logo by ALEXGIZH
UME (Universal Machine Emulator) combines the features of MAME and MESS into a single multi-purpose emulator. The project represents a natural course of development for the emulators which already share large amounts of code and is part of an ongoing effort to unify development efforts and provide a single emulation platform for users and developers alike.
As of 0.146 the UME target is officially provided in the MESS development tree, however the teams have opted at this time to not supply binaries of the build on the official site(s) so instead I’m supplying them here and dealing with support for them.
The builds here are produced using unmodified code from the MESS SVN repository which contains the latest code for both the MAME and MESS projects. As part of the unification the teams will be moving to a single shared SVN in the near future, although the projects will still maintain their separate identities and distributions, including this one, the UME build.
For the end-user UME allows a user to unleash the full potential of both the MAME and MESS projects from within a single convenient environment, using common configurations. It is designed to demonstrate how close the projects already are while providing an introduction to MESS and how some more advanced features of the project which MAME doesn’t utilize directly are used.
Why Should I Use UME instead of a regular MAME/MESS build?
No functionality from regular builds has been removed, so even if you don’t make use of any of the additional functionality you’re not losing out by using UME instead of a single project. Beyond that you have access to a whole new sub-set of platforms. For example you can quickly launch either the standard NES version of Super Mario Bros. the Playchoice 10 version, or the VS. System version using the same application which you’ve already set up and configured. The main added factor is convenience.
From a development perspective you have instant access to the components which exist in both projects without having to move code around if you’re simply interested in doing some quick tests. You also have access to a more flexible range of software and test cases for common components within a single project as well as a greater level of awareness over component reuse between the projects. This should allow for greater testing of code and hopefully reduce the chances of accidental duplication.
Why Should I Use UME instead of MESSUNI (another recent combined build)?
MESSUNI is what I like to call a discriminatory build. It is billed as a combined binary, but actually strips a large amount of both projects out merely based on flags and personal preference of the developer. Any seasoned MAME or MESS user will tell you that there are many things flagged which are actually usable to a good degree because flags are often used as a precautionary measure, especially in MESS where you have systems where several hundred games may function correctly on a system, but likewise many may not, so the flags remain.
Furthermore MESSUNI is built on the MESSUI code, which in turn is based on the legacy MAMEUI code. I’m aware that this is preferential to people over the commandline but the code has been rotting for years and introduces numerous stability and usability issues which will degrade the overall experience of using either MAME, MESS, or a combined build. The current recommended way to use the emulators is with the QMC2 frontend, which should support the UME build shortly.
Where Can I Download UME?
I’ve combined both the source, as well as 32-bit and 64-bit binaries into a single downloadable package HERE (61.8 MB). Tools have been moved to the ‘tools32’ and ‘tools64’ folders after each compile.
These are compiled with ‘gcc version 4.6.3 (rubenvb-4.6.3)’ on a Core2Duo system. The official MAME / MESS toolchain will probably be migrated to that toolchain, or one close to it shortly.
What’s New in UME?
UME 0.146 contains *everything* from MAME 0.146 and *everything* from MESS 0.146 please refer to the relevant what’s new lists for each project.
To be more specific it’s based on MESS SVN 15264, which is slightly newer but adds a fix which allows the tools to compile without error.
Everything?
Ideally everything, yes, although due to an oversight the megatech.xml and stv.xml software lists from MAME are not in the MESS SVN tree despite being in shared folders so are currently absent. That isn’t an issue however because the primary method of launching these is with the internal setlists anyway. This will most likely be resolved once the official development teams are sharing an SVN.
When Shouldn’t I Use UME?
UME shouldn’t be used for reporting things to Mametesters, doing so will result in lots of angry developers chasing you with cattle prods. If you encounter a bug in UME you should verify that it occurs in a regular build too. There is no reason why a bug should be specific to UME, but it makes sense to check first.
Future Plans for UME?
I’ll make an effort to put out a build for each ‘u’ release (as long as I feel the overall ‘u’ release is stable enough) as well as each final release (which should be stable..) People are welcome to compile and post their own builds, especially for non-Windows platforms as I’m unable to supply those myself.
Anything Else?
I’m currently undecided over setting up a new sub-page for UME builds, or just posting them as part of the regular news stream here.
Hi Haze!
