[dreamcat4]

The ability to put individual launcher items (or sub-menus from your addon) into the main Kodi menu requires a missing option Kodi 'Add to favorites' in the item's context menu. I think I mentioned that already. Just wanted to clarify why the feature is being requested.

Ability to kill running (launcher managed) programs is another one I did not explain the reason for... but its pretty simple: if that program crashes, we need to be able to kill it properly before relaunching a new instance.

Hopefully the other things are pretty self-explanatory: switch-to is important because when your other program takes a long time to load up. Ideally you want both Kodi and the other program(s) running in background. I already have mapped 1 button in eventghost to bring Kodi window to the front (active). However evenhghost does not and cannot know what other (many) programs I add in AE Launcher. So it would be very cumbersome (and require far too many buttons on the remote, which I simply do not have enough free buttons for) to map specific buttons for all programs in eventghost. That would be impossible. So having AEL automatically do a 'switch-to' (bring to front) instead when the program is already running is basically essential. Otherwise there really is no convenient way to switch back / forth between Kodi and the programs it launches using a standard remote control.

[KidCastro]

Hi Wintermute0110 - I absolutely love this plugin and I am currently using it in my libreelec raspberry pi running Gamestarters retroarch and cores.

I'm having a major issue when scraping N64 and PSX games, It seems those databases are mixed and are actually reporting as the same category.

Not sure if this has been reported yet but as below, I added the n64 games which are 296 in total for example then I move on to adding psx games and It reports that 296 games are still in the database. When I go to PSX category now it shows the psx games and n64 games mixed together, could there be a fault in the code somewhere.

Here is a snippet from /.kodi/userdata/addon_data/plugin.porogram.advanced.emulator.launcher/reports/_report.txt

*** Starting ROM scanner ... ***
Launcher name "Playstation"
launcher ID "13d4566ea34693ad198d66ed0af0c016psx"
ROM path "/storage/emulators/roms/psx/"
ROM ext "bin|img|pbp|PBP|IMG|BIN"
Platform "Sony PlayStation"
Loading launcher ROMs ...
296 ROMs currently in database
Removing dead ROMs ...
Scanning files ...
Directory /storage/emulators/roms/psx/
Found 97 files
Processing files ...]

Can you please assist? this is my only fault with AEL both n64 and psx cannot co-exist separately. If I clear all roms from the psx launcher it deletes all the roms in the n64 launcher as well.

[Wintermute0110]

Hi
Your program is fantastic !

Just a question : when when i click to "add new rom", i can see the new but no one are scrapped (front/meta, etc)
i have to scrap manually every game to add picture (edit rom/asset artwork/scrap with...)

is it normal ?

thanks in advance

Fred

Hi,

Do you mean context menu "Add ROMs", "Scan for New ROMs" or "Add ROMs", "Manually Add ROM"?

[Wintermute0110]

Hi,

After Hours or works, m'y configuration is near to what I wanted to do !

I spend many many time to exclude roms that I don't want to appears in my set. There is no possibility to select multi-roms so I excluded them one by one, set by set. Anyway those roms still exist on my hard drive. I fear that with a new installation of your addon or if my Pc crash, I loose all this work.

I was wondering if You can make a "tool" or an option in the next release to delete thoses roms on my hard drive?
I Know that in some situation, like mame roms, parents or clones are needeed to be launched. ( pacman for exemple)
This tool or option would be only for console set.

Is it possible ?

Regards

Yevaman

In order to filter the ROMs you don't want you need a ROM filter tool like NARS. Currently NARS is unstable (it needs a big update of the code to work properly) and you may try. For No-Intro ROM sets, AEL 0.9.7 will support the 1 game 1 ROM launcher view mode. In the 1G1R mode, only the parent ROMs are shown on your launcher. AEL 0.9.8 will incorporate ROM filters: for example, you may want to show only Europe, Japan or USA ROMs. Basically, I plan to incorporate the NARS features into AEL so you won't need to delete any ROM from your collection.

For MAME ROMs the situation changes. As you have said, some ROMs depend on other ROMs to run. You can use NARS to create customised MAME ROM sets or use Advanced MAME Launcher. I can code a feature in AML to export any filtered MAME machine list to be imported in AEL as a launcher. Also, you can use other filtering tools like ROMLister.

In any case, I strongly recommend never to delete any ROMs. Just organise your setup like this:

Code:

/home/kodi/ROMs/nintendo-snes/ -> Here you keep your SNES complete No-Intro collection
/home/kodi/AEL-ROMs/nintendo-snes/ -> Here you copy the filtered SNES ROM collection

[Wintermute0110]

* Ability to add a configured launcher to Favorites.

Do you mean Kodi Favourites or AEL Favourites?

