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Long File Name (LFN) support

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Reply 100 of 104, by Wengier

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Avenger wrote on 2021-04-27, 02:58:
So I gave this a go. I definitely like the expanded UX options such as removing UI elements, BIOS splash screen, desktop positio […]
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Wengier wrote on 2021-04-25, 21:43:
Avenger wrote on 2021-04-25, 21:08:

Well, the standard DOSBox SVN LFN release from a few years back wouldn't do it so that's why I ask. I was able to run EXE files with more than the standard 8.3 characters but spaces still caused problems.

I'm hoping that this X version has changed that.

The LFN patch for SVN had not been updated for some time, so it is a much older version compared with the DOSBox-X version. The LFN patch for SVN supports spaces in file reading/writing etc (e.g. type "a b.txt" will work), but not in file execution (which is why running the EXE file "hard game.exe" did not work). On the other hand, the LFN support in DOSBox-X is a much newer version and resolves all such issues. Hope this helps.

So I gave this a go. I definitely like the expanded UX options such as removing UI elements, BIOS splash screen, desktop position, etc. A lot of the additional features are certainly suited for applications though (and there's a TON of them) which in my circumstance aren't needed so I had to strip down all the .conf files I created considerably to make them traversable as opposed to a massive wall of text settings.

A couple of other things:

-Long file name support does work for EXE's with spaces in the name but does not for WAD files. Even with quotes or wild cards.
-Quake game music sounds a little odd. Almost as if it's being slightly drawn out. It's hard to explain. I compared using the exact same settings on the same machine between the regular 0.74 version of DOSBox and then spent an hour messing with the audio settings with no luck. I'm personally running the game through QDOS as the machine I used doesn't have an optical drive for my disc and this allows music playback via OGG files. Don't know if that has anything to do with it but I would assume there shouldn't be any difference in behavior from the base version.

I'll continue to use it with the hope of these being fixed in the future.

Cheers.

This thread is about LFN support, so I will primarily talk about the LFN feature here. I am not quite sure what you meant by “does not for WAD files”. In DOS (or DOSBox/DOSBox-X indeed) only EXE, COM, and BAT are executable files. Files with other extensions can be viewed, read, or write, but not executable. Can you please give a concrete example to show exactly what you meant above? If it is indeed an issue I will certainly try to fix. Please also note that if you are running a DOS program or game, the LFN feature is only available if the program or game itself supports it, or it won’t work, which is not an issue of any particular LFN patch, but how the LFN feature works in general, including real DOS environments with LFN support. There are indeed many newer DOS programs (and some games) support LFNs, but not older ones.

As for game music, it is not about LFN support, but I want to mention that DOSBox-X natively supports FluidSynth and MT-32 which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox, and you probably want to give them a try, and they may sound much better than the default MIDI handler. DOSBox-X also supports cue sheets with MP3/OGG/Opus/FLAC audio tracks which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox.

Additionally, there are two reference config files in DOSBox-X, the “common” one and a full one, namely dosbox-x.reference.conf and dosbox-x.reference.full.conf respectively. If you do not need the full config options, you can just use the “common” config file as your config reference. You can further reduce the config file size by using a command like “config -mod -wcp config.conf” which will write modified config options only, perhaps also a -norem option to remove all comments so that the config file will be even smaller. Hope this helps.

Reply 101 of 104, by Avenger

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Wengier wrote on 2021-04-27, 05:52:
This thread is about LFN support, so I will primarily talk about the LFN feature here. I am not quite sure what you meant by “do […]
Show full quote
Avenger wrote on 2021-04-27, 02:58:
So I gave this a go. I definitely like the expanded UX options such as removing UI elements, BIOS splash screen, desktop positio […]
Show full quote
Wengier wrote on 2021-04-25, 21:43:

The LFN patch for SVN had not been updated for some time, so it is a much older version compared with the DOSBox-X version. The LFN patch for SVN supports spaces in file reading/writing etc (e.g. type "a b.txt" will work), but not in file execution (which is why running the EXE file "hard game.exe" did not work). On the other hand, the LFN support in DOSBox-X is a much newer version and resolves all such issues. Hope this helps.

So I gave this a go. I definitely like the expanded UX options such as removing UI elements, BIOS splash screen, desktop position, etc. A lot of the additional features are certainly suited for applications though (and there's a TON of them) which in my circumstance aren't needed so I had to strip down all the .conf files I created considerably to make them traversable as opposed to a massive wall of text settings.