I strongly support the universal target, it should’ve been done many years ago. But, better later than never, right? The only thing that bugs me is the hierarchy, where specific arcade games are on the top level, whereas console/pc games are a level below, in software lists. I know that the top level equals unique hardware, but my perfectionist/ocd hierarchy obsession makes me feel disturbed about this :)
Anyway, the main reason for me writing now is not about my ocd problems. I’ve made a logo for UME, so if you like it, you can use it, and even contact me to modify it to suit your needs, if you think that something’s missing/doesn’t feel right. I played a little with your initial idea (which I like), and took the liberty to make the U and E blue and the M orange, because I didn’t like the M being split (mail me if you want to see the whole case study with the inbetween iterations). Moreover, I made it geometrically more accurate and standardized than the current MAME/MESS logos, but it retains the look and feel of the original(s).
Without further ado, here it is:
http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/723/ume.png
Alright, I do like that one actually, if you want to post the iterations you can tho.
My reason for wanting a shaded M was for a possible icon too. Micko added an icon to MAME (a blue M) and MESS has had the orange M for some years now, I was thinking half/half would represent what it was, a blend of the two. I have to admit I wasn’t really sure it would look great at a large size like that tho, so this design is better imho :-)
The icon (if I choose to have one) and the main logo can be different anyway ;-)
As for the ‘OCD’ issue, I think you just have to consider it in terms of hardware, yes.. I know there are some systems in MAME which took a ‘sub-board’ (or even the concept of a cartridge / cd directly) but the vast majority weren’t really designed to have the media changed on a regular basis, with most pcbs really being for a single game only (even in the case of shared drivers the pcbs weren’t always identical)
Also from the point of organization, I was reading that there are something like 15,000 unique spectrum games, you couldn’t possible represent that per-system at base level so the hierarchy of ‘platform’ and ‘software list’ is needed.
You kinda get used to it.
There are a lot more systems (phones, mp3 players etc.) MESS could potentially emulate too, so I’d expect the basic list there to expand over time too..
Good job.
I’ll make an attempt for a logo soonish (real life in the way).
You should move to a sub-page.
Also I wonder if you should publish this in MW too. :)
Simple news feed. No comments or whatever.
No reason to follow a thread or whatever (you read their forum anyway), but if you don’t want to be discriminated, don’t discriminate from your side too. You don’t have to like them.
I post in some fora I don’t like people lurking (or even controlling) too, because they are the fora a specific subject should be whether I like it or not.
UME-irrelevant comment to strengthen the paragraph above (feel free to skip):
…and yes I am known to be a pain in the a?? even of my friends. :) Speaking what I believe to be the truth, not taking into account the consequences… In the virtual world has led me to some bans, in real world it has led me to loose two of my best friends… thing is, the second actually got back to me 8 years later (!) to tell me I was actually right (and still a friend).
Anyway, keep up the good work. Keep the low profile.
I’m really glad you like it! I wouldn’t post the iterations publicly though, that’s why I said you can drop me an email :)
I can produce the icons too, and I agree that the icon should be a color-divided “M”, not an “U”. Ultimately I see UME as being the primary target with MAME and MESS being optional, but the legacy of MAME (as the more recognizable “brand”) and MESS (a bit less) should be respected.
Ah, forgot… Have to say I like the single distribution too.
Having both 32bit and 64bit in same archive will actually eventually strengthen X64 build, since most people today have X64 capable CPUs (and some even X64 Windows and some don’t even know it).
Having the source together MIGHT actually help people that are not into building, to actually try it.
On the other hand, I am not sure if our linux friends will appreciate having to download all these exes.
the linux folk probably know to just check out the correct code revision from the MESS SVN/GIT and just compile it with the right target ;-)
Yes, that’s the way software is usually distributed on Linux: we download the source for the repository, build binary packages and upload them to our Linux distribution app catalog (Debian, Fedora … )
We don’t care that much about the UME binaries but of course, having a single source tree to work with, will reduce duplicated work for us :)
+1 for mess for having a public svn/git repository.
Hi!
Note that QMC2 SVN r3920 now HAS support for U.M.E. / a new QMC2-UME variant :)!
It’s missing its own logo at the moment, so don’t be surprised when some dialogs look ugly right now… but other than that it should work more or less fine. Be prepared for bugs, though, since it’s missing tests and users. Also, I haven’t tested it on anything else than Linux yet (that is, only with SDLUME and not with UME).
