VOGONS


Reply 40 of 100, by Roger Wilco

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Roger Wilco wrote:

I will write the status, the machine is booted into, into a file during startup - status.txt. It will contain a simple string. NORMAL, XMS, EMS, NOEMS, and so on.
In the launcher menu, for certain games that need special boot options, i will start a bash script, that checks the status and if it's the wrong one, a message will be displayed: "to play this game, you have to boot into EMS mode", for example, and exit.
If it's the right one, the game will be started.

Even that should be unnecessary, as I believe DOS creates an environment variable called %CONFIG%, if you are using menu options in Config.sys, with the value set to the name of the chosen configuration.

You are right 😀 I knew, it's probably easier, as I imagined. Thanks 😀

Reply 41 of 100, by MusicallyInspired

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Looks very similar to something I wanted to accomplish (but which was vastly out of my reach 🤣). I'll definitely be using this on my 486 to replace the cheap hacky hardcoded one I wrote!

Last edited by MusicallyInspired on 2019-03-25, 13:13. Edited 1 time in total.

Yamaha FB-01/IMFC SCI tools thread
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Reply 43 of 100, by DoctorDalek

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It's be really nice to have alternate launch commands with configurable title. Sort of like how Steam does it:

905a591cd9ed8ff.png

This way you could allow users to still access setup or launch with alternate commands. Preconfigured options for multiplayer and such would make this a really convenient launcher.

Reply 44 of 100, by jasondavidcarr

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Hey all, wow, this thread took off a bit and I apparently lost track of it; sorry for that. It's great to see all the use that LaunchBox for DOS is getting. I just put out the first official version of LaunchBox for Android, and stumbled on this thread again.

Anyways, I can always use a break from "real" development every once in a while, so let me know if there's anything you guys are missing from the app. Also, if you haven't updated, I did put out an update to version 2.0 last year with the following:

- Many new fields are available for each item: Genre, Series, Developer, Publisher, Release Year, Status, and Favorite
- Can now sort items by Title, Favorite, Release Date, and Status
- Can now filter items by Genre, Series, Developer, Publisher, Release Year, or Status
- LaunchBox now remembers your last selection
- List titles and counts have been added

https://forums.launchbox-app.com/files/file/9 … pecial-edition/

Also, some clarifications. I built the original version of this app in 2 days, probably only spending around 12 hours on it. I've probably put in another 12 hours or so in updates since then. For software development, that is lightning fast, and I was able to build it so quickly because I built it in Microsoft Visual Basic for DOS 1.0. It's ridiculous that VB for DOS even exists, but it does, and it's perfect for a launcher like this. And the funny thing is, that development time included the time it took for me to learn VB for DOS (not much). So VB for DOS is a pretty well-kept secret; I found it fairly unbelievable that no one had built something like this with it already.

That said, the reason for the 286 requirements is that VB for DOS only supports 286s and higher. So unfortunately, there's no way for me to add support for earlier processors. That's a disappointment for me as well, as I'm currently having to run Direct Access on my 5160. Direct Access is really awful, but at least it ticks the nostalgia boxes.

Anyways, thanks for keeping this thread alive guys. 😀

Reply 45 of 100, by jasondavidcarr

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DoctorDalek wrote:
It's be really nice to have alternate launch commands with configurable title. Sort of like how Steam does it: […]
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It's be really nice to have alternate launch commands with configurable title. Sort of like how Steam does it:

905a591cd9ed8ff.png

This way you could allow users to still access setup or launch with alternate commands. Preconfigured options for multiplayer and such would make this a really convenient launcher.

Not a bad idea. I'll see what that would take to add. 😀

Reply 47 of 100, by jarreboum

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jasondavidcarr wrote:

That said, the reason for the 286 requirements is that VB for DOS only supports 286s and higher. So unfortunately, there's no way for me to add support for earlier processors.

Have you considered using the older gwbasic? Or is it problematic?

Reply 48 of 100, by jasondavidcarr

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jarreboum wrote:

Have you considered using the older gwbasic? Or is it problematic?

I've played with GWBasic before, but it's a completely different beast. Unfortunately it would be a nightmare to build this in GWBasic, if it's even possible at all. It's the Visual part of Visual Basic that made it quick to develop.

Reply 49 of 100, by Cralex

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Got this working on iDOS 2 on my iPhone, and I’m working on making it my main (only) menu from Appgo. I keep thinking about the novelty of running such a new piece of software, built for such an old platform, on such a new, closed phone. It’s such a novel feeling.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/a423fz5ut982ndc/Pho … 4%20PM.png?dl=1

Reply 50 of 100, by DoctorDalek

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jasondavidcarr wrote:

Better yet; is anyone interested in the source code? If there's interest, I'd be willing to Github it.

Yes! I'm a youngish .NET dev so I don't know how much I could contribute, but I'd love to take a look.

