Announcing Pegasus Frontend

PlayingKarrde

@herb_fargus Ah very cool thanks. This will help get me going a lot faster. I have some ideas about assets so we'll see if it works.

fluffypillow

@lazd Thanks! I think I can fix both issues, will post a new build later. If you have gamepads available, could you check if they're working fine?

@PlayingKarrde

DirectShowPlayerService::doRender: Unresolved error code 0x80040218 ()

Oh, that's actually a video playback issue, usually happens when Windows doesn't have the necessary video codecs (DirectShow filters) available to play the stream. Installing opencodecs_0.85.17777.exe from here should fix this. You can also use codec packs like K-Lite if you prefer that. I'll add this info to the documentation.

I'm having a hard time importing my EmulationStation games. I run that in portable mode also so it isn't automatically picking up my library so I'm not sure exactly how to get it in.

Hm yes I think in such case you can either make ES non-portable or convert the gamelists to Pegasus' files and add the game directories in the Settings.

I tried using your tool to convert my es_systems to a collections.txt but that doesn't appear to do anything (likely I'm missing a step somewhere). I also wasn't able to convert any of my gamelist.xml files. No error or anything, it just won't do anything.

You mean using this site you've copied the contents of the XML files to the left, but nothing at all happened on the right? Interesting, could you send an example file that causes this issue? Maybe there's some new node that breaks the tool.

I'm still working on this but just wanted to post some mockups of the potential theme. Ultimately I want something slick and modern that can fit in with other current smart TV apps. Please let me know if you see anything I'm attempting that you don't think is possible with Pegasus.

Very nice! Yes technically everything is possible, the only thing currently missing is the recently played games (and, in general, sorting), but that will be added eventually.

flixnet theme

It's a bit outdated so might not work at the moment (but that can be fixed). There's also an article about its code too.

fluffypillow

Ok, another Mac build here. This should fix the Steam and network issues, and in theory hide the menu bar.

PlayingKarrde

@fluffypillow

Oh, that's actually a video playback issue, usually happens when Windows doesn't have the necessary video codecs (DirectShow filters) available to play the stream. Installing opencodecs_0.85.17777.exe from here should fix this. You can also use codec packs like K-Lite if you prefer that. I'll add this info to the documentation.

Yeah that was the issue with the videos not playing but it still hitches between selections. I still feel like it is due to trying to load many things at once. My suggestion would be to have a slight delay before trying to load the background image and video then fade them in after, say, a second. This would be a smoother browsing experience and just overall more polished I feel.

You mean using this site you've copied the contents of the XML files to the left, but nothing at all happened on the right? Interesting, could you send an example file that causes this issue? Maybe there's some new node that breaks the tool.

Yes this is the one. Here's an example XML: https://pastebin.com/gjuK4uU0

Very nice! Yes technically everything is possible, the only thing currently missing is the recently played games (and, in general, sorting), but that will be added eventually.
Thanks. I figured sorting was still to do.

Also if I could make one more suggestion, would it be possible to also read LaunchBox data as a data source? For me LaunchBox does a much better job scraping metadata as well as being a lot easier to organise your collection. ES2 is fine but it's very limited requiring lots of manual copy/paste. Since I feel your tool has a lot more potential and power, having easy access to that meta data easily would be amazing.

Keep up the great work!

PlayingKarrde

@fluffypillow

Oh I also just got a crash (no big deal but here's the log in case it's useful): https://pastebin.com/TniqiTYn

fluffypillow

@PlayingKarrde

Yeah that was the issue with the videos not playing but it still hitches between selections. I still feel like it is due to trying to load many things at once. My suggestion would be to have a slight delay before trying to load the background image and video then fade them in after, say, a second. This would be a smoother browsing experience and just overall more polished I feel.

Everything is loaded asynchronously already :) It's just not animated. The video loading also has a slight delay (though maybe a bit too slight); based on all the DirectShow errors in the last log I still suspect the video playback isn't 100% correct, but if the videos play correctly that should not cause such a visible issue in theory. I'll take a deeper look into the performance issues.

Yes this is the one. Here's an example XML: https://pastebin.com/gjuK4uU0

Thanks! Will look into it.

Also if I could make one more suggestion, would it be possible to also read LaunchBox data as a data source?

Likely possible, though I've never used LaunchBox before. I can't seem to find any documentation about its files either, but if its some structured text file, that could be read.

Oh I also just got a crash (no big deal but here's the log in case it's useful): https://pastebin.com/TniqiTYn

Thanks, there are indeed a few interesting things, it seems as if some URLs might have changed on Steam side. Then there's another DirectShow doRender error at the bottom, maybe there's a different video format as well. Did Pegasus crash on exit or just randomly? Can the crash be reproduced with a specific game?

PlayingKarrde

@fluffypillow said in Announcing Pegasus Frontend:

Likely possible, though I've never used LaunchBox before. I can't seem to find any documentation about its files either, but if its some structured text file, that could be read.

They use XML as well. Honestly though in the long term I think it would be ideal if Pegasus had it's own way of managing/scraping data. Launchbox is also Windows only and one of the things I really like about Pegasus is that it's cross platform. I think one of the key elements that is holding back pretty much all launchers is their inaccessibility with managing libraries though. Launchers become a power user only thing when really the whole point is to make people's lives easier. ES2 actually does do a decent job (as does OpenEmu on the Mac) but ES2 is limited in what it can scrape and if you want to make and changes beyond adding new roms you have to start editing text files. Not very friendly.