See also: http://sourceforge.net/apps/mantisbt/qmc2/view.php?id=22
Cheers, René
Thanks, what are people doing about QMC2 binaries, or is it very much compile-your-own?
If so I’ll probably leave it a few days for some beautification, then hopefully see what’s needed to put a binary up. I don’t really use a frontend myself but yours always comes highly recommended as being a powerful replacement for getting full functionality out of the software without needing to resort to the commandline.
Very cool.
I checked the “-listxml” output of UME 0.146 and could not find any console games in there, just console systems like “a2600” and “a7800”.
How do you run Atari 2600 games with UME ?
Also, I have a suggestion. Would it be possible to add “arcade” / “console” / “computer” tags on each game so you know what game is arcade, what game is console and what game is computer ?
These tags would also appear in the “-listxml” output.
Note that I never used MESS so I don’t know how it works.
Thank you Haze for this project.
@Haze: building it is actually quite simple with Micko’s version of the MAME dev-tools… but I can prepare new Win32 binaries in a few days if it’s that what you’re asking for :).
Oh, another thing… is it OK to use your UME logo in QMC2?
I have no problem with the logo being used, it’s the one I plan on using for any future announcements, so it makes sense, and I’m sure the guy who posted it above will be happy to see it put to use :-)
Ciro> the console stuff works via the softlists, which MESS makes extensive use of compared to MAME (which only has a select few, Megatech etc.)
For the most basic cases you just launch with
ume64 genesis gamename
if you need the software list info for a specific system you can do
ume64 genesis -listsoftware
which will give you the shortnames etc.
( a plain ume64 -listsoftware list everything known for all systems )
Just think of the softwarelist as being like mame’s internal lists, but stored in external files and tied to specific systems :-)
I think eventually some of the systems in MAME will be migrated to work exclusively this way too (where it makes sense) although that’s still under debate. You can currently launch the majority of NeoGeo software in MAME the same way because it has a software list in addition to the internal sets (mame64 neogeo eightman)
some of the use cases are more difficult but the basic ones are a breeze.
for systems which don’t *require* media to be inserted to boot you can also change the current media from the internal menus once the system is booted.
for example with the amiga 500 (which doesn’t have a software list) you can launch it with ume64 a500p, then bring up the tab menu (you might need to hit scroll lock to switch out of emulated keyboard mode) and select the ‘file manager’ then use that to locate and .adf disk image you want to boot. (the amiga driver isn’t very good mind you, so your mileage will vary ;-)
note, all this functionality is in the MAME core, just MAME only uses a subset of it in most cases by default because 99% of arcade boards are fixed configuration things you simply turn on, MESS makes full use of it, and that’s why I often say MESS is the primary project :-)
Here is the first attempt for UME’s icon. I tried several combinations of a split “M”.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/35261066/ume_icon.7z
Hi Haze,
here is my UME logo :
http://img256.imageshack.us/img256/5656/umelogo.png
Cheers,
JacKc.
Hmm.. not so keen on that one, looks like it’s been put through some extreme 4xscale filter or something, sorry ;-)
thanks for the detailed info, Haze.
I like the current logo being displayed at the top.
“As part of the unification the teams will be moving to a single shared SVN in the near future”
Hopefully they won’t have a shared backup…
RB has a few comments about the logo being used here on MW, apparently feels that the U doesn’t really fit the font used by the rest of the letters.
Personally I like it, but I thought I’d pass on the feedback from there :-)
Ok Haze,
No 4xscale filter has been put…100% original creation :
http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/5656/umelogo.png
best regards,
JacKc.
that looks more natural, at least the shading, but I still think the way the tip of the E ends up blue like the M looks a bit awkward, and I think the U looks more out of place there than it does with the one being used.
I don’t know, as I said I’m not an artist myself but it doesn’t appeal to me in the same way. I still think I prefer the basic style of the ones done by alexgizh which is closer to what I had in mind from the start :-)
No problemo Haze…You don’t need to justify your choice.
here’s my last try :
http://img341.imageshack.us/img341/5656/umelogo.png
now concerning alexgizh logo, it is really nice but the “U” doesn’t macth the rest of the fonts…
yeah, as I mentioned in an earlier comment, the same was said on MW, the widths aren’t quite right etc. I do prefer the way the U is slanted to match the E tho.
agreed !
http://img703.imageshack.us/img703/5656/umelogo.png
this last one from JacKc looks very nice.
but I like the wave effect from the logo currently begin used.
