New release: v2.1.2

[freezy]

This release updates the ZeDMD driver to work with the latest firmware, which now supports frame compression for smoother playback. There has been a breaking change, however. The section in the INI file has slightly changed, so if you're a ZeDMD user, be sure to change section header [ZeDMD] to [zedmd] (all lowercase).

 

This release also includes some basic analytics. The main reason is dmdext being distributed from so many different places, and I'd like to get an idea how many people are actually using it. You can easily opt-out by adding "skipanalytics = true" under the "[global]" section in DmdDevice.ini. The analytics data also contains game started and ended, and I'd like to make this available to the community. I'll soon be pinging Dazz about some stats on the main page, which would be nice. Something like most played games today. Comments and ideas welcome.

 

There has also been progress on porting @lucky1's plugin system for PAC, but I'm not quite done with it, so that's probably for the next release.

 

Lastly, some news on the Pinball FX side. I'm in contact with Zen Studios and they have started working on native dmdext support. This is awesome, because their new Steam version doesn't work with real DMDs yet, and adding dmdext support gives the community full modding capabilities for new features and devices.

 

Download as usual here.

 

Cheers and enjoy,

 

    -freezy.

 

EDIT: Oops, there was a bug that crashed after segment display games. Updated link to v2.1.2.

[MrGrynch]

Wow!  That's great news on all fronts!  Thanks @freezy!

[MikeDASpike]

Thanks Freezy. Sounds promising. I hope that Zen studio comes quickly with a fully supported option.

And good that pac files will be added via a p.ugin as well.

1 dmdext for all !

Good work and hope this doesn't impact/delay the release of VPE :p 

Edited May 24, 2023 by MikeDASpike

[mk47]

22 hours ago, freezy said:

This release updates the ZeDMD driver to work with the latest firmware, which now supports frame compression for smoother playback. There has been a breaking change, however. The section in the INI file has slightly changed, so if you're a ZeDMD user, be sure to change section header [ZeDMD] to [zedmd] (all lowercase).

The latest firmware for ZeDMD could be found here:
https://github.com/PPUC/ZeDMD/releases/tag/v3.2.1

[MakTheWookie]

Is there any news on Scorbit integration?

[freezy]

Jay is still moving, but we'll have a call next week I think.

[MikeDASpike]

On 5/19/2023 at 6:40 PM, freezy said:

Lastly, some news on the Pinball FX side. I'm in contact with Zen Studios and they have started working on native dmdext support. This is awesome, because their new Steam version doesn't work with real DMDs yet, and adding dmdext support gives the community full modding capabilities for new features and devices.

Nice job @freezy to get Zen Studios use your dmddevice. Its working like a charm. So this will avoid  any issues in the future with update (i hope)

Thanks for putting effort into this

[freezy]

Yes, as long as they don't withdraw support in upcoming releases, it should be future-proof.

 

There are still a few glitches with v2.1.2 that are fixed in my plugin branch, and I wanted to do a beta release yesterday, but I came across another bug I wanted to fix first. So, stay tuned.

[MikeDASpike]

Not sure if I must ask this in this thread, but found something odd
I set the environment variable DMDDevice_config to my vpinmame directory.

 

 

The ini file will be searched now in that location, but checking the DMDdevice.log of the Pinball FX , it is using the DLL from the DMDext directory under vpinmame

 

 [1] 2023/06/10 06:35:02.073  INFO | Successfully loaded config from C:\pinball\Visual Pinball\VPinMAME\DMDext\DmdDevice.ini. 
 [1] 2023/06/10 06:35:02.298  INFO | Determined color path from VPinMAME registry: C:\pinball\Visual Pinball\VPinMAME\altcolor 
 [1] 2023/06/10 06:35:03.848  INFO | Starting VPinMAME API 2.1.2 through PinballFX-Win64-Shipping.exe. 
 [1] 2023/06/10 06:35:03.848  INFO | Assembly located at C:\pinball\Visual Pinball\VPinMAME\DMDext\DmdDevice64.dll 
 [1] 2023/06/10 06:35:03.848  INFO | Running in D:\Pinball\Steam\steamapps\common\Pinball FX\PinballFX\Binaries\Win64 

As this was a version from 2022 (think it was shipped with Vpinball setup , the colors didn't work.
Adding the latest DMDDevice64 to this directory maked my color to work.
question is : Why is it looking/using the DMDDevice from the DMDext directory ?
I checked registry , but could not find it. 

any Idea ?  Now I still have to manage multiple locations with DMDdevice(64).DLL 

I normally only have DMDdevie.dll in the vpinmame or is this because of the global environment, that now all the DLL's can be placed under DMDext subfolder ?

Edited June 10, 2023 by MikeDASpike

[freezy]

It's the path to the ini file, not the folder where the ini is located.

[Energetics]

MikedaSpike

 

could you please elaborate?

 

I have re-setup my system to 64bit and used the Update Baller Installer May 2023

 

now i see that dmdext folder with the dmddevice dlls

 

at install FlexDMDUI hat all green checks

 

no colour support as expected

 

now all of a sudden??? the  check atdmddevice dll was missing..so I copied the files and ini from the dmdext folder up to vpinmame  and now i wander what to do next to get colour back from my pac files

 

---------------

nailbuster said:

if you have manually changed your config in the past to use pac coloring files (instead of the default dmdext/freezy) you will need to reapply/setup luckys dll/framework in vpinmame folder to get pac coloring files working again.

--------------

 

maybe i did this back then? can't remeber....how to find out?

 

help pleez

 

[Rappelbox]

3 hours ago, Energetics said:

MikedaSpike

 

could you please elaborate?

 

I have re-setup my system to 64bit and used the Update Baller Installer May 2023

 

now i see that dmdext folder with the dmddevice dlls

 

at install FlexDMDUI hat all green checks

 

no colour support as expected

 

now all of a sudden??? the  check atdmddevice dll was missing..so I copied the files and ini from the dmdext folder up to vpinmame  and now i wander what to do next to get colour back from my pac files

 

---------------

nailbuster said:

if you have manually changed your config in the past to use pac coloring files (instead of the default dmdext/freezy) you will need to reapply/setup luckys dll/framework in vpinmame folder to get pac coloring files working again.

--------------

 

maybe i did this back then? can't remeber....how to find out?

 

help pleez

 

since you updated you now have the dmddevice files without pac support.

get the files from lucky1 and you'll be good again