* Ability to not block for an already-launched application.

That feature will be supported in 0.9.7.

* If / when multiple applications can be launched, then a submenu item to managed those already-launched programs, and e.g. bring to front (switch-to), to restart or relaunch them, or to quit them. All from within AE Launcher in kodi.

Due to the way Kodi plugins work that feature cannot be implemented, sorry. Also, the ability to bring programs into front (give focus) depends on the operating system you have. Keep in mind that AEL code must work on all supported platforms (Linux, Windows, iOS, Android).

[Wintermute0110]

Hey Wintermute. Thanks for the compliment. Like I said my scripting is very basic, and once you have changed AEL to non-blocking, you'd want to exit Kodi gracefully with a kodi-send command. That's the only change I would make to the script. This requires, obviously, for kodi-send to be installed.

Regarding assets: My ideal setup would be to point AEL to a generic asset folder for all scraped roms, and for that folder to contain subfolders specific to each type of asset. The reason why this is ideal for me is that I run everything off of a server (mounted as a local folder on the pi), and it would be convenient and easy for me to duplicate my setup to other Pis in the house by simply duplicating the SD card. Then I won't need to rescrape assets, and I can keep the install size to a 4 gb card or less. Just my 2 cents. I try not to get into the nitty gritty of xml files if I can help it.

In theory you can have all launchers to point to the same asset directories. However, if you have ROMs with same name on different launchers then the asset files will be overwritten. Keeping the assets for every launcher on their own folder does not prevent to have the assets on an SD card and then duplicate that card. Just make sure the paths on every Pi are the same. For example, suppose all your PIs mount the sdcard on /sdcard/. Then, configure AEL like this:

Code:

/sdcard/AEL-ROMs/snes/ -> SNES ROMs
/sdcard/AEL-ROMs/sms/ -> Master System ROMs
...
/sdcard/AEL-assets/snes/ -> Asset main directory. Same name as the ROM directory
/sdcard/AEL-assets/sms/

[Wintermute0110]

Hi Wintermute0110 - I absolutely love this plugin and I am currently using it in my libreelec raspberry pi running Gamestarters retroarch and cores.

I'm having a major issue when scraping N64 and PSX games, It seems those databases are mixed and are actually reporting as the same category.

Not sure if this has been reported yet but as below, I added the n64 games which are 296 in total for example then I move on to adding psx games and It reports that 296 games are still in the database. When I go to PSX category now it shows the psx games and n64 games mixed together, could there be a fault in the code somewhere.

Here is a snippet from /.kodi/userdata/addon_data/plugin.porogram.advanced.emulator.launcher/reports/_report.txt

*** Starting ROM scanner ... ***
Launcher name "Playstation"
launcher ID "13d4566ea34693ad198d66ed0af0c016psx"
ROM path "/storage/emulators/roms/psx/"
ROM ext "bin|img|pbp|PBP|IMG|BIN"
Platform "Sony PlayStation"
Loading launcher ROMs ...
296 ROMs currently in database
Removing dead ROMs ...
Scanning files ...
Directory /storage/emulators/roms/psx/
Found 97 files
Processing files ...]

Can you please assist? this is my only fault with AEL both n64 and psx cannot co-exist separately. If I clear all roms from the psx launcher it deletes all the roms in the n64 launcher as well.

There is a bug in the categories.xml distributed with the current version of the GameStarter addon. Have a look at this and previous posts for instructions of how to fix it.

[elementalwindx]

Why am I getting this error? All I did was upgrade from a dolphin version 1 month old to the newest nightly build. I can run the commandline it's trying to run in command prompt and it runs just fine. If I run this rom from your plugin in kodi, I get this error:

Code:

07:03:53.344 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() Launching ROM in Launcher ...
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() Using Launcher standard arguments
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() Sigle ROM detected (no multidisc)
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() ROMFileName OP "C:\ROMS\Wii\Super Paper Mario [NTSC-U].iso"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() ROMFileName  P "C:\ROMS\Wii\Super Paper Mario [NTSC-U].iso"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() categoryID   root_category
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() launcherID   2a8cf90a3a485b863a2599f9cfdb4733
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() romID        7e6aaec1bd0138f42318a36a94bf7673
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() romfile      "C:\ROMS\Wii\Super Paper Mario [NTSC-U].iso"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() rompath      "C:\ROMS\Wii"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() rombase      "Super Paper Mario [NTSC-U].iso"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() rombasenoext "Super Paper Mario [NTSC-U]"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() romtitle     "Super Paper Mario [NTSC-U]"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() application  "E:\Emulators\Dolphin-x64\Dolphin.exe"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() apppath      "E:\Emulators\Dolphin-x64"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() romext       "iso"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() raw arguments   ""%ROM%" -b"
07:03:53.345 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() final arguments ""C:\ROMS\Wii\Super Paper Mario [NTSC-U].iso" -b"
07:03:53.363 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : fs_write_Favourites_JSON() File special://profile/addon_data\plugin.program.advanced.emulator.launcher\most_played.json
07:03:53.367 T:9568   ERROR: AEL INFO : _command_run_rom() Launcher is not Kodi Retroplayer.
07:03:53.877 T:9568   ERROR: AEL ERROR: SingleInstance::__exit__() Unhandled excepcion in protected code
07:03:53.880 T:9568   ERROR: EXCEPTION Thrown (PythonToCppException) : -->Python callback/script returned the following error<--
                                             - NOTE: IGNORING THIS CAN LEAD TO MEMORY LEAKS!
                                            Error Type: <type 'exceptions.WindowsError'>
                                            Error Contents: [Error 740] The requested operation requires elevation
                                            Traceback (most recent call last):