@Ciro: when you parse the UME xml, just look if the entry contains a item. if so, that system has a list is available.
then, you can call “ume system -lsoft” to list the corresponding entries (but mind that some systems support multiple software lists), or you can parse the hash/ directory to read the entries of the corresponding software list.
feel free to ask here or to PM me at MW if you need any more info on software list support for your frontend :)
grr… xml tags were ignored… let me try again…
@Ciro: when you parse the UME xml, just look if the <game> entry contains <softwarelist> a item. if so, that system has a list is available.
then, you can call “ume system -lsoft” to list the corresponding entries (but mind that some systems support multiple software lists), or you can parse the hash/ directory to read the entries of the corresponding software list.
feel free to ask here or to PM me at MW if you need any more info on software list support for your frontend :)
I’ll try to update the logo later today to fix the widths of the letters, and maybe alter the “U” a little bit.
Here’s a QMC2 Win32 VC++ 2010 build including “experimental” support for UME:
Installer: http://qmc2.arcadehits.net/Win32/qmc2-win32-0.37-SVN-r3926.exe
Archive: http://qmc2.arcadehits.net/Win32/qmc2-win32-0.37-SVN-r3926.7z
Have fun, René
thanks for the tips etabeta.
Here’s the new (fixed) version:
Installer: http://qmc2.arcadehits.net/Win32/qmc2-win32-0.37-SVN-r3927.exe
Archive: http://qmc2.arcadehits.net/Win32/qmc2-win32-0.37-SVN-r3927.7z
The (MESS) device-configuration just crashed in the old one because of “machine” vs. “game” issue :). This part was “purely MESS” before, so I overlooked it in the first place…
Nice progress. :) Ah the avalanche is getting bigger.
Seeing the new thread in MW (someone actually posted about UME… guts or unaware of the danger, I don’t know :D), I really wonder what you have done for the team to hate you. :D
Maybe you should give this to someone else to take it forward. :P
Seems UME is partially taboo because YOU are taboo or something.
Yet in the older (locked) thread they claimed no politics are involved. YEAH RIGHT!
Thanks René, I’ll put up an update about it later.
And yes, as I’ve said before, most of Mamedev who are against it are against it because it’s my idea, it’s *entirely* political, whatever they claim in public.
ReadOnly is MESSfan, who is a long term ‘Haze troll’ under previous aliases and constantly on the Mess forums, regardless of what I do / said, hence his ‘who gives a fuck’ troll, which is typical and CTOJAH is just an idiot recycling the same old ‘memory’ tripe which has been dispelled by Mamedev countless times over the past years, although not surprising given his ‘fruit machines are a cancer on mame’ stance when he could just ignore them.
Luckily Micko doesn’t care for such nonsense, and while he’d probably be booted out if he even considered doing it as the main build he’s quite happy for it to co-exist as it does now :-)
Haze, don’t try to twist again things to seem the victim of other people conspiracies.
there are a few people which are against releasing a unified build because it’s your idea, but there are also people which have motivated their opposition over and over.
are you able to see beyond your ego? politics is mostly in your eyes…
and NLS “Speaking what I believe to be the truth” is what 99% of the trolls use as motivation of their pointless posts. you’re way better than a troll (or I would not even reply to your posts ;) ), so don’t act like a crusader where there is no crusade to fight…
I’ve been given various logs which make it very clear that certain people are mounting strong opposition against this simply because is because it’s my idea. Either they oppose in private, or offer empty ‘I’ll quit if it happens’ threats. That isn’t ego, it’s politics, plain and simple.
You even state ‘there are a few people’ in your above text. Yes, there are a few people, but ‘active’ mamedev is only a few people anyway so it only takes a few people opposing it for such reasons to cause an issue. I’d be interested in a headcount of mamedev members who are active, and what they’re actively working on to add real value to the project (drivers and such) because I’d be very surprised if it’s above single digits. I ask, because I’d like to do a refresh on things which need working on, which is likely to just be mostly the same as before because the majority of the challenging cases haven’t progressed at all.
Personally I don’t care, this solution works for me, I think it’s a *shame* it isn’t more official with the packages on the main site(s), but beyond that I’m fine with compiling / packaging / maintaining this, it’s no big deal. If one day it becomes official then I’ll stop posting them here, but in the meantime things can work like this without any real issues.
