MAME32 INI Tools Copyright (C) Moose O'Malley, ---------------- September 2003. +===========================================================+ | T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S | +===========================================================+ | * Introduction (LONG) | * Why I wrote this Program / Why use this Program | * Using this Program | * Benchmarks | * Limitations / Restrictions of the program | * The Future | * Special Greetings / Thanks to | * Warranty | * Amendment History | * Contacting the Program's Author +===========================================================+ Introduction : -------------- N.B. This program is for use with MAME 32 v0.63 or later. If you are using a version of MAME prior to v0.63, then please use MAME 32 Tools. MAME32 INI Tools for Windows 95 / 98 / NT / 2000 / ME / etc. MAME32 INI Tools is a companion utility / tool for the MAME 32 Arcade Machine Emulator : http://www.mame.net MAME32 INI Tools is a companion utility to MAME 32 - that means that it is designed to be used in conjunction with MAME 32. i.e. used in conjunction with the Windows GUI version of MAME. MAME32 INI Tools currently allows you to : - Select which MAME 32 INI file to process - And, using this INI file, it will determine : * How many games are supported by the version of MAME 32 that you currently have installed, * Which ROMs are missing / invalid, and, * Which Sound Samples are missing / invalid. So, in a nut shell, this program will enable you to determine which ROMs and Sound Samples are missing or need replacing / redumping. This is something that MAME itself will NOT tell you - because it goes against MAME's licence agreement. This program does not have *ANY* in-built ROM auditing capabilities, as I could see absolutely no point in duplicating this functionality that is already provided by MAME 32. To do so would have been a complete waste of time. So, this program needs MAME 32 to tell it which ROMs are correct, etc. Before running MAME 32 INI Tools, you will need to have run MAME 32 for Windows (i.e. the GUI version), and asked MAME to do a full audit of all games, and then exited MAME, so that it saves the audit results to its INI file(s). If you do use this program, please send me an email and let me know. If you like, I will also email you when new versions of MAME32 INI Tools are released. If people use the program, then I am more likely to enhance it further in the future. If you find this program useful, then please give something back by helping the arcade emulation community in some way. MAME32 Tools is NOT an official part of the MAME project. Developed using 32-bit Delphi. Why I wrote this Program / Why use this Program : ------------------------------------------------- I wrote this program because when MAME changed from using the Windows Registry to an INI file to hold all of the game / sample / status information, then my previous program (MAME 32 Tools) no longer worked. So, I wrote MAME 32 INI Tools to fill in while I get around to changing MAME 32 Tools to support MAME 32's INI files as well as MAME 32's Registry Keys. So, it's alll a *Work In Progress* thing at the moment - and how much work I do depends on Using this Program : -------------------- To use this program, simply unzip it to a directory (using PKUNIP, WinZIP, or similar), run it, and click on the buttons to view / perform the activities you require. Then, run the program and select the "mame32ui.ini" file you want to process. If MAME is installed in the c:\MAME\ directory, then this INI file should be in the c:\MAME\INI\ directory. You can also Drag & Drop the file onto MAME 32 INI Tools using Windows Explorer. Then, press the "Process INI File" button, and the program will scan 1,000's of lines of the "mame32ui.ini" file in the blick of an eye, and report which ROMs and Samples you are missing. Benchmarks : ------------ On my Pentium III 700 MHz PC (256 MB RAM, Windows XP Professional), for MAME 32 PLUS v0.70 (which supports 4,010 games) : - the processing of the INI file took 0.25 seconds, and, - the sorting of the full randomised list of 4,010 games took 5.0 seconds. Limitations / Restrictions of the program : ------------------------------------------- None. There is no trial period and there is no "cutdown" or "restricted" functionality that requires users to register. This program is FREE software - any person and any company is welcome to copy it, use it, and distribute it as they see fit, as long as the EXEcutable and this text file remain intact. If you paid money for this program, then you were ripped off, and you should complain to the person who sold it to you !! (Don't complain to me, it's nothing to do with me !!). The Future : ------------ In the future, many improvements