*edit* nvm. It's because dolphin was set in windows compatibility mode to run as administrator. No idea why this would fudge up your plugin to run it -__- sigh

[bkrieger]

I need help with using the online scraper. When I search for the artwork it always comes back with no results. When I was using Advanced Launcher that scraper worked fine. I want to add thumbnails and fanfart to my Roms.

[Wintermute0110]

Code:

- NOTE: IGNORING THIS CAN LEAD TO MEMORY LEAKS!
                                            Error Type: <type 'exceptions.WindowsError'>
                                            Error Contents: [Error 740] The requested operation requires elevation
                                            Traceback (most recent call last):

*edit* nvm. It's because dolphin was set in windows compatibility mode to run as administrator. No idea why this would fudge up your plugin to run it -__- sigh

Python produces an exception because Kodi does not have permissions to launch an executable that requires administrator privileges. I'm not sure if you did this on purpose or Windows did it randomly. If the latter, Windows doing crazy stuff from time to time... nothing new under the sun.

[Wintermute0110]

I need help with using the online scraper. When I search for the artwork it always comes back with no results. When I was using Advanced Launcher that scraper worked fine. I want to add thumbnails and fanfart to my Roms.

I do not have magical divinatory powers. What scraper? Is the platform of the launcher correctly set? Do you have the problem when scanning for ROMs or when you scrape using the ROM context menu? Also, AEL does not support thumbnails (icons) anymore. You will need to download or scrape the Boxfronts which by default are mapped to Icon.

[bkrieger]

Yes, that’s what I meant. It will not find thumbnail icons and fanart. Good to know it’s not supported

[Wintermute0110]

Yes, that’s what I meant. It will not find thumbnail icons and fanart. Good to know it’s not supported

Just to clarify: Icons are supported. But the artwork model is slightly more complex than old good Advanced Launcher.

For each ROM, AEL supports the following assets: Title, Snap, Boxfront, Boxback, Cartridge, Flyer, Map, Manual, Trailer, Fanart, Banner and Clearlogo. In order to visualise all these assets you need an skin that supports AEL, for example, Estuary AEL MOD.

On the other hand, Kodi supports the following standard assets: Icon (previously known as Thumb), Banner, Poster, Fanart and Clearlogo. In order to use AEL with skins that do not natively support it, AEL is able to "map" any of the supported assets to any of the standard Kodi assets, using the Launcher context menu (with the Launcher context menu you map the assets for all ROMs in the launcher). By default, the mappings are like this:

Code:

Icon -> mapped to Boxfront
Fanart -> mapped to Fanart
Banner -> mapped to Banner
Poster -> mapped to Flyer
Clearlogo -> mapped to Clearlogo

You can see an example of the mapping in the following shot:



Icon and Boxfront are the same image, as are Flyer and Poster.

If you are using an skin that only displays Icons and Fanarts and you want to show the Titles as Icons, just map AEL Titles to Icons. You may want to do this if only Title screenshots are available and not Boxfronts for that launcher.

[jon123456]

Hi, I need a rom list of arguments for retroarch android. I have tried different and do not want to run any emulator.

[Wintermute0110]

Hi, I need a rom list of arguments for retroarch android. I have tried different and do not want to run any emulator.

In the AEL Asset Library you have several working examples of Retroarch launchers for Android. Have a look at the XML files, for example this for a Retroarch SMS launcher, and you should be able to figure out the ROM path, arguments, etc. Alternatively, you can edit the XML files (or create new ones using the existing as a template) and then import the XML launcher in AEL.

Here you have a well commented XML Launcher example of Retroarch in Linux for Playstation. This should help understanding the meaning of the XML tags used by AEL. Note that some of the tags are new to 0.9.7 which is currently unreleased and won't work in 0.9.6.