Thanks etabeta for calling me a troll.
In my eyes you are what… in YOUR eyes is Haze. Someone that contributes (more or less) and believes this makes him a judge.
Not too great to actually be the same as someone you don’t like.
In the end I don’t see your arguments AGAINST the merge. You just say that “some” present “some” valid arguments. Well. Let’s hear them here.
In virtually all aspects of development, the MAME and MESS teams have already merged or will merge soon – in the case of the SVN source trees. I don’t see what the big fuss is about. This arguing is pointless from both sides, to be honest and I’m know I’m sick of wasting my time reading it.
I don’t think Haze judges but he has every right to do so
Time after time Haze is the man coming up with the goods and always delivering quality
He has been there, seen that for every part of Mame development and given me all the arcade games I remember with Mame
If a legendary figure like Haze can’t judge who are you to pass judgement on others etabeta
Guys, can you stop the personal attacks, as I asked before. I know eta pretty much started it but I’d rather the rest here didn’t stoop that low.
Well I didn’t resort to name calling that is for sure.
Interesting twist. I got banned. To be precise first they insulted me, I was smart enough not to answer back but still *I* got banned. :-) Great, so Smittdog is not just an asshole. He is a gay asshole. Hope he reads this and hope he will visit Greece some time. I’ll happily sign my comment on his nose with my boot.
Haze I am starting to realize your position after all. Sorry if my attempts have in fact hurt your project.
Etabeta hope you see things more clearly now. To me they are brighter than the sun.
You will get banned from Mameworld if you don’t fit in or have an opinion which differs from theirs.
First everybody will gang up on you, make fun of you etc. then they will ban you. It’s not an emulation forum / site, it’s a school playground. Seen it countless times before, which is why I refuse to re-register there.
Their main forum being a trash talking pervy piece of garbage says a lot.
Hi Haze,
I used to only read the posts@MW that you contributed to. Your one of the gods that help make the reality of my favorite arcades games being alive again. I was always blown away that you took time to give your point of view.
Much respect and love to you.
I am the Lord God. Thou shalt have no other Gods before me (1st commandment, Moses). ; )
Haze it is unbelievable. In fact I think they would ban me earlier, they only waited a bit longer seeing I registered there NINE years ago (i.e. before many or most of the admins).
Anyway, now I know. Some people there are plain assholes. Most of them can afford to be exactly because they are behind a monitor. As I said before I’d be glad if Snoopdog attempted to call me an asshole face2face (which trust me he wouldn’t). I would “explain” why I am not.
I have a family, I am well recognized in local IT community, involved with computers for the last 29 years and on the other hand I am 100kg, ex. special forces airborne and was practicing taekwon-do for more than 10 years. I’d really like Snoopshit face2face.
Anyway, good thing is that after so many years in the virtual world, I’ve learned to ignore such crap (or at least they don’t get “inside” me). :) I am pretty ok. In fact I love how the thread is still there for other users to make their own judgement.
Anyway. Any emulator-themed democratic forum you can suggest? Because blog (like here) is not going to cut it.
I don’t think there really are any, at least not ones with a MAME focus.
Most of the ones I’ve seen lost interest in emulation a while back, and turned to similar ‘trash talk’ forums, and as you’ve noticed if you try and talk emulation you just end up with the kind of crap you got there.
The MESS forums are pretty good for strict development, but there is an absolute ban on UME talk there too because RB doesn’t like it.
But yeah, emulation friendly forums for upcoming MAME developers without all the crap like ‘The Loony Bin / Current Affairs’ which are nothing but a disgrace to the MAME name and only going to put genuine people off, forget about it, I don’t think you’re going to find a forum with intelligent company these days (and people wonder why you’re seeing such a shortage of contributors)
As you can see, the threads quickly turned to attacks on my character (and your character), instead of the idea, trying to make me + anybody supporting it look bad, and therefore make the ideas look invalid, that’s what happens every time, and by mamedev members no less. As far as the build situation is concerned, I’m happy enough with how things stand, their loss if they don’t want to promote it on the official site. As far as attitudes of the official team go, they’re absolutely killing the project and that’s the real frustrating point especially the ones I invited onto or suggested for the team in the first place to take the project forward.
