NVOffset

[Manuel-K]

Hi,
since I'm not using discord, I'll ask my question here. I hope that's okay…

Is NVOffset supposed to work in standalone? I've tried several tables with NVOffset(1) without luck – always adding it directly after the .GameName = cGameName line.

Cheers

[jsm174]

Hello! At the moment, I do not have any of the nvram functions ported to libpinmame. I will add this to my list of things to do.

Note, you can usually work around by commenting out the relevant code. For example, see here

[jsm174]

btw, can you provide table link, so when I do implement this, I can test?

[Manuel-K]

It's a function in core.vbs (https://github.com/vpinball/vpinball/blob/standalone/scripts/core.vbs#L2987). Looking at it I'm not surprised that it does not work, since it works by moving files around and it reads a path from the registry.

I don't think that there is a table that uses it per default, but it's supposed switch to a different nv file in order to use different tables that use the same rom.

Btw., I've got a WIP launcher that uses python/tkinter (since that's preinstalled on the Steam Deck) with keyboard/mouse/gamepad (uses xpad, so that part is Linux only) navigation, preview image and nvram reader to access last game/highscore information. Unfortunately the information display is cumbersome, since using PINemHI through wine is really slow and information about the structure is sparse. I've only found a collection of json files for some roms.

[Manuel-K]

Since I already parse parts of the vbs file for the launcher, I could do the rename before running the table as a workaround.

[francisdb]

@Manuel-K interesting, is your code open source?
Already asked the PINemHI dev for his source but he's currently not willing to open source.

There's https://github.com/neophob/wpc-emu which has some rom memory mappings:
eg https://github.com/neophob/wpc-emu/blob/master/lib/db/t2.js

[Manuel-K]

@Manuel-K interesting, is your code open source?

Not yet. I'll be away for a week and a half – then I'll be able to do the reorganizing of the code that's necessary.

There's https://github.com/neophob/wpc-emu which has some rom memory mappings:

Yes, I know that one. And there is also https://github.com/tomlogic/pinmame-nvram-maps which is the source for some of those mappings.

That's all that I've found. At the moment I'm at 9 additional json files that I'll try to get added – but some of them need an additional decoding logic, so I've slightly changed the format.

[francisdb]

@Manuel-K ping me if you do, are you on the discord?

[Manuel-K]

are you on the discord?

No. See top message. ;-)

[Manuel-K]

Finding the high_score parts is faster than finding the last_game areas in most cases (if the score is close to the initials), so I'm not sure if the PINemHI code would help that much.

[francisdb]

Misread that part, I'm actually interested in tracing the current score/drains/extra balls/ball roll distance/other stuff over time (telemetry) + sharing that online as high score service. Preferably in a generic way that would work for rom/original tables and allow plugging different score keeping backends. (scorbit, ...)

Wondering where your code fits in the current stack.

[Manuel-K]

Tracking score after VPX has written a nv file is possible from the last_game data for some roms. That's what I'm using it for.

The code is separated in four parts: The table indexer that reads some information from the vbs, the GUI, the nvram parser and a local score keeping backend.

Wondering where your code fits in the current stack.

It makes playing tables on the Steam Deck (and on my desktop) easier…

[jsm174]

Ah, I did not realize that. I was thinking you wanted get_NVRAM and get_ChangedNVRAM implemented.

Most of FileSystemObject has been implemented, but I would have to double check on copyFile. We could leverage SaveValue and LoadValue instead of using the registry as that writes to VPReg.ini in the ~/.vpinball directory.

[Manuel-K]

Ah, I did not realize that. I was thinking you wanted get_NVRAM and get_ChangedNVRAM implemented.

I'll probably want those soon…

[francisdb]

@Manuel-K did you actually pursue this idea?

Reference for myself:

_ Nfozzy's Space Station (Williams 1987) 1.21 generates score popups during the game using get_NVRAM (would be better it used get_ChangedNVRAM). Note: only in desktop mode
https://www.vpforums.org/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=12717_

He got the idea from https://www.vpforums.org/index.php?showtopic=39255

[Manuel-K]

Sorry for disappearing, but I can't log into my account at the moment due to TFA combined with getting the basement flooded last August. I actually thought about searching the recovery codes again, but there is still a lot of displaced stuff all around. What I got since about a year (when I decided to let it rest for a while after getting a bit burned out on pinball after creating many test files) is a last game score and high score reader for (probably) everything that PINemHI supports implemented in Python that can run as part of the launcher or standalone. The only issue is that you have to quit VPX (or rather PinMAME) to read the data. I've made several test with inotify and there is nothing that can be done without modifying PinMAME to get inbetween data.

[francisdb]

Thanks for the quick reply. Any plans to share that code?

[andremichi]

I am also interested in contribute on that topic. @francisdb I asked a similar question on the vpx-standalone channel on Discord this week.