[SOFT] New Scraper in the works

kiro

@Folly Nice! Thanks!

I'm going through all the videos with this 'Predictive' profile to fix them. Once this is done I'll start with the --mediadir flag.

Again, thanks a lot for all this testing.

Folly

@kiro

Good idea.
Not tested yet on my pi4, but indeed, when all videos are converted they probably will work too.

Wanted to ask.
Does the script have the ability to scan also subfolders ?

Folly

@kiro

As far as I know you removed the backup function for gamelist.xml.
If so you can remove it from the --help
~~--nobackup Do not backup gamelist.xml file~~

kiro

@Folly Hi, the backup functionality was not removed, at least not intentionally :-) Is it not doing backups anymore?

Also, it will in principle scan subdirs, and exclude '/videos/', '/images/' and '/marquees/' from the scan.. although I have not tested it (I do not have subfolders in my rom collection honestly)

Although thinking about it, probably the --relativepath option will not work in this case due to how I extract the path from the filename... will have to rethink the relative logic...

Folly

@kiro

By default the backup function doesn't work anymore, so you should look at this.

I did a test with placing the megaplay roms directory inside playchoice10.
Then the subfolder isn't scanned/detected.

Will do a second test with a subfolder.
Placed some playchoice10 files in a subfolder and indeed they aren't detected.

kiro

@Folly Will check on the default backup issue.... and will put the subfolders in my todo list :-)

backup should be ok now...(it was a matter of the logic being inverted)

Folly

@kiro

By default backing up gamelist.xml works again.
Tested the --nobackup function and that works too.

kiro

@Folly thanks! Yes the double negative logic just screwed with my brain...

Folly

@kiro

Haha, Yes I can imagine.

kiro

@Folly Hi Again! I'm trying the subfolders, and it is somehow working, except that I have a starnge behaviour from emulationstation:

This is a snippet of the created gamelist:

        <game>
                <rating></rating>
                <name>3d Asteroids</name>
                <marquee>./marquees/3D Asteroids (1987) (Atari) (Prototype) [a1].png</marquee>
                <image>./images/3D Asteroids (1987) (Atari) (Prototype) [a1].png</image>
                <publisher></publisher>
                <releasedate></releasedate>
                <players></players>
                <video>./videos/3D Asteroids (1987) (Atari) (Prototype) [a1].mp4</video>
                <genre></genre>
                <path>./myroms/3D Asteroids (1987) (Atari) (Prototype) [a1].zip</path>
                <developer></developer>
                <thumbnail/>
                <desc>This is an unencrypted pre-release version of the game that became Asteroids for the 7800.</desc>
                <playcount>0</playcount>
                <lastplayed>0</lastplayed>
        </game>

So roms in subfolders are detected and integrated into the gamelist, even in relative mode.

BUT, see emulationstation:

and when I enter the 'myroms' subfolder:

Is this the expected behavior from emulationstation?

(same behaviour when using absolute paths)

Anyway, just added the --recursive flag that will do exactly that, recurse over subfolders in the systems path. Let me know when you have a chance to test it. I do not know how to remove those subpaths in emualtionstation menu though.

Folly

@kiro

Nice ;-)

Yes, it works with and without the option --relativepaths.
Though I am missing that the script will not display what's being recognised.

The subfolder behaviour is expected.
Subfolders are shown when they contain roms.
Dependant on the theme they are mostly showing up as gray text in emulationstation.
Obviously such folder has to be there otherwise you can not select a rom from a subfolder.
As far as I know it's possible to add media to a folder just like it's done with files but for the folder no media has been added in the gamelist.xml now.

kiro

@Folly said in [SOFT] New Scraper in the works:

Though I am missing that the script will not display what's being recognised.

What do you mean by this?

Folly

@kiro

As test 1 placed 1 rom in the roms folder en 1 in a subfolder called sub :

pi@Bullseye-VM:~/RetroPie/roms/playchoice10$ find *
pc_1942.zip
sub
sub/pc_bball.zip

I would expect that the name of 1942 and bball are shown as usual.
Though they are missing in the output of the scan :

pi@Bullseye-VM:~/retroscraper-rpie$ python3 retroscraper.py --systems playchoice10 --recursive --relativepaths
Starting retroscraper - be Patient :-)
Starting retroscraper - be Patient :-)
Loading RetroScraper config File
Loading systems from Backend
Scanning Systems ['playchoice10']
Loading companies from backend
Starting scraping
Scanning Files
SCANNING DIRECTORY
SCRAPPING ENDED --- Thank you for using retroscraper!!

This is shown with a normal scan with both in roms directory :

Game : 1942 (playchoice-10)
Game : Baseball (playchoice-10)

kiro

Hmmmm strange, le me try that.. cannot replicate that... is the rom you copied actually with an accepted extension (I would assume yes, but just trying to understand)

I did some tests:

/home/pi/retroscraper-rpie/retroscraper.py --systems ags --bezels --sysbezels --relative --recursive 
Starting retroscraper - be Patient :-)
Starting retroscraper - be Patient :-)
Loading RetroScraper config File
Loading systems from Backend
Scanning Systems ['ags']
Loading companies from backend
Starting scraping
Scanning Files
SCANNING DIRECTORY
Game : test.zip
WRITING GAMELIST
SCRAPPING ENDED --- Thank you for using retroscraper

Folly

@kiro said in [SOFT] New Scraper in the works:

--relative

Can I now use --relative instead of --relativepaths ?

--recursive

Removing this option and detected roms in the roms folder are shown again.

Very strange that you don't experience this behaviour.

kiro

@Folly :-) I should've put --relativepaths, good sight !

Anyway , I tried one rom in system path, one rom in subfolder and one rom in both, and it seems to work?

I'll see if the git version is the latest one...it is... hmmm can you try --debug and see if something shows up?

Folly

@kiro

I updated the script on my pi4 and it worked correctly showing the games in the script output when using a subfolder.

I did the same on my VM.
The first time it did not display the games when using a subfolder.
The next tries were always successful so I can't reproduce the error any more so I can't use --debug anymore.
I had a generated file from my script 0 rom-index 0 in the roms folder, this could have had some influence, but moving it back and it still worked fine so I doubt it.

Let's say it's solved for now.
If it comes back again we can have a second look.

Btw. the pc_mario.mp4 works as expected on the pi4 ;-) (video and sound OK)

Folly

@kiro

Hi,

Here you can read about using folders in gamelists using descriptions and media :
https://github.com/RetroPie/EmulationStation/blob/master/GAMELISTS.md

I did a quick test and it's not only restricted to :

name - string, the displayed name for the folder.
desc - string, the description for the folder.
image - image_path, the path to an image to display for the folder.
thumbnail - image_path, the path to a smaller image to display for the folder.

Quick example :

<folder>
		<rating></rating>
		<name>subfolder</name>
		<marquee>./marquees/pc_1942.png</marquee>
		<image>./images/pc_1942.png</image>
		<video>./videos/pc_mario.mp4</video>
		<path>./more</path>
		<thumbnail/>
		<desc>description</desc>
</folder>

Looks like this :

kiro

@Folly thanks for that, although I'm not sure what would be the use for that in an automatic scraping... I mean, the folder tag could be created automatically, but what about description and image and the rest? Fill this info based on what exactly? Something to think about...

Folly

@kiro

I agree, it's not something to implement directly into the script.
I only mention it because you questioned why a folder looked the way it did.
So it's only for the knowledge.