In all fairness, NLS, my message in reply to you in the thread was meant as a warning.. to have you realize that your incessant hammering of the subject needed to stop. It is fine to discuss for the sake of discussion but your messages quickly deteriorated into something else. You, in my eyes, had reached a point where there was not one thing anyone could have said or done that would have placated you. You kept the thread going, even after I moved it out of EmuChat (yep, that was me) when you could have just let it go for now.
Life goes on. People make new accounts. People get banned. Circle of life.
I don’t understand what “merge” means for you NLS. As mentioned before, MAME and MESS projects are already/will be ‘merged’ in all applicable areas with development teams, source trees and now even a shared bug database. Haze will continue support the merged UME project until such time the situation changes and developers’ views change where it becomes an officially supported build. What, again, is there an argument about?
The discussions get derailed intentionally because some key people there don’t want it.
They then proceed with character assassinations against me to further invalidate the idea, rather than discussing the idea on it’s own merits, thus further derailing the topic.
All I’m trying to do is get on with an honest job of doing something to benefit people. I’m sure if NLS had posted pics of semi-nude girls taken without their permission in every post he made instead he’d be being worshiped there already. Instead he wanted to discuss emulation, and the mods resorted to name calling.
If I had any sense I’d tell Smit to stuff it instead of continuing to work with him on PGM stuff, but maybe that’s the problem, everybody just sees me as weak and knows I’ll continue working on stuff regardless because I care about the projects more than this BS.
Tafoid I am glad you read this blog. At least you see how I saw it. I don’t claim you should understand though. I am not going to discuss about the merge here again (unless something new happens).
As for the ban… I wonder how you let this thing go on. Read on and let me know where I am wrong point by point (you know by now that I like ARGUMENTS).
1) I didn’t insult anybody. Yes/no?
2) I DID get insulted (ON purpose) BY an admin (and a couple of people that like to suck other people’s balls). Yes/no?
3) I didn’t react in an insulting way to #2, not ever an angry way. Yes/no?
4) Thread was moved out of EmuChat, so one more reason to let it live its half-life. (if you mean that EmuChat is like some clean section which I disagree but that is not my problem or the issue here) Disagree?
5) There is one thing called: Ignore someone that you don’t like. Yes/no?
6) There is one other thing called: Ignore a thread you don’t care about (and Loony Bin is a fine place just for that). Yes/no?
7) Instead after getting insulted in a way that in real life translates either broken teeth or suing (or both actually) *I* got banned. Yes/no?
If you have two minutes take the time to answer the above.
So… you call this a forum? I call it crap.
That said, I want my account (even if I don’t ever use it again). It is a nine years old account. SOMEONE should have respect this.
No the circle of life ain’t get banned and make new account (and I am not making one).
People with the attitude of Shitdog should not be admins, not be part of ANY team etc. Make SURE to send him my “fuck you asshole”.
Sorry. I already gave the reason why I moved the News Post discussion elsewhere and will not be participating in your questionnaire, thank you.
You getting banned was not my doing, so if there is any chance in having your personal account unbanned, you will need to play nice with Smitdogg. Respect or not, as forum admin and ranking user, he makes the final call. Hardly anyone who is banned is banned forever there – making your chances of coming back greater than you think.
Sorry I won’t lick the ass of someone I’ve said I would happily give him a new (much different) smile.
He can keep me banned or unban me. I will ignore him anyway.
He makes the last call in his forum, but my problem is not that. My problem is how you play nice with such a homo erectus. This is the reason you don’t participate in my little questionnaire. You actually don’t like the replies you would HAVE to give. It is actually pitiful. If I was an important user as you, I would let him play admin with no users like me (you). There is a thing called “dignity”.
Anyway, I am sure you have your reasons. Please don’t take this as a personal attack. My simple (or even simplistic) questions are still there for you. I am curious.
