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    Syncing button leds with gameplay

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    • F
      Folly @hopwon
      last edited by

      @hopwon

      On which hardware do you run retropie ?
      lr-mame can be installed from binary when using rpi.

      Tell me, what script did you make to count the inserted coins and do you use a joystick or keyboard ?

      mituM H 3 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 1
      • mituM
        mitu Global Moderator @Folly
        last edited by

        @Folly said in Syncing button leds with gameplay:

        On which hardware do you run retropie ?

        First post:

        ... I am using LEDSpicer on RPI4.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
        • H
          hopwon @Folly
          last edited by

          @Folly said in Syncing button leds with gameplay:

          Tell me, what script did you make to count the inserted coins and do you use a joystick or keyboard ?

          A bit nasty but:

          I used inputseeker running in background to grep for a credit button being pressed on(6=P1, 7=P2 in my case) and when it successfully finds a 6 or 7 it increments a counter +1.
          You can do it with awk also but I got tired and when to bed :)

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • H
            hopwon @Folly
            last edited by

            @Folly said in Syncing button leds with gameplay:

            lr-mame can be installed from binary when using rpi.

            Installing it now

            F 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • F
              Folly @hopwon
              last edited by

              @hopwon

              I will look at ledspicer with inputseeker again.
              Seem a really nice package but I have to take some time to dig into it.
              Hopefully I will grasp it.

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • F
                Folly @hopwon
                last edited by Folly

                @hopwon

                I uninstalled my previous install of LEDspice.

                This I what I did :

                cd ~/Downloads/LEDSpicer-development/
                ./autogen.sh
                ./configure --prefix=/usr --sysconfdir=/etc --enable-raspberrypi 
                make
                sudo make install
                sudo usermod -a -G users pi #replace user with your username
                sudo usermod -a -G input pi #replace user with your username
                sudo cp /usr/share/doc/ledspicer/examples/21-ledspicer.rules /etc/udev/rules.d/
                sudo chmod 744 /etc/udev/rules.d/21-ledspicer.rules
                sudo udevadm control --reload-rules && sudo udevadm trigger
                sudo cp /usr/share/doc/ledspicer/examples/ledspicer.conf /etc
                ledspicerd -v
                ledspicerd -d
                sudo ledspicerd -d #seems to be the way to go with RaspberryPi
                

                Running with -d gives :
                Program terminated by error: Empty devices section

                Added the controller name in /etc/ledspicer.conf :

                	<devices
                		name="RaspberryPi"
                    		boardId="1"
                >
                	</devices>
                

                or

                	<devices>
                		name="RaspberryPi"
                    		boardId="1"
                	</devices>
                

                Still no dice.

                Any help would be appreciated.

                H 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • H
                  hopwon @Folly
                  last edited by

                  @Folly You need to manually create your ledspicer.conf, I've attached mine to give you some idea (sorry admins no pastebin!), But basically the file maps pins #'s on your LED controller to an "Element", you can then create groups of Elements and address either the group or Element...

                  FYI On this controller I have 2 x Joystick + Trackball, each player has 8 buttons, plus start, credit, hotkey and exit.

