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CAN DOSBOX COMMAND LINE UPDATE CONFIG FILE IN REAL TIME?

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First post, by fnick50

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Hello Again all,

I got a new question for the forum.

If you update your configuration from the command line for example:

CONFIG -SET "MACHINE=TANDY"
CONFIG -WRITECONF DOSBOX.CONF

After updating the dosbox.conf with the new machine tandy, it would be nice to run a program with the tandy emulation right from the command line without having to exit out of dosbox and restart it to see the change. Because even though the dosbox.conf has updated the machine, it still runs under the machine dosbox started up with?

So my question, is their a way to do this without using a frontend, just from the command line? Simply saying can I switch one machine from another on the fly from Vga to Tandy or reverse without exiting and restarting dosbox?

Thanks for your help,
fnick50

Reply 2 of 6, by fnick50

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Hey dosfreak thanks for the quick response, also by the way I got the mouse to work with deskmate, it was exactly what you said the program did have its own mouse driver.

I put in these commands:
machine tandy
machine=tandy
and the ones above
I even tried z:\autoexec.bat,
but nothing will trigger the new video mode that was updated to dosbox.conf

and when I just type machine after the update it does change from reporting vga which dosbox started up with and reports the new setting tandy, but the video never switches over unless their is a exit and restart of dosbox.

I would like to create a menu when dosbox starts with the choice command 1st choice to run tandy emulation with game and 2nd to run vga w/game, but can't think of a way to do it on the fly. I know there is frontends out there but I just wanted something simple, and minimal inside of dosbox. I guess a better way to ask can dosbox refresh or reboot without exiting to run the updated config video set from command line?

Reply 4 of 6, by MiniMax

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You can - with some difficulty - simulate this menu system you are talking about.

Assume you can have one of these files on the mounted C drive:

1) C:\MACHINE.TDY
2) C:\MACHINE.VGA

You start run a BAT/shell file in Windows/Linux, and delete both files (if they exist). Now you start DOSBox, auto-mounts the C-drive, and starts the menu system. Since there is no MACHINE.TDY / MACHINE.VGA file the user is prompted for a choice, and your menu system creates the desired file.

The menu exists, and DOSBox exits too.

Back in the BAT/shell script you check which file was created, and re-launches DOSBox with a configuration-file with the correct machine-setting.

Game runs, DOSBox again exists, and you are back in the BAT/shell script. Delete the MACHINE-file, and start over.

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Reply 5 of 6, by fnick50

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Hey just and update,

I wanted to thank you all for you suggestions.
Minimax I liked you idea alot, but in the end I decided to go with a front end.

Trying it out D-fend Reloaded is better for me to use in the long run.

But to confirm the question: You can't update the configuration file during runtime of dosbox, atleast not yet.

Thanks again,
fnick50

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