Everything Haze and NLS has said about MAMEWorld forum is absolutely correct. As a former member, a couple months ago I decided I could no longer bite my tongue and I spoke up. I took on basically the whole MW forum the last month or so. They are so pathetic. Nobody is allowed to disagree with any senior members, staff, or devs. And all the members kiss each others’ butts. I don’t understand why they even allow new members to join their forum because all they do is agree with each other and post negative comments to people who don’t agree with them or people who don’t kiss their butts. I seriously have never seen more of a pathetic bunch of losers in my life. Yesterday I was banned. During the last month or two, I was never the first one to say anything negative to somebody nor did I ever start in with anyone. I always said “please” and “thank you” and was always nice, courteous, and respectful until somebody decided to say negative comments to me. They were always the one to start in with me and say negative things after every one of my original posts. Unlike most of the other mice on that forum, I stood up for myself and totally bitched them. Unfortunately, sometimes I stooped to their level in the process of speaking the truth and standing up for myself. I “won” every arguement that they started with me. It was so disgustingly pathetic and truely sad seeing how they act and kiss each other’s butts. If I were to say, “the sun is hot”, somebody would disagree with me and everyone would agree with that person. Then they would all gang up against me and I would take them all on!… and win! Words can’t describe how they are pathetic, negative, and toxic people. Now wonder why the MAMEWorld forum is the laughing stock of the gaming community. They get ripped in every forum that they are mentioned.
Well, on one side most of the questions you asked could have been answered more quickly than the time required to make the posts, on the other I have a feeling maybe you already knew this and were just gathering a consensus of opinion / testing the knowledge of the regulars there, who on most cases showed not a great deal of understanding.
That said, they were usually on-topic emulation related questions, and emulation related debates, and they kept the place looking ‘active’, so banning you was probably a bit harsh, but as a MAME site it may as well be about the musical these days so hardly surprising.
MAME does seem to lack a good ‘first point of contact’ for any kind of intelligent conversation or debate, which I’m sure puts people off because it’s put me off contributing to other projects in the past because I have no way to gather the general vibe of the project, direction, leadership, goals, activity etc. MESS has that with the more open approach and forums, which is why that project has a greater developer appeal even if it doesn’t have the users. Note, the active encouragement of SVN testing, threads where users post screenshots and their experiences of working with the drivers, and lots of little contributions; it’s a positive, serious place for development and people interested in the development to gather. It’s just a shame MESS doesn’t have more users for better testing, and many of the best developers are still opting to do their own thing, otherwise it could really be the ultimate emulator.
Of course maybe MESS has better developers / more developer interest than MAME because computers you were always encouraged to tinker around and discover stuff, whereas arcades were just games you played as a ‘dumb user’ much like modern consoles. As I’ve mentioned before, don’t take the rough compatibility in MESS as meaning it’s an inferior emulator, it’s just that in MAME the cracks are easier to paper over with hacks than when you need to support an entire software library, getting it perfect however does require the absolute best developers, and ones who don’t just want to hide hacks in closed source projects and claim to be the best, such developers are rare, very rare. I believe byuu has mentioned before that the last 10% of compatibility for any system is 99% of the work and that 10% requires things to balance with such ridiculous precision that you have to know the systems inside out to get it right, and MESS doesn’t currently have that now; you’ve only got to look at some of the standalones which have been around as long as MAME / MESS but are only emulating a single system and STILL fixing bugs in that to understand the dedication required.
Given that MAME development on the whole should be easier I’m surprised there are less interested developers, many things which need fixing are probably easy enough fixes given eyes looking at them; I’m sure getting the Konami ‘Tasman’ gambling games past their self-check screens would be easy for example, they just want to checksum the various video roms, and there is already code in MAME to do that. Getting those running might then have the knock-on effect of providing more test cases for the Konami GX video and mixer emulation and improve games there, but if nobody is even doing the basic bits (passing checksums) what hope is there for the rest, and why are people opting to develop more for the vastly more complex project?
Obviously nothing I can resolve (either an official forum as point of contact, or somehow getting the best developers onboard) because I’m not the ‘official face of MAME’ in any way so anything I do would be ‘just another unofficial forum’ even if I do probably know more about the project than a lot of other people.
Incidentally, I still think the steeper accuracy requirements of Computer / Console software is one reason some devs are opposed to the merge, it shows the MAME emulation for what it is and destroys some of the “it’s slow because it’s the most accurate emulator” facade.
I’ll always use the Jaguar emulation as an example. It might hold up for the handful of Jaguar based arcade titles in MAME, just about, but has an overall compatibility of about 2 titles when faced with a real Jaguar software library.
Same for the CD32 emulation, it can run the Cubo games, but there are very few, if any real CD32 games which work. Amiga is a similar case.
The Playstation stuff in MAME is another good example, some claim it’s slow because it’s the most accurate emulaton, but faced with an actual Playstation library it falls apart completely.