                  pi@pacman:~ $ cat /etc/ledspicer.conf 
                  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
                  <LEDSpicer
                      version="1.0"
                      type="Configuration"
                      fps="30"
                      port="16161"
                      colors="webColors"
                      loglevel="Info"
                      userId="1000"
                      groupId="1000"
                      craftProfile="true"
                  >
                      <devices>
                          <device
                              name="UltimarcUltimate"
                              boardId="1"
                          >
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON1"
                                  red="54"
                                  green="53"
                                  blue="52"
                  		defaultColor="Red"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON2"
                                  red="57"
                                  green="56"
                                  blue="55"
                  		defaultColor="VeryDarkMagenta"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON3"
                                  red="60"
                                  green="59"
                                  blue="58"
                  		defaultColor="Blue"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON4"
                                  red="63"
                                  green="62"
                  		blue="61"
                  		defaultColor="Yellow"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON5"
                                  red="66"
                                  green="65"
                  		blue="64"
                  		defaultColor="Salmon"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON6"
                                  red="69"
                                  green="68"
                  		blue="67"
                  		defaultColor="Lime"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON7"
                                  red="72"
                                  green="71"
                  		blue="70"
                  		defaultColor="Violet"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_BUTTON8"
                                  red="75"
                                  green="74"
                  		blue="73"
                  		defaultColor="VeryDarkYellow"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_START"
                                  red="79"
                                  green="80"
                  		blue="81"
                  		defaultColor="DarkOrange"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_CREDIT"
                                  red="93"
                                  green="92"
                  		blue="91"
                  		defaultColor="DarkOrange"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_TRACKBALL"
                                  red="28"
                                  green="29"
                                  blue="30"
                   	        defaultColor="Cyan"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P1_JOYSTICK1"
                                  red="49"
                                  green="50"
                  		blue="51"
                  		defaultColor="Lime"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="HOTKEY"
                                  led="85"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="EXIT_KEY"
                                  led="88"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_CREDIT"
                                  red="84"
                                  green="83"
                  		blue="82"
                  		defaultColor="DarkOrange"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_START"
                                  red="78"
                                  green="77"
                  		blue="76"
                  		defaultColor="DarkOrange"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON1"
                                  red="4"
                                  green="5"
                                  blue="6"
                  		defaultColor="Red"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON2"
                                  red="7"
                                  green="8"
                                  blue="9"
                  		defaultColor="Green"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON3"
                                  red="10"
                                  green="11"
                                  blue="12"
                  		defaultColor="Blue"
                              />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON4"
                                  red="13"
                                  green="14"
                  		blue="15"
                  		defaultColor="Yellow"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON5"
                                  red="16"
                                  green="17"
                  		blue="18"
                  		defaultColor="Salmon"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON6"
                                  red="19"
                                  green="20"
                  		blue="21"
                  		defaultColor="Lime"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON7"
                                  red="22"
                                  green="23"
                  		blue="24"
                  		defaultColor="Violet"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_BUTTON8"
                                  red="25"
                                  green="26"
                  		blue="27"
                  		defaultColor="VeryDarkYellow"
                  	    />
                              <element
                                  name="P2_JOYSTICK1"
                                  red="1"
                                  green="2"
                  		blue="3"
                  		defaultColor="HotPink"
                  	    />
                          </device>
                      </devices>
                      <restrictors>
                        <restrictor name="ServoStik" boardId="1" player="1" joystick="1" />
                          <!-- Player 2 with ServoStik -->
                        <restrictor name="ServoStik" boardId="1" player="2" joystick="1" />
                      </restrictors>
                      <layout defaultProfile="default">
                          <group name="whole board">
                              <element name="P1_JOYSTICK1"/> 
                  	    <element name="P1_TRACKBALL"/>
                              <element name="P1_START"/>
                              <element name="P1_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON8"/>
                              <element name="P2_JOYSTICK1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON8"/>
                              <element name="P2_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P2_START"/>
                          </group>
                          <group name="Player1">
                              <element name="P1_JOYSTICK1"/>
                              <element name="P1_TRACKBALL"/>
                              <element name="P1_START"/>
                              <element name="P1_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON8"/>
                          </group>    
                          <group name="Player2">
                              <element name="P2_JOYSTICK1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON8"/>
                              <element name="P2_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P2_START"/>
                          </group>
                          <group name="Players">
                              <element name="P1_JOYSTICK1"/>
                              <element name="P1_TRACKBALL"/>
                              <element name="P1_START"/>
                              <element name="P1_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON8"/>
                              <element name="P2_JOYSTICK1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON8"/>
                              <element name="P2_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P2_START"/>
                          </group>
                  	<group name="Whole board as a circle">
                      	    <element name="HOTKEY"/>
                              <element name="P1_CREDIT"/>
                  	    <element name="P1_START"/>
                              <element name="P1_JOYSTICK1"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON8"/>
                              <element name="P1_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P1_TRACKBALL"/>
                              <element name="P2_JOYSTICK1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON5"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON1"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON6"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON2"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON7"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON3"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON8"/>
                              <element name="P2_BUTTON4"/>
                              <element name="P2_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P2_START"/>
                  	</group>
                          <group name="Ctrl keys">
                      	    <element name="HOTKEY"/>
                              <element name="P1_CREDIT"/>
                  	    <element name="P1_START"/>
                              <element name="P2_CREDIT"/>
                              <element name="P2_START"/>
                              <element name="EXIT_KEY"/>
                  	</group>
                          <group name="TopRow">
                  	    <element name="P1_CREDIT"/>
                  	    <element name="P1_START"/>
                              <element name="HOTKEY"/>
                              <element name="EXIT_KEY"/>
                  	    <element name="P2_CREDIT"/>
                  	    <element name="P2_START"/>
                          </group>
                      </layout>
                  </LEDSpicer>
                  
                  
                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                  • H
                    hopwon @Folly
                    last edited by

                    @Folly said in Syncing button leds with gameplay:

                    @hopwon

                    I uninstalled my previous install of LEDspice.