I don't know if you ever do intend to tackle this issue but if so I'd be happy to put together a user flow/set of wireframes for how I have always wanted the experience to be.

Thanks, there are indeed a few interesting things, it seems as if some URLs might have changed on Steam side. Then there's another DirectShow doRender error at the bottom, maybe there's a different video format as well. Did Pegasus crash on exit or just randomly? Can the crash be reproduced with a specific game?

It just exited randomly. I can't reproduce it so I don't think it was game specific. Not a big deal at this point at all.

fluffypillow

@PlayingKarrde Ideas are always welcome; if you put together something, I'll certainly take a look on, but I can't promise to implement it :) I agree that a metadata editor would be nice, and I'd like to add support for it eventually.

As for scraping though, I'm not sure about that yet. A scraper that's available for all the platforms Pegasus is doesn't sound bad, but I'm not sure I have the time and energy to start and maintain yet another free time project. There are a few scrapers already, so some kind of plugin system and integration would be more ideal, but a proper implementation of that looks similarly troublesome, and I wonder how many people would use that anyway. If there ends up a high demand for a scraper, I might start working on it, but right now it's not priority.

PlayingKarrde

@fluffypillow totally agree and you're right, there are options that exist already so it's not that important.

By the way I tracked down the troublesome entries in that gamelist I posted before. I'm not entirely sure what within them is causing it to fail but removing these ones allows it to work. Hopefully this will make it easier to track down the issue.

https://pastebin.com/Rphv2fjU

-edit- actually it looks like these all have 4+ set as their players and this is what's causing it to fail. Removing the + in these entries allows it to parse.

PlayingKarrde

OK, I've made some good progress today. First off I want to say I love working with this launcher. Really, great job @fluffypillow . It's basically everything I've been looking for. I can do everything I wanted and more with this thing and feel like I've barely even scratched the surface. I really do feel like this can be a powerhouse app that puts everything else to shame once it hits full release.

Anyway, here's my progress so far:

Still a long way to go but I'm comfortable enough with the system now that I can make progress a lot faster. Very excited to keep going on this.

Some issues I'm having though:

Having some issues with fonts. I can't seem to get my own fonts to load for whatever reason
Steam backgrounds suck. They have a blue overlay built into them. I went with screenshots here but need a better solution for this. Not too worried about that right now though.
I haven't figured out how to get the selection to move around the grid in a vertical fashion and keep the even spacing yet. If anyone has some advice on this please let me know.
Still haven't figured how to get my own lists into this launcher yet haha

Seya16

Hey,
First of all, big thanks for your work, we can really see the progress and the potential of this software.
Here's my questions :
As an android user, I wanted to know if it's a way to add android games/apps into pegasus and create categories for it. Also if it's possible to use it as a main launcher.

fluffypillow

@PlayingKarrde

-edit- actually it looks like these all have 4+ set as their players and this is what's causing it to fail. Removing the + in these entries allows it to parse.

Thanks! Yeah the + was indeed not handled. Is that even supported by ES?

First off I want to say I love working with this launcher.

That's good to hear :) And nice progress!

Some issues I'm having though:

You might want to take a look in the recent themes that also use custom fonts, like here. In general, you'd use FontLoader somewhere to load the font, then for a Text set the font.family to either the font's name or a FontLoader object's name property.
You mean keeping the selection in the middle row when going up/down? preferredHighlightBegin and End might help with that.
This page might help. If something's unclear just tell me :)

@Seya16 I'm not sure whether Android lets you list the apps as files, however it should be possible to add support for that internally as a data source (like ES2 and such). As for the main launcher, I don't plan to make Pegasus as one, as that'd need me to deal with things like home screens, widgets, app drawers and whatever else a launcher does.

Purg.Derren

I have strange controller issues on android. I tried with usb donge (wifi) or bluetooth controller, in pegasus-frontnend they always double-mapped (analog stick and d-pad) so i always skip 2 menu-entries / games instead of one by one. On Windows (partially same controllers) i have no issue.

Is there a way to "force divide" the left analog stick and the d-pad?

edit: tried on a android streaming box and the fire tv stick 3

sunwind

what's this frontend chooser? is it possible to add this onto an existing retropie installation?

mitu

@sunwind said in Announcing Pegasus Frontend:

what's this frontend chooser?

It's a game library and launcher, similar to Emulationstation - please read the 1st post and visit the homepage - http://pegasus-frontend.org.

is it possible to add this onto an existing retropie installation?

Yes. There is package you can install from the experimental section.

dudleydes

@sunwind The Frontend chooser is a graphical utility that lets you install the available frontends for RetroPie and select the one you would like as default. It's a neat way of testing the frontends on your system before you commit.

You can install it by following the instructions at the foot of this page: https://github.com/mmatyas/retropie-frontendchooser.

fluffypillow

@Purg-Derren someone has also just reported this issue a few days ago; does it used to work in older releases?

PlayingKarrde

Hey, how can I run as portable on the mac?

fluffypillow

@PlayingKarrde I think that should be open -a /path/to/Pegasus.app --args --portable

Purg.Derren

@fluffypillow not sure, first version i tried on android was alpha 9-59 i think (had already the problem) ..not sure about pre alpha 9

Also, the strange "super-zoom" effect is still there (all platfroms).
If there are only 3 or less (i beliefe it's max 3 items) games in a collection and you switch ONE collecttion for- or backward and then back again, the entries are "super-sized" - so they partially overlap.
If you go two or more steps for- and then back, then there is no such effect.