[crono141]

Wintermute,

Thanks for the update.  Rom scanning and scraping now appear to work.

I have yet another hiccup though.  I've set all the paths in the addon options to a certain folder.  This is the folder I want all my scraped assets to go to.  But for some reason they're all going somewhere else (my retropie folder).  Is there a config file or path that I need to edit to set where the scraped assets go?

[Wintermute0110]

Wintermute,

Thanks for the update.  Rom scanning and scraping now appear to work.

I have yet another hiccup though.  I've set all the paths in the addon options to a certain folder.  This is the folder I want all my scraped assets to go to.  But for some reason they're all going somewhere else (my retropie folder).  Is there a config file or path that I need to edit to set where the scraped assets go?

 
Are we talking about Categories, Launchers, Collections or ROM assets?

It will help if you create an AEL Debug log (instructions on first post). 1) First set AEL into debug mode. 2) Reboot Kodi. 3) Open AEL and scrape some asset. 4) Upload the log with Ronie plugin.

[crono141]

ROM Assets.  I've worked around the issue using a symbolic link, so I'll let this lie for now.  I was also wondering if rom import and scrape operations couldn't be performed in the background, with a status shown in the top right corner.  Like how Kodi shows the progress of a library import.  At least then if a long import is going on, the system could still be used as a media player.

[Wintermute0110]

ROM Assets.  I've worked around the issue using a symbolic link, so I'll let this lie for now.

OK, but if you suspect there is a bug in AEL I need a debug log to see what's going on and pinpoint the bug.

I was also wondering if rom import and scrape operations couldn't be performed in the background, with a status shown in the top right corner.  Like how Kodi shows the progress of a library import.  At least then if a long import is going on, the system could still be used as a media player.

Not at the moment and very unlikely in the future. It will require a complete redesign of AEL, creating an AEL service to do the scanner to work in tandem with the AEL addon. A lot of work and the gains will be marginal, in my opinion.

For 0.9.8 and by popular demand I will add the feature to scrape assets in a Launcher without the need to use the ROM Scanner and delete the ROMs from the Launcher first, although I discourage its use. There will be a command in the Launcher context menu, "Edit Launcher", "Manage ROMs", "Scrape ROMs missing artwork" that will work as the current "Rescan ROMs local assets/artwork". "Scrape ROMs missing artwork" will only scrape artwork that is not locally available and you can use the Automatic or Semi-automatic scraper modes.

Note that if you use the offline scraper and local artwork a launcher with 5000 MAME ROMs takes less than one minute to be scanned in my Intel NUC. You can let the scanner with the scraper running over night.

[RazorFR]

Thanks Wintermute for beta2 fixes

Using with the latest version I was able to fix my artworks. Also came across a few minor bugs

- Beta2 returns an error when editing and trying to change a launcher name
- Recanning ROMs for a launcher including multidisc roms. They are deleted and re-added (same as 9.6), but once scanning is finished you lose the developper info for those specific roms.
- Also new version is clearly more picky about artworks paths. Maybe by design.
In 9.6 I didn't have all launchers artworks paths filled (only poster, flyers, fanarts) and was just receiving a warning notification when launching a scan for new roms.
in beta2, these same settings don't work. Had to set all artworks folder paths (banner, clearlogos, maps all of them for each launcher... ) for the scanning to be done correctly. Well OK...
That is not a problem, one done though (and I think it may be done automatically when you create a new launcher, which I didn't as I imported my launchers long ago. )

[sagrath]

Hi @wintermute

I have my Categorys and launchers ready.
When I start ADL, I have my first row of Categorys: Arcades, Emulators, Steam and Windows Games
When I enter in some category, like Emulators, I have my launchers: Super Nes, Sega Saturn, Mega Drive, Playstation, etc.
When I enter in some launcher, I get the rom list.

Working like a charm.

But I want to achieve the following:

When I get focus o some category, display the list of emulator on the same view.

Kodi has a feature called Dynamic Lists.
See here: http://kodi.wiki/view/Dynamic_List_Content

It's possible to use this feature with ADL?
Because I want to mod certain view on the skin I used to use this feature

Here's a mockup of to better visualization:



If it's possible, whats the correct code in exemple below?

<content>plugin://plugin.test.me?arg1=foo</content>

[Wintermute0110]

- Beta2 returns an error when editing and trying to change a launcher name

Fixed. I also improved all notifications when editing launcher metadata.

- Recanning ROMs for a launcher including multidisc roms. They are deleted and re-added (same as 9.6), but once scanning is finished you lose the developper info for those specific roms.

OK. I will need more time for this. Maybe in 0.9.8 or 0.9.9.

- Also new version is clearly more picky about artworks paths. Maybe by design.
In 9.6 I didn't have all launchers artworks paths filled (only poster, flyers, fanarts) and was just receiving a warning notification when launching a scan for new roms.
in beta2, these same settings don't work. Had to set all artworks folder paths (banner, clearlogos, maps all of them for each launcher... ) for the scanning to be done correctly. Well OK...
That is not a problem, one done though (and I think it may be done automatically when you create a new launcher, which I didn't as I imported my launchers long ago. )

Fixed. AEL should never crash, no matter what. The problem was that the new file cache (which increases scanning speed quite a lot) didn't deal correctly with empty paths.

[Wintermute0110]

But I want to achieve the following:

When I get focus o some category, display the list of emulator on the same view.

Kodi has a feature called Dynamic Lists.
See here: http://kodi.wiki/view/Dynamic_List_Content

It's possible to use this feature with ADL?
Because I want to mod certain view on the skin I used to use this feature

Here's a mockup of to better visualization:



If it's possible, whats the correct code in exemple below?