could be made to this program, such as : - Merge this program with my MAME 32 Tools program - which provides far more functionality. - Optimise my sort routines. - Anything else ? If you would like any of these improvements, or would like to suggest more, or would like to give me some feedback on the program, please email me and let me know. Special Greetings / Thanks to : ------------------------------- Special thanks to all arcade emulator authors, people who maintain arcade emulator sites, those who dump the roms, and those who work hard to try and preserve the actual physical arcade machines, with special mention to : - Dave Spicer for developing Sparcade - the very first Arcade Emulator for PCs, which introduced me to Arcade Emulation way back in 1995. I was and still am compltely blown away by arcade emulation !! - Nicola Salmoria (for MAME and other emulators) and the fabulous MAME and various MAME 32 Development Teams. - Neil Bradley (Emu, Retrocade and others). - Antiriad and the Raine Development Team. - Dave (Final Burn). - Anders Nilsson & Janne Korpela (Neo Rage and Tutankham). - Thierry Lescot (System 16 Emulator). - Neill Corlett (MGE). - Michael Cuddy (KEM & Gyruss). - and all other arcade emulator developers - you guys rule !!! - Virtu Al, Brian Peek, MAME DK, and others - you guys rule too !!! Even though some of these emulators are no longer under development, your amazing work is NOT forgotten !! Warranty : ---------- This software and the accompanying files are provided "as is" and without warranties as to performance or merchantability or any other warranties whether expressed or implied. The user assumes the entire risk of using this software. If you do find any faults with this program, email me and let me know, and I will do my best to fix it ASAP. Amendment History : -------------------- Vers Date Description 1.0 30-Jun-2003 First Public Release. (52,437 lines of code / comments.) 21-July-2003 - Email Retrogames (Prophet and Griking) to announce this program. 21-July-2003 - I announced this program on MAME's Fun / Fluff Message Board at www.mame.net 1-Aug-2003 - MAME Benchmarker, MAME Screen Shot Organiser, and MAME 32 INI Tools mentioned in the news section of MAME World and M32: http://www.mameworld.net/ http://www.mame32.cl/ Thanks ~Twisty~ and M32 !! :) 1.1 13-Aug-2003 Improve the "Select INI File" functionality. Change to the latest INI File keys that MAME 32 apparently now uses. This is explained below. In MAME v0.63 to MAME v0.70, values of "1" in the INI file indicated that ROMs and samples were correct. For example, this indicated that samples and roms were OK : ### Naughty Mouse (set 1) ### nmouse_playcount 0 nmouse_roms 1 nmouse_samples 1 However, in MAME v0.71 onwards, these keys changed and values of "0" suddenly indicated everything was OK. I have no idea why this change occured and it is NOT documented in any of the "whatsnew" or "changes" files for MAME. So, this now indicated that samples and roms were OK : ### Naughty Mouse (set 1) ### nmouse_playcount 0 nmouse_play_time 0 nmouse_rom_audit 0 nmouse_samples_audit 0 Thanks for reporting this .... errrm, actually no-one bothered to report this issue at all. I found out about it when I finally got around to updating my MAME v0.70 installation to MAME v0.71 and MAME v0.72 on 12-Aug-2003. If no-one reports problems then there is a chance that I wont know about them so they wont get fixed. OK guys ? ;) (52,782 lines of code / comments.) 1.2 18-Sep-2003 Add in support for Official MAME 32. Since MAME v0.65 onwards, I have only used MAME 32 PLUS. But, today I downloaded the Official MAME 32 to check this program worked with it, and I was shocked to find lots of differences. Never mind, official MAME 32 and MAME 32 Plus are now supported. Official MAME 32 and MAME 32 Plus both store the ROM information in different INI files, in different locations, and they have different formats and keys. I don't know if this program works with Stretch MAME 32, Thunder MAME, Fast MAME or any other versions, and I haven't got the time or energy to check this. If anyone uses a version of Windows GUI MAME 32 that does NOT appear to be supported by this program, then please let me know and email me a copy of the INI file, and I will add in support and email you a new version of the program. (53,180 lines of code / comments.) If this program was not downloaded from my Home Page, then it might be an old version. The latest version of this program is available from my WEB page - see below. For more great software, please visit my WEB page ! Mike "Moose" O'Malley ____________________________________________________ Moose's Software Valley - Established July, 1996. WEB: http://move.to/moose ____________________________________________________