                    This I what I did :

                    cd ~/Downloads/LEDSpicer-development/
                    ./autogen.sh
                    ./configure --prefix=/usr --sysconfdir=/etc --enable-raspberrypi 
                    make
                    sudo make install
                    sudo usermod -a -G users pi #replace user with your username
                    sudo usermod -a -G input pi #replace user with your username
                    sudo cp /usr/share/doc/ledspicer/examples/21-ledspicer.rules /etc/udev/rules.d/
                    sudo chmod 744 /etc/udev/rules.d/21-ledspicer.rules
                    sudo udevadm control --reload-rules && sudo udevadm trigger
                    sudo cp /usr/share/doc/ledspicer/examples/ledspicer.conf /etc
                    ledspicerd -v
                    ledspicerd -d
                    sudo ledspicerd -d #seems to be the way to go with RaspberryPi
                    

                    Running with -d gives :
                    Program terminated by error: Empty devices section

                    Added the controller name in /etc/ledspicer.conf :

                    	<devices
                    		name="RaspberryPi"
                        		boardId="1"
                    >
                    	</devices>
                    

                    or

                    	<devices>
                    		name="RaspberryPi"
                        		boardId="1"
                    	</devices>
                    

                    Still no dice.

                    Any help would be appreciated.

                    Make sure when you are starting for the first time, run the daemon in foreground (-f) as it is the best way to troubleshoot. Its quite verbose in its output so if there is a problem you should get a good indication of exactly what it is.

                    F 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • F
                      Folly @hopwon
                      last edited by

                      @hopwon

                      Thanks, will have a look when I am using my pi.

                      H 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • H
                        hopwon @Folly
                        last edited by

                        @Folly So I managed to get the command line options passed to lr-mame based on the info you provided. I can now see that (I am using Missile Command as a test), led0=0, led1=0, led0=1 led1=1, repeating in the console for any button press.
                        This tells me (I think) that mame is making two led's flash and thats it. No specific output regarding credit or I could be wrong.

                        From runcommand.log using -output console

                        led0 = 1
                        led0 = 0
                        led0 = 1
                        led0 = 0
                        led0 = 1
                        led0 = 0
                        led0 = 1
                        led0 = 0
                        led0 = 1
                        led1 = 1
                        led1 = 0
                        led0 = 0
                        

                        These represent a button press, I think one press = 4 log entries

                        F 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • F
                          Folly @hopwon
                          last edited by Folly

                          @hopwon

                          Yes indeed that is correct.

                          It's jsut how the original hardware worked and that is implemented in mame.
                          It's basically the same with the galaga example I used before, only here you have to add 2 credits for 1 player and 4 credits for 2 players.

                          What you want is not implemented in mame so you need to get the information in an other way just like you did with inputseeker.
                          I tested that and indeed reading event becomes very easy but you need to add a whole script for doing stuff with that information.

                          I see the problem getting some uniform data for every game it seems a bit different.
                          Basically it could mean that for every game you need to make a script.

                          If you want more advanced ways you could look at mame lua plugin scripts.
                          With that you might be able to extract data in a different / better way.
                          FYI I used them for tests but I never wrote them.

                          H 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • H
                            hopwon @Folly
                            last edited by

                            @Folly @MeduZaPaT talks about doing the part to make credit flash here:

                            link text

                            If there was a way to set a counter or write to an output, then that's the solution...

                            F 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • F
                              Folly @hopwon
                              last edited by Folly

                              @hopwon

                              Ok, I used your ledspicer.conf and customised it for use with RaspberryPi (GPIO).
                              For error sake I made all red, green and blue use the same pin (red=4, green=5 and blue=6) and added an empty profile which is explained over here.

                              Now I don't get errors anymore when running :

                              ledspicerd -d
                              

                              Then I tried :

                              ledspicerd -f
                              

                              That gave me :

                              2023-09-21 21:23:41 initCheckPermitted: 
                              +---------------------------------------------------------+
                              |Sorry, you don't have permission to run this program.    |
                              |Try running as root, e.g. precede the command with sudo. |
                              +---------------------------------------------------------+
                              Program terminated by error: Failed to initialized Raspberry PI GPIO
                              

                              So now I know RaspberryPi needs running with sudo, like this :

                              sudo ledspicerd -f
                              

                              I might have to check ledspicer.conf again for correct values and then I have to add some game profiles.
                              Would like to check first if the mame "-output network" is detected without using emulationstation.

                              sudo ledspicerd -f should do that trick right ?

