in data folder make this also). And name 'run' item as 'open' for non executables.

5. Data folder view. When I drag file to data tab - no effect. On next attempt i receive a message 'Could not copy'. And no problem when dragging folder.

6. ScummVM Settings (profile editor). May you make interval between autosave and textspeed edits more wide. Label texts (in russian) overlap by two characters, sorry.

Hi, ...

I try to made = The directory(s) "LEMMINGS.001" "LEMMINGS.002" "LEMMINGS.3" Then = i have been able, to create a directory with ".000" or others extention, like a file that can have extention after the dot. Like "readme.txt"

I dont know if the extention in a directory name, is 100% compatible, with other "dos, win, linux, mac, and others"

-----

It mean = Some working directory(s) below

Lemmings 1 = "LEMMINGS.1"
Lemmings 2 = "LEMMINGS.2"
Lemmings 3 = "LEMMINGS.3"
Lemmings 1 ShareWare = "LEMMINGS.1SW"
Lemmings 1 Registred = "LEMMINGS.1RG"
Lemmings 1 = "LEMMINGS.001"

--
Not work well Directory(s) =

Lemmings 1 = "LEMMI~1"
Lemmings 2 = "LEMMI~2"
Lemmings 3 = "LEMMI~3"

Sometime after copy files from usb to hard disk to cd-rom/dvd/hd,... and retransfert to an other drive

= Before

Lemmings 1 = "LEMMI~1"
Lemmings 2 = "LEMMI~2"
Lemmings 3 = "LEMMI~3"

can be

Lemmings 1 = "LEMMI~2"
Lemmings 2 = "LEMMI~3"
Lemmings 3 = "LEMMI~1"
------

Then try to create directory(s) with extention, in dos

md lemmings.1
md lemmings.002
md lemmings.3SW

I dont test in window, to create a directory and name it "lemmings.1" if it work with "lemmings.1" in dos, after it have been created in windows explorer.

I will try in Linux Ununtu, later.
---
Also test =

Lowercase mixed with uppercase "file name" or directory name".

Like =

Lemmings
lemmings
LEMMINGS
LEMM~1
Lemm~1
----

Please test at your side, ...

Please respond me soon as possible, ...
----------------------------------------------------------------
Sylvain St-Amand

Thread cleanup. If you still want to discuss the finer details of long versus short folder names, go here:
What's in a name? You say tomato, I say ...

Hi, Alexander!
Some more warnings:

1. In Program Setup, Media Viewers 6 radiobutton captions ('use default' and 'use custom') go out of right border.
2. In FindScummVMIni (ScummVMUnit.pas) better use order AppData->Windows->ScummVMPath.
3. In Profile Editors, Serial frames - SetGame and GetGame use dosbox Serial1 setting for all com ports. And, please, make keywords in 'SerialX=' values in lowercase. DoxBox cannot recognize values as 'Serial1=Dummy'. And check all temlates for uppercase (default including) - or simply translate this values while writing dosbox.conf
4. ScummVMSettings.
- 'music_driver' value is set with extra brace, as in 'music_driver=auto)'.
- add 'extra_path' to [scummvm] section from main ini with defaut on scummvm program dir (as for themepath). (Extra data files for some games reside there).
- correct copying default ini sections (now both sections go to [scummvm]). And maybe you should not copy [game] section - for scummvm.ini may have several records for same game with different settings, but you may use only one or none (if they are named differently).

- for the next version maybe? Values left:
- render_mode - for games that has different graphic resources. And add value list to defaults editor.
- platform - if scumm can not recognize it by game data.
- gameid and description - set it from gameid in profile and profile name
- soundfont - (any file) presently it is used only for fluidsynt as midi_gain (not available under windows). But maybe in future version we will have it.
- language - move hardcoded values to default list. And may be add checkbox for use any language from full list (to support future fan/official translations)
- extrapath - allow game to specify folder with its own extra data (and don't write empty value, [scummvm] section should have default).

Hi skatz,

thank you very much for so much beta testing. I hope I'll have time on the weekend to take a closer look on that much things.

Greetings
Alexander