Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections

Used2BeRX

@NeMesiS Hey bud.

@meleu @UDb23 This is my "linux buddy" from the other site.

I'll redownload that file. That's for sure not the link I used when I downloaded it earlier.

EDIT:

Help works now with the new download (went from 65kb to only 3kb???)

Don't know what to do from there though. I put the XML files in /home/pi/RetroPie/Media/NES/XMLTest/

Then I ran ./fullpath-gamelist.sh /home/pi/RetroPie/Media/NES/XMLTest/ gamelist.xml

: file not found.

UDb23

@meleu said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

As far as I understood @UDb23 asked me to "fix" the xml files that his MetaX is generating. And that's what I tried to do. But IMHO making the entire process in Linux would be extremely simpler and faster.

Surely it is simpler in Linux. Point is @Used2BeRX asked a windows application for the main "conversion" task. That's what I did.

Searching for Roms came after and I thought it would make sense to apply the "directory customization" directly on the Raspberry so it would adapt to each users actually installed roms on the Pi itself.
Roms and xml will be used on the Pi anyway in the end.

I think adding this functionality to MetaX, looking for windows folders, and then write out the xml with "unix style paths" is possible; probably takes a significant amount of time and not sure if it is worth the effort.

Any feedback welcome.

meleu

@UDb23

Surely it is simpler in Linux. Point is @Used2BeRX asked a windows application for the main "conversion" task. That's what I did.

I got it bro. Please, I'm not disrespecting your work on that program at all. And I was OK doing what you requested. But it seems that the first-step-on-Windows-second-step-on-Linux way of working is confusing @Used2BeRX . That's why I think that making everything on one environment should be less confusing.

As you said: "Roms and xml will be used on the Pi anyway in the end."

Then why not convert everything in a Linux environment? :-)

Used2BeRX

@meleu For starters, I have trouble getting a help function to work. lol

Now that I got that far, I have no idea how to do anything with the program, and I have a feeling that doing it this way is going to require me typing out hundreds of lines of commands to get everything done instead of being able to just point and click from a GUI.

I'm trying to learn out of necessity here since it looks like we won't be able to do this the easy way.

meleu

@NeMesiS Hey dude, I was trying to help @Used2BeRX with this ~~crazy~~ conversion but, as we have different OS backgrounds, we were having some - let's say - communication issues. I saw you wrote a script to make the conversion and posted on the other forums, I'll try to test that script and we can continue the conversation there.

NeMesiS

@meleu Yea, sweet...
I'll have to catch up with this thread,
is 6am atm I really should go to bed...
What have you guys got so far?

meleu

@NeMesiS said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

What have you guys got so far?

This. But I think it's better you go to bed for now. :)

edit: and @UDb23 made a Windows program to convert from txt to xml. My script only looks for the full path to the ROM...

meleu

@Used2BeRX Please, mark true or false for the following sentences, assuming you're saying them:

I understand that, despite being a more user-friendly environment, making the conversion from txt to xml on Windows is more painful.
I understand that Linux has powerfull tools to process text files, and my coders friends will be happy to help me if I am able to run their programs and provide feedback.
I'm not used to Linux but, as we are generating files to be used on Linux, I want to learn at least the basics (e.g.: how to execute simple commands from the prompt).
I prefer to spend some hours learning the basics of Linux than months generating xml files manually.
I want to share the results with the RetroPie community.
I don't want to use the results for commercial purpposes.

Thanks.

dankcushions

do it all in python and stop worrying about linux vs windows ;)

Used2BeRX

@meleu

False (I think. I don't know if I understand the question)
True
True
True
True
True

meleu

@dankcushions said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

do it all in python and stop worrying about linux vs windows ;)

What about C:\windows\path\style vs /UNIX/style/one?

dankcushions

@meleu said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

@dankcushions said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

do it all in python and stop worrying about linux vs windows ;)

What about C:\windows\path\style vs /UNIX/style/one?

the python OS/sys/io libraries deal with that i think... although i never bothered with my one python script :)

Used2BeRX

@meleu Thought you may have missed my edit. I'd like to try your script out as-is now, but I can't get it to do anything... any ideas?

Help works now with the new download (went from 65kb to only 3kb???)

Don't know what to do from there though. I put the XML files in /home/pi/RetroPie/Media/NES/XMLTest/

Then I ran ./fullpath-gamelist.sh /home/pi/RetroPie/Media/NES/XMLTest/ gamelist.xml

: file not found.

meleu

@Used2BeRX said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

Then I ran ./fullpath-gamelist.sh /home/pi/RetroPie/Media/NES/XMLTest/ gamelist.xml

: file not found.

Looks like there's a unecessary space after the last / and before gamelist.xml

Used2BeRX

@meleu said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

Ah... I thought that was a separated part of the command. I'll try it and edit this post with my results. Thanks

EDIT: No. Same result.

Is the script expecting there to be a gamelist.xml file that already exists?

If it does, does it matter if it's just an empty file called gamelist.xml?

meleu

@Used2BeRX

Is the script expecting there to be a gamelist.xml file that already exists?

Sure. It's supposed to be used with the xml files generated by the @UDb23 's program.

If it does, does it matter if it's just an empty file called gamelist.xml?

The script does nothing with empty files.

UDb23

@Used2BeRX said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

Is the script expecting there to be a gamelist.xml file that already exists?
If it does, does it matter if it's just an empty file called gamelist.xml?

Surely yes.
Just take one of the files converted to xml and it should be ok

UDb23

@UDb23 renaming it to gamelist.xml.

meleu

@UDb23 actually there's no need to make it named as gamelist.xml ;-)

UDb23

@meleu said in Making premade gamelist.xml with xtra media collections:

Please, I'm not disrespecting your work on that program at all.

Don't worry; I understand what you mean. As said, regardless of final results, it was and is a good opportunity for refresh my VB knowledge under Windows.
I really like the Raspberry with all the opportunities it offers thru Linux... it reminds me when I started with the Vic20 so many years ago... no GUI... just commands and programming line by line... I loved it !!

That's why I think that making everything on one environment should be less confusing.

And it does of course make sense if @Used2BeRX is ok with your proposal.
I will not get offended if you'd like to manage the whole conversion + folder process with a single script. ;-)
Take care by the way... as said I have a significant amount of metadata (in a different format) for Vic20 that I may end up asking you to convert on top of @Used2BeRX txt files.