                              Will have look later again.

                              H 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • H
                                hopwon @Folly
                                last edited by

                                @Folly the -f option runs in foreground so yes, you should see something...

                                F 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                • F
                                  Folly @hopwon
                                  last edited by

                                  @hopwon said in Syncing button leds with gameplay:

                                  These represent a button press, I think one press = 4 log entries

                                  Missed that part.
                                  No they aren't really button presses.
                                  On the other end you could see it that way but inserting a coin while playing the game does nothing.
                                  Taking galaga as example, it's that led0 goes on and off after inserting a coin and when the start button is not pressed yet and not playing the game.
                                  For missile that is 2 coins (led0) and 4 coins(led1).

                                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • F
                                    Folly @hopwon
                                    last edited by

                                    @hopwon

                                    Was able to test the led on GPIO pin 4 with this :

                                    pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo ledspicerd -l
                                    Test LEDs (q to quit)
                                    
                                    Select a Led (r to reset, q to quit):
                                    4
                                    
                                    Select a Led (r to reset, q to quit):
                                    r
                                    
                                    Select a Led (r to reset, q to quit):
                                    q
                                    

                                    So basically ledspicer is working.
                                    Have to look at the game profiles now.

                                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                    • F
                                      Folly @hopwon
                                      last edited by Folly

                                      @hopwon

                                      It seems very hard to understand the docs and how everything actually works ;-(

                                      I am struggling with creating a single game input xml in /usr/share/ledspicer/profiles/arcade.
                                      I added galaga in /usr/share/ledspicer/profiles/profile_arcade.xml like this :

                                      <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
                                      <LEDSpicer
                                      	version="1.0"
                                      	type="Profile"
                                      	backgroundColor="Black"
                                      >
                                      	<inputs>
                                      		<input name="galaga"/>
                                      	</inputs>
                                      </LEDSpicer>
                                      

                                      I tried to begin with the example from here.
                                      Though I have to edit the file somehow as it is not accepted.
                                      Do you have an example for me ?
                                      Or, do you know what to edit ?

                                      I read over here that you can also use a "craftProfiles" option for multiple games.
                                      "LEDSpicer will attempt to use the pre-scraped data from mame (gameData.xml) along with controls.ini (if available) and colors.ini (if available) to set lighting based on the games control scheme. So... one profile_arcade.xml file to manage thousands of roms."

                                      They also use the emitter part.
                                      Is that nessesary to use ?

                                      H 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                      • H
                                        hopwon @Folly
                                        last edited by

                                        @Folly I use craft profiles, it only works for mame. You need a profile in the profiles dir called profile_arcade.xml and then you call emitter from "runcommand_onstart.sh" with LoadProfileByEmulator

                                        Craft profiles really take the heavy lifting out of LEDSpicer config and its an awesome feature.

                                        This is my profile_arcade.xml - there is nothing in it...

                                        <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
                                        <LEDSpicer
                                        	version="1.0"
                                        	type="Profile"
                                        	backgroundColor="Black"
                                        >
                                        </LEDSpicer>
                                        

                                        After that LEDSpicer takes care of the rest.

                                        I'll try and do a bit more of a write up but Friday night is calling! But check out this link for a guide on as I used it to eventually decode and get LEDSpicer running...

                                        LEDSpicer on attractmode

                                        F 3 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • F
                                          Folly @hopwon
                                          last edited by Folly

                                          @hopwon

                                          I want to get it working before I implement in emulationstation.

                                          Ok, so I do need the emitter.

                                          First I started with :

                                          sudo ledspicerd -f
                                          

                                          So for galaga I tried the command but got an error :

                                          pi@raspberrypi:~ $ emitter LoadProfileByEmulator galaga arcade
                                          Error: Failed to open device 0xd209:0x1700 id 1
                                          Failed to execute rotator 2 1 '2' 1 1 '2'
                                          

                                          The led that I attached burns but there is no other effect when starting galaga.
                                          Any ideas ?

                                          All commands are done over 3 terminal consoles.

                                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                          • F
                                            Folly @hopwon
                                            last edited by Folly

                                            @hopwon

                                            I am really not sure if I should spend more time on this.
                                            Ledspicer seems a really nice and advanced program but I am missing the bigger picture on how it works and how all configs and xml's are connected to each other.
                                            Perhaps I will ditch the elements from the ledspicer.conf except one.
                                            That way I can see if 1 element will react if not I will probably stop trying.

                                            Ps.
                                            I have send a message to @MeduZaPaT hope he can help.

                                            MeduZaPaTM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
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