Has anyone else created front-ends for Amiga games or demos?

[Foebane]

I have spent the last few months developing ADLaunch, a front-end menu system for Amiga demos primarily, but which I've also used for games as well. It works with several core configurations for WinUAE, which are modified for each demo or game as necessary, and it uses the WinUAE command-line extensively for passing parameters.

When the program is run, a config/image folder is run and the configurations added to a menu list, with the corresponding images showing up when an item is selected. The configuration contains an exe filename in the executable folder, with a Pouet.net reference number for the production (or none at all for games) and a core configuration for it to run on in WinUAE. Then follows any extra parameters to modify the core configuration if needed, and extra information such as a script to run multi-file demos or games in LHA archives as part of the autorun feature.

The project is still work in progress, but is stable and works well.

This is my Amiga front-end, I was wondering if anyone had programmed their own?

[tero]

I started a frontend some time ago. The most complex thing was the tosec parser to get as much information as possible from the tosec .dat file.

With this you can create a database of games within the frontend. Scan you collection and have it automatically sorted within the database, no matter how the disks are named. (using the hash provided by the dat file.)

As a bonus each scanned tosec .dat creates a category based of the filename that can be selected in the mainwindow. That's how the Games categorie was created in the screenshot. Categories can be created manually too, but having it automated is nice too.

Other features are scanning for doubles. Creating adf/hdf. Import games from Amiga forever cd and Winuae/fs-use configurations. Exporting tosec miss/have lists.

Not all features are working 100% atm and i have a few things on the todo list. Just not much time to work on it.

The database is empty, so there is not much to see. Games are only shown in the list if a disk exist for it. But one of the screenshots shows the tosec debug window

Screenshots:

[fgh]

I made a simple one for my mame cab, but it only has to handle my favourite games, so not a full blown front end by any means

But it does run mame games and winuae save states, and switches game graphics and button LED colors by joystick input left/right.
Made in purebasic.

(PS: Sorry, I don’t know why it rotated my pics)

[mrv2k]

I'm working on a WHDLoad/CD32 launcher at the moment....

[malko]

Not sure if we can consider my reinstallDDWC scrip as a "front-end"

Originally Posted by fgh

I made a simple one for my mame cab, but it only has to handle my favourite games, so not a full blown front end by any means

But it does run mame games and winuae save states, and switches game graphics and button LED colors by joystick input left/right.
Made in purebasic.

(PS: Sorry, I don’t know why it rotated my pics)

Really nice Amiga arcade cabinet

[gimbal]

"UltraMiggy". Excellent name.

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by fgh

I made a simple one for my mame cab, but it only has to handle my favourite games, so not a full blown front end by any means

But it does run mame games and winuae save states, and switches game graphics and button LED colors by joystick input left/right.
Made in purebasic.

(PS: Sorry, I don’t know why it rotated my pics)

I like your Amiga arcade cabinet! Is each one of those panels an LCD screen? How did you get the different shapes?

[lyzanxia]

I like the ultramiggy Will it be faster than igame? Hate the fact that it is so slow and dependant on extra libraries

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by lyzanxia

I like the ultramiggy Will it be faster than igame? Hate the fact that it is so slow and dependant on extra libraries

What I don't get with the UltraMiggy is why so much detailed database information? Is it being typed in by hand, or read in from an online source or database file?

With ADLaunch, I have to manually download the game or demo files, tailor them in Explorer, then create the blank config file to edit the specifics for the app, and finally go into WinUAE to take a picture. But from then on, I can edit the config within ADLaunch to fine-tune it. I don't rely on a database at all.

Another thing I don't get about these collections is the example of "A-Train" - why are so many versions needed, so many languages? Why not just choose one and be done with it?