A couple of other things:

-Long file name support does work for EXE's with spaces in the name but does not for WAD files. Even with quotes or wild cards.
-Quake game music sounds a little odd. Almost as if it's being slightly drawn out. It's hard to explain. I compared using the exact same settings on the same machine between the regular 0.74 version of DOSBox and then spent an hour messing with the audio settings with no luck. I'm personally running the game through QDOS as the machine I used doesn't have an optical drive for my disc and this allows music playback via OGG files. Don't know if that has anything to do with it but I would assume there shouldn't be any difference in behavior from the base version.

I'll continue to use it with the hope of these being fixed in the future.

Cheers.

This thread is about LFN support, so I will primarily talk about the LFN feature here. I am not quite sure what you meant by “does not for WAD files”. In DOS (or DOSBox/DOSBox-X indeed) only EXE, COM, and BAT are executable files. Files with other extensions can be viewed, read, or write, but not executable. Can you please give a concrete example to show exactly what you meant above? If it is indeed an issue I will certainly try to fix. Please also note that if you are running a DOS program or game, the LFN feature is only available if the program or game itself supports it, or it won’t work, which is not an issue of any particular LFN patch, but how the LFN feature works in general, including real DOS environments with LFN support. There are indeed many newer DOS programs (and some games) support LFNs, but not older ones.

As for game music, it is not about LFN support, but I want to mention that DOSBox-X natively supports FluidSynth and MT-32 which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox, and you probably want to give them a try, and they may sound much better than the default MIDI handler. DOSBox-X also supports cue sheets with MP3/OGG/Opus/FLAC audio tracks which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox.

Additionally, there are two reference config files in DOSBox-X, the “common” one and a full one, namely dosbox-x.reference.conf and dosbox-x.reference.full.conf respectively. If you do not need the full config options, you can just use the “common” config file as your config reference. You can further reduce the config file size by using a command like “config -mod -wcp config.conf” which will write modified config options only, perhaps also a -norem option to remove all comments so that the config file will be even smaller. Hope this helps.

If you load a WAD file along side say the DOOM2.exe as in "DOOM2.exe -file xxx xxx.wad" you'll receive a message in DOSBox X stating that it can't find the file. Where as if you close the space "DOOM2.exe -file xxxxxx.wad" it loads without issue.

Regarding the Quake music, I should have mentioned that I also had fluidsynth installed via plugin/dropin/diff file added to the base 0.74 DOSBox directory so it was active on both versions and should in theory sound the same between the two. There's still a very noticable difference and I can't figure out why. The music sounds considerably worse on DOSBox X but so far from what I've noticed it's only specific to Quake run through QDOS. Not sure why since it's literally just OGG file playback. I'm also not sure if this is the case when using standard CD Audio playback but I don't have the ability to test that at the moment. I'll report back with any more issues with other games when I get the chance to test them though

I'll also try what you mentioned regarding conf files. I found it odd as a standard DOSBox user coming to DOSBox X that a configuration file wasn't already present in the downloaded zip file. After fidding with the default menu for a couple minutes I found out that you're able to manually create one via one of the drop downs but had no idea there was different variations. Might be nice for other users in my position trying to find it to have them present without the need to dig for it. Just a suggestion...

Thanks.

Reply 102 of 104, by Ringding

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Avenger wrote on 2021-04-28, 02:28:

If you load a WAD file along side say the DOOM2.exe as in "DOOM2.exe -file xxx xxx.wad" you'll receive a message in DOSBox X stating that it can't find the file. Where as if you close the space "DOOM2.exe -file xxxxxx.wad" it loads without issue.

This is to be expected because Doom does not know anything about blanks in filenames. It interprets the first word after "-file" as the file name, and this word ends at the first blank.

Reply 103 of 104, by Wengier

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Avenger wrote on 2021-04-28, 02:28:
If you load a WAD file along side say the DOOM2.exe as in "DOOM2.exe -file xxx xxx.wad" you'll receive a message in DOSBox X sta […]
Show full quote
Wengier wrote on 2021-04-27, 05:52:
This thread is about LFN support, so I will primarily talk about the LFN feature here. I am not quite sure what you meant by “do […]
Show full quote
Avenger wrote on 2021-04-27, 02:58:
So I gave this a go. I definitely like the expanded UX options such as removing UI elements, BIOS splash screen, desktop positio […]
Show full quote

So I gave this a go. I definitely like the expanded UX options such as removing UI elements, BIOS splash screen, desktop position, etc. A lot of the additional features are certainly suited for applications though (and there's a TON of them) which in my circumstance aren't needed so I had to strip down all the .conf files I created considerably to make them traversable as opposed to a massive wall of text settings.