<content>plugin://plugin.test.me?arg1=foo</content>

Hi. So you want to create a view that displays category launcher fanarts when you select a category. In principle it may be possible to do... but keep in mind that my skinning abilities are limited at best. The URL to render the launchers inside a category is:

html:
plugin://plugin.program.advanced.emulator.launcher/?com=SHOW_LAUNCHERS&catID=85bf68c21954f85d1f3c55815f741d8b

Actually, if you set the AEL log to Debug in AEL settings, AEL prints in the Kodi log the URLs every time its called.

You need to know the categoryID which is a MD5 hash string. Currently AEL does not expose the ID of ListItem elements but if you need it I can add some code to set a custom Property with the ListItem kind (category, launcher, ROM) and the MD5 ID. Here and here you can see the properties currently set by AEL for ROMs.

Also, I think what you want to do is somewhat similar to the widgets you can see in the Home screen. For example:



Have a look here to the code that renders the AEL widgets in Estuary AEL, which uses Dynamic Content. Maybe you can get some inspiration from there for your view.

[Wintermute0110]

New AEL release 0.9.7

Release notes

0.9.7 just has a couple of fixes compared with 0.9.7-beta2 and only one new feature: the ability to export individual Launcher XML configurations. This will be very convenient to track future problems (you can post the Launcher config in addition to the DEBUG log).

Release 0.9.8 "the scraper edition" will introduce a lot of new features and will take some time to develop (read several months at least). I think 0.9.7 is pretty stable and usable until 0.9.8 is finished. If somebody discovers a serious bug I may release a bug fix 0.9.8 release and move all new features into 0.9.9.

If you are upgrading to 0.9.7 from AEL 0.9.6 or earlier make sure you read the 0.9.7-beta1 release notes. If you are upgrading from 0.9.7-beta1 or 0.9.7-beta2 just install the new ZIP file and you are good to go.

Advanced Emulator Launcher | version 0.9.7 | 23 November 2017

Code:

FEATURE  Export individual Launcher XML configuration.

FIX      Fixed crash when editing Launchr Title in context menu.

FIX      Fixed crash in the ROM Scanner when Launcher had unconfigured ROM asset paths.

[crono141]

As a follow up bug: If you have your ROM asset folders set to a folder that does not exist, that also causes an error, instead of creating that folder first.  This appears to be true in 0.9.7 as well.

[Wintermute0110]

As a follow up bug: If you have your ROM asset folders set to a folder that does not exist, that also causes an error, instead of creating that folder first.  This appears to be true in 0.9.7 as well.

OK. That can only be possible if the user deletes the directory. Either if you use the Add Launcher wizard or use an XML config file to create the Launcher, asset directories are automatically created at launcher creation time. I think the correct behavior for AEL in this situation is not crash (of course) and notify the user the directory does not exist and treat it like an unconfigured directory. I don't think that creating missing directories that should be there would be such a good idea because, for example, you may have your artwork in a remote filesystem that is current unavailable. By notifying the user then you can open the Kodi File Manager to confirm the remote filesystem is not mounted.

EDIT: I can reproduce the bug. I've looking at the code responsible and it needs some refactoring (both in the ROM scanner and in "Rescan Launcher assets/artwork". I will fix it ASAP but is going to take some time.

[Master_Blaster]

Hi all,

i checked AEL out and found it as a great alternative to RCB which always makes troubles with my KODI.
But, what i dont get is why i cannot scan my new launcher (SNES) for roms. I set the correct paths for the emulator and the rom (with zip file ending) and AEL does not import any roms. However when i manually search for roms, i can add one by one.
But this would take far too long. Whats the problem ?

Best regards

[Wintermute0110]

Hi all,

i checked AEL out and found it as a great alternative to RCB which always makes troubles with my KODI.
But, what i dont get is why i cannot scan my new launcher (SNES) for roms. I set the correct paths for the emulator and the rom (with zip file ending) and AEL does not import any roms. However when i manually search for roms, i can add one by one.
But this would take far too long. Whats the problem ?

Best regards

I need you to do a couple of things:

1) go to the launcher, open context menu, "Edit Launcher", then "Export Launcher XML configuration". Please post the contents of the XML file.

2) Scan ROMs for the launcher (context menu, "Add ROMs", "Scan for new ROMs"). When the scanner finishes, open the context menu again, "View Launcher", "View Launcher scanner report". Do you see something unusual in the report? Please also post the report. You can find it in $AEL_DATA_DIR/reports/roms_<category_name>_<launcher_name>_<id>_report.txt

[Master_Blaster]

1) Here is the configuration:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes"?>
<!-- Exported by AEL on 2017-11-25 21:56:28 -->
<advanced_emulator_launcher_configuration>
<launcher>
  <name>snes9x</name>
  <category>root_category</category>
  <year />
  <genre />
  <developer />
  <rating />
  <plot />
  <platform>Nintendo SNES</platform>
  <application>G:\Games\Emu_Zone\SNES test\snes9x\snes9x.exe</application>
  <args>&quot;$rom$&quot;</args>
  <args_extra />
  <ROM_path>G:\Games\Emu_Zone\SNES test\snes roms\</ROM_path>
  <ROM_ext>ZIP</ROM_ext>
  <ROM_asset_path>G:\Games\Emu_Zone\SNES test\assets</ROM_asset_path>
  <Asset_Prefix />
  <s_icon />
  <s_fanart />
  <s_banner />
  <s_poster />
  <s_clearlogo />
  <s_controller />
  <s_trailer />
</launcher>
</advanced_emulator_launcher_configuration>

2) where can i find the text file of the scanner report ? Did not find the folder ...

[Master_Blaster]

So i found the issue: Using zip as file extension does not work. However the unziped file (.smc) is found upon scanning for roms.
Another problem i encountered is scraping for NES artwork. It works only manually if i scrape one by one. This would take me lightyears to finish my build....