Reply 51 of 100, by mixerjdp

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jasondavidcarr wrote:

Better yet; is anyone interested in the source code? If there's interest, I'd be willing to Github it.

would be so nice if you release source code, im interested in learning more about vbasic for dos, i suppose vb is better than qbasic 😊

Reply 52 of 100, by Peter Swinkels

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Nice, I remember writing my own program launcher. Do you have the source code available or do you prefer not to share it?

I looked at your batch file that came with it:

REM Help the user if they're not in the correct directory.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO You have run LaunchBox from outside of the LaunchBox directory.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO Please make sure that you change into the LaunchBox directory using the CD
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO command before running LAUNCH.BAT.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO For example:
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO C:
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO CD \LAUNCH
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO LAUNCH.BAT
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE ECHO.
IF NOT EXIST LAUNCHBX.EXE GOTO FINAL

The above seems like such a weird way to go about this. Why not use a single IF statement to jump to a section of the batch file that handles displaying all that text?

Do not read if you don't like attention seeking self-advertisements!

Did you read it anyway? Well, you can find all sorts of stuff I made using various programming languages over here:
https://github.com/peterswinkels

Reply 53 of 100, by mothergoose729

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Hey Jason, thank you for continuing to support this! And for the tip for VB 1.0 for DOS. That is something I might check out for myself.

My biggest feature request is to add some form of free text to each selection For those of use with frankenmachines (multiple sound cards and video cards that need some configuring), it would be really nice to be able to add maybe 200 characters or so of configuration notes. Something like "disable board cache, set SB IRQ to 5" or whatever.

Reply 54 of 100, by Pierre32

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I know this is a bit of a bump, but I just discovered it and wanted to say thanks!

I'm usually perfectly happy with the DOS prompt, but I've put together a "Voodoo 1 exclusive" machine and a nice slick launcher felt right for this one. This launcher is absolutely mint, and I love how easy it is to configure. Nice work 😁

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Reply 55 of 100, by Storm82

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Really nice Launcher! Good job!

Would it be possible to add a "Install" option? I would like to have a launcher for a selfmade Games-Compilation CD. It just have to copy a zip file from the cd and extract it to a defined path.

That would be the icing on the cake for me 😀

Reply 57 of 100, by HandOfFate

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jasondavidcarr wrote on 2019-09-10, 00:00:

Better yet; is anyone interested in the source code? If there's interest, I'd be willing to Github it.

Hi Jason, did you ever got around to publishing the source somewhere?

If putting it up on GitHub is too much work, would you mind just posting it as an attachment here? In that case you wouldn't have to deal with issues, pull requests etc.

Am486 DX4 120MHz, no L2, 16MB, Tseng ET4000/W32 1MB VLB, ESS ES1869 /// 5x86 133MHz, 256kb L2, 64MB, S3 Virge/DX 4MB PCI, SB16 + Yucatan FX, PicoGUS /// Pentium III 1GHz, 512MB, Asus V7700 64MB AGP, SB Live!

Reply 58 of 100, by overload86

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HandOfFate wrote on 2020-09-30, 16:03:
jasondavidcarr wrote on 2019-09-10, 00:00:

Better yet; is anyone interested in the source code? If there's interest, I'd be willing to Github it.

Hi Jason, did you ever got around to publishing the source somewhere?

If putting it up on GitHub is too much work, would you mind just posting it as an attachment here? In that case you wouldn't have to deal with issues, pull requests etc.

Yes please, a thousand times!

I would really love a way to auto-populate my gamelist with every BAT file in a single directory and the "Title" set to the name of that file. Then I could just go through and manually edit the info, if I want it and a "long title" xD
So if you could either program such a thing in or give us the source and I could TRY to do that myself, that would be awesome. ^^

Reply 59 of 100, by HandOfFate

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I made a Python script to populate the Launchbox.txt file. I can polish it a bit and share it.

It works by comparing what's already in the file and the contents of a games directory (C:\Games in my case) and guesses what the game and setup executables are (which works better than I expected).

Then it looks up all games in the Metadata.xml file that Launchbox uses to try and enrich the entries with name, genres, release year, developers, etc.

In the end the hope is to have every entry to go as smooth as, for example, Ultima Underworld:

ULTIMAUW -> File(name='UW', extension='EXE', size=561744) File(name='INSTALL', extension='EXE', size=62352)
ULTIMAUW -> Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss

which resulted in this Launchbox.txt entry:

Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss
---GENRE---Action; Adventure; Role-Playing
---DEVELOPER---Blue Sky Productions
---PUBLISHER---ORIGIN Systems, Inc.
---YEAR---1992
C:
cd \games\ultimauw
UW.EXE
---CONFIG---
c:
cd \games\ultimauw
INSTALL.EXE

Am486 DX4 120MHz, no L2, 16MB, Tseng ET4000/W32 1MB VLB, ESS ES1869 /// 5x86 133MHz, 256kb L2, 64MB, S3 Virge/DX 4MB PCI, SB16 + Yucatan FX, PicoGUS /// Pentium III 1GHz, 512MB, Asus V7700 64MB AGP, SB Live!