A couple of other things:

-Long file name support does work for EXE's with spaces in the name but does not for WAD files. Even with quotes or wild cards.
-Quake game music sounds a little odd. Almost as if it's being slightly drawn out. It's hard to explain. I compared using the exact same settings on the same machine between the regular 0.74 version of DOSBox and then spent an hour messing with the audio settings with no luck. I'm personally running the game through QDOS as the machine I used doesn't have an optical drive for my disc and this allows music playback via OGG files. Don't know if that has anything to do with it but I would assume there shouldn't be any difference in behavior from the base version.

I'll continue to use it with the hope of these being fixed in the future.

Cheers.

This thread is about LFN support, so I will primarily talk about the LFN feature here. I am not quite sure what you meant by “does not for WAD files”. In DOS (or DOSBox/DOSBox-X indeed) only EXE, COM, and BAT are executable files. Files with other extensions can be viewed, read, or write, but not executable. Can you please give a concrete example to show exactly what you meant above? If it is indeed an issue I will certainly try to fix. Please also note that if you are running a DOS program or game, the LFN feature is only available if the program or game itself supports it, or it won’t work, which is not an issue of any particular LFN patch, but how the LFN feature works in general, including real DOS environments with LFN support. There are indeed many newer DOS programs (and some games) support LFNs, but not older ones.

As for game music, it is not about LFN support, but I want to mention that DOSBox-X natively supports FluidSynth and MT-32 which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox, and you probably want to give them a try, and they may sound much better than the default MIDI handler. DOSBox-X also supports cue sheets with MP3/OGG/Opus/FLAC audio tracks which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox.

Additionally, there are two reference config files in DOSBox-X, the “common” one and a full one, namely dosbox-x.reference.conf and dosbox-x.reference.full.conf respectively. If you do not need the full config options, you can just use the “common” config file as your config reference. You can further reduce the config file size by using a command like “config -mod -wcp config.conf” which will write modified config options only, perhaps also a -norem option to remove all comments so that the config file will be even smaller. Hope this helps.

If you load a WAD file along side say the DOOM2.exe as in "DOOM2.exe -file xxx xxx.wad" you'll receive a message in DOSBox X stating that it can't find the file. Where as if you close the space "DOOM2.exe -file xxxxxx.wad" it loads without issue.

Regarding the Quake music, I should have mentioned that I also had fluidsynth installed via plugin/dropin/diff file added to the base 0.74 DOSBox directory so it was active on both versions and should in theory sound the same between the two. There's still a very noticable difference and I can't figure out why. The music sounds considerably worse on DOSBox X but so far from what I've noticed it's only specific to Quake run through QDOS. Not sure why since it's literally just OGG file playback. I'm also not sure if this is the case when using standard CD Audio playback but I don't have the ability to test that at the moment. I'll report back with any more issues with other games when I get the chance to test them though

I'll also try what you mentioned regarding conf files. I found it odd as a standard DOSBox user coming to DOSBox X that a configuration file wasn't already present in the downloaded zip file. After fidding with the default menu for a couple minutes I found out that you're able to manually create one via one of the drop downs but had no idea there was different variations. Might be nice for other users in my position trying to find it to have them present without the need to dig for it. Just a suggestion...

Thanks.

For the LFN, as Ringding already mentioned this is to be expected, simply because Doom itself does not support the handling of such file names. Older DOS programs and games including Doom need to to updated in order to support LFN properly, so it is not an issue with the LFN patch but rather the game.

For the FluidSynth support, it is quite possible that the said differences are caused by the FluidSynth version and/or settings. Note that there are many FluidSynth-related config options in the full config file, which may make a difference for your specific game. If you compile the DOSBox-X source code yourself you can also install your own version of FluidSynth.

For the conf files, I am not sure what OS you are using and which zip files you have downloaded. For the Windows Visual Studio binary zips (dosbox-x-vsbuild-*.zip) for example, both dosbox-x.reference.conf and dosbox-x.reference.full.conf files can be found inside the zips. The Windows installer will also install config file(s) automatically. The config files may not be present in certain downloaded zips, but you can always create one yourself of course.