Saturn isn’t much better, although (prior to recent changes) you did have a pretty good level of compatibility, albeit more with the lesser known Japanese games than the titles people are more likely to want to run.
Not allowing such things to run in MAME effectively gives developers an excuse to not care with the ‘It’s in MESS, so it doesn’t matter’ attitude, and gives a false impression that the drivers are better than they really are.
Of course there are some better quality drivers, but those are usually ones which have come the other way, from MESS into MAME.
At least I think *thats* why some developers are afraid of the combined build, of course I don’t really think it’s such a big deal, people like Aaron have done so much for MAME in the past that a sub-par Jaguar driver is just one of those things, heaven knows the number of unfinished drivers there are in MAME anyway but I have been given quotes to indicate at least a few devs would see their egos and reputation being harmed if people were to see beyond the walled garden MAME provides and were allowed to run a wider range of software on the drivers hence them rather keeping MESS hidden and the link between the projects less apparent.
It’s a bit of a shame, and one of the reasons for UME is that I like to give people the chance to judge for themselves, see things for what they are and really highlight a link between improving console emulation and having more trustworthy arcade emulation as a a result.
I also would like to add that it’s unfortunate how many potential members and devs have been shied away and were lost due to the senior members & staff of the MAMEWorld forum. Take for example Haze… the MAME project is better off with Haze than without him. His past contributions have already proved that. It’s a fact. So to exclude a dev that has contributed in a positive way to MAME makes no sense. How is that not politics? It’s common sense, a project gets more done when there is 9 skilled workers rather than 8 skilled workers. Even if he would have just added one additional driver/feature to MAME, that is still one extra driver/feature that would not have been there if he wasn’t excluded from the team.
The MAMEWorld staff & senior members have such poor attitudes and wrong assumptions of others that it is truely mind boggling. They are just negative people, down to the bone. I would hate to live life that way. They always assume the worst in people and are normally always wrong with their assumptions.
Somebody (I think NLS) was looking to find a different forum that is exclusive to MAME. I stumbled across “mameaddicts” and “mameitalia”. Are any of those two forums any good? Unfortunately the latter is in Italian language but you could always use Google/Bing Translate.
I know nothing of mameaddicts, never seen anybody else talk about it, or even mention it, so I doubt it will be a major source of knowledgable information.
Mameitalia isn’t bad, but is also mostly dead, and strictly Italian only. they accept english posts from devs or other people who have contributed (as otherwise sometimes questions would go unanswered) but they wouldn’t appreciate Google translated posts.
So basically we are dead in the water.
I see Smit has now resorted to trolling the Linux conversation guy instead of trying to have a reasonable debate / intelligent conversation there…
anybody want to take bets on who gets banned next?
It *should* be Smit.. but MW will always be a shithole.
Cannot find the thread.
The member “italie” is one of the biggest losers on that MAMEWorld forum. Everyday he posts pointless, dumb, and random stuff in the Looney Bin regarding his personal life at home. He posts there as if he was tweeting on his Twitter account. All his Looney Bin posts are like Twitter type of posts. He’s so pathetic. Everyday, when I see his Looney Bin posts, I think to myself, I could only imagine what he would reply to me if I was the one posting that type of stuff. He would redicule and flame me everytime. But unlike him, I would never post that type of stuff.
Soon after NLS and I got banned, everyone has been saying “where is everyone?”… “it’s so quiet on this forum.” Everyone has been saying that lately. They wonder why it’s so quiet… it’s because they ban anyone who has a different opinion than them or anyone that actually has the balls to stand up for themselves and speak the truth instead of kissing their butt. All that forum consists of are a small group of members who suck each others “you know what”.
Just to clarify. UME uses a ume.ini? (in the sense of mess.ini and mame.ini)
It also supports multiple paths separated by “;”?
In other words in ume.ini this will work?
rompath .\roms;.\chd;.\firmware;.\software
(where “roms” are MAME ROMs, “chd” are MAME CHD, “firmware” are MESS ROMs and “software” are MESS software lists)
Will this work AND check ok? (ume.exe calls will detect them all when called)
yes, and anything that works in mame.ini / mess.ini will work. I currently have
rompath roms;c:\mameroms;c:\mameroms2
in ume.ini for example.
would have been quicker to actually try it than asking me tho, surely.
Yes if I were WHERE my collection is. I am at work.