Reply 104 of 104, by Avenger

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Wengier wrote on 2021-04-28, 13:25:
For the LFN, as Ringding already mentioned this is to be expected, simply because Doom itself does not support the handling of s […]
Show full quote
Avenger wrote on 2021-04-28, 02:28:
If you load a WAD file along side say the DOOM2.exe as in "DOOM2.exe -file xxx xxx.wad" you'll receive a message in DOSBox X sta […]
Show full quote
Wengier wrote on 2021-04-27, 05:52:

This thread is about LFN support, so I will primarily talk about the LFN feature here. I am not quite sure what you meant by “does not for WAD files”. In DOS (or DOSBox/DOSBox-X indeed) only EXE, COM, and BAT are executable files. Files with other extensions can be viewed, read, or write, but not executable. Can you please give a concrete example to show exactly what you meant above? If it is indeed an issue I will certainly try to fix. Please also note that if you are running a DOS program or game, the LFN feature is only available if the program or game itself supports it, or it won’t work, which is not an issue of any particular LFN patch, but how the LFN feature works in general, including real DOS environments with LFN support. There are indeed many newer DOS programs (and some games) support LFNs, but not older ones.

As for game music, it is not about LFN support, but I want to mention that DOSBox-X natively supports FluidSynth and MT-32 which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox, and you probably want to give them a try, and they may sound much better than the default MIDI handler. DOSBox-X also supports cue sheets with MP3/OGG/Opus/FLAC audio tracks which are not supported by vanilla DOSBox.

Additionally, there are two reference config files in DOSBox-X, the “common” one and a full one, namely dosbox-x.reference.conf and dosbox-x.reference.full.conf respectively. If you do not need the full config options, you can just use the “common” config file as your config reference. You can further reduce the config file size by using a command like “config -mod -wcp config.conf” which will write modified config options only, perhaps also a -norem option to remove all comments so that the config file will be even smaller. Hope this helps.

If you load a WAD file along side say the DOOM2.exe as in "DOOM2.exe -file xxx xxx.wad" you'll receive a message in DOSBox X stating that it can't find the file. Where as if you close the space "DOOM2.exe -file xxxxxx.wad" it loads without issue.

Regarding the Quake music, I should have mentioned that I also had fluidsynth installed via plugin/dropin/diff file added to the base 0.74 DOSBox directory so it was active on both versions and should in theory sound the same between the two. There's still a very noticable difference and I can't figure out why. The music sounds considerably worse on DOSBox X but so far from what I've noticed it's only specific to Quake run through QDOS. Not sure why since it's literally just OGG file playback. I'm also not sure if this is the case when using standard CD Audio playback but I don't have the ability to test that at the moment. I'll report back with any more issues with other games when I get the chance to test them though

I'll also try what you mentioned regarding conf files. I found it odd as a standard DOSBox user coming to DOSBox X that a configuration file wasn't already present in the downloaded zip file. After fidding with the default menu for a couple minutes I found out that you're able to manually create one via one of the drop downs but had no idea there was different variations. Might be nice for other users in my position trying to find it to have them present without the need to dig for it. Just a suggestion...

Thanks.

For the LFN, as Ringding already mentioned this is to be expected, simply because Doom itself does not support the handling of such file names. Older DOS programs and games including Doom need to to updated in order to support LFN properly, so it is not an issue with the LFN patch but rather the game.

For the FluidSynth support, it is quite possible that the said differences are caused by the FluidSynth version and/or settings. Note that there are many FluidSynth-related config options in the full config file, which may make a difference for your specific game. If you compile the DOSBox-X source code yourself you can also install your own version of FluidSynth.

For the conf files, I am not sure what OS you are using and which zip files you have downloaded. For the Windows Visual Studio binary zips (dosbox-x-vsbuild-*.zip) for example, both dosbox-x.reference.conf and dosbox-x.reference.full.conf files can be found inside the zips. The Windows installer will also install config file(s) automatically. The config files may not be present in certain downloaded zips, but you can always create one yourself of course.

As I already mentioned regarding Quake, I spent an hour going through every possible sound setting including all the different MIDI devices present and they all sound the same, (odd) compared to on standard DOSBox 0.74 with the fluidsynth patch. I poked around inside the patch I have but couldn't find a version number. Just a date of 2014. But this brings me back to what I initially said in that the music isn't utilizing MIDI anyway since it's just playback of OGG files so changing the fluidsynth version won't have any effect on the out come.

Here's an example of the two with the exact same sound settings:

DOSBox 0.74:
https://streamable.com/r2q3ed

DOSbox X:
https://streamable.com/evh1kz