Help with VJ for Mac OS X

[tujucrue]

Okay, I might not be a real computer genius or nothing, but I am having a hard time figuring out how to compile VJ. I have the developer tools for Jaguar, however, I can not seem to load the file in Project Builder. I download the sit file from the VJ web site, put the file on my desktop, and then opened the project builder. I still can not figure out a way to get this thing to work. Step by step instructions would be greatly appreciated.


Also, should I use the xCode beta edition instead of project builder? If so, since we are only two days away from Panther, I'll wait.

[Shamus]

From what it sounds like, you're trying to compile the already compiled MacOS binary. If you really want to compile from source code, you need to download the Fresh & Minty source code from the official web page...

[Adam Green]

Indeed. To run Virtual Jaguar, just download the Mac OS X version and you can run it in the Terminal. Read the documentation for details on what you need, etc.

[tujucrue]

Okay, I see what I was doing was totally off. I assumed that the file was the source.

Okay, next stupid question. How do I execute the program. I am used to the GUI not the terminal, so what do I do? There are no instructions on how to execute in what I have downloaded. Help?

thanks

[tujucrue]

Okay disregard the last post. Here is where I am stuck. I download the boot roms for both jag and jagcd. The names are exactly the same as the cfg file says and they are in the proper directory. I also created a directory with in the folder of vj called roms where I have atarikarts.jag waiting. I can't figure out what to do next. I have the terminal at ./vj [atarikarts.jag]. Is this wrong? What do you all suggest? I appreciate your help.

Thanks.

[Adam Green]

You need to change your directory in the terminal to the directory with Virtual Jaguar in it. "cd [directory here]" (without the quotes). There are plenty of places on the internet to give you a crash course in Unix, which I would recommend.

[tujucrue]

I know how to navigate the Terminal to the directory of VJ. It's just when I get to the directory where the file vj is (it's the same location with the vj.cfg file and the other directories) I don't know what to do next. I am wondering how to run the actual emulator and execute it. The problem is, the instructions offered no true help. Any suggestions?

[Shamus]

Where are your ROM images? If they're in a separate directory, you have to prepend that directory name to the ROM name if VJ is to find it. E.g., if your ROM images are in a subdirectory called ROMs you would say:

vj ROMs/gamename

If you want VJ to automatically find them, then set the appropriate line in the vj.cfg file:

ROMs = ./ROMs

Of course, you would change ROMs (on the right hand side) to the path to where your ROM images are. This way, you can simply run the emulator and it will present you with a list of ROMs which you can select with the keyboard.

[tujucrue]

I just give up. I can't get it to work. Shamus, I appreciate your help but the stupid thing wont work. The roms are in a ROM folder inside the Virtual Jaguar folder. VJ is in there and I am typing vj ROMs/atarikarts and nothing happens. I give up. Thanks any way.

[Shamus]

Maybe you could post the vj.log file that it produces? That would probably have some clues as to what's going wrong...

[tujucrue]

There is no log file as the application won't run. What I'm getting are mixed errors. Some say that I don't have the proper permission, other times it says it can't open. Bear in mind I have tried several variations to load the app. One of the things I tried is this...

vj atarikarts

Obviously this did not work. I am wondering if it's the rom? I am looking for rom's now. But in the mean time, I am trying to figure out if it has something to do with what I am doing in Terminal. I am learning a little unix as I am used to GUI only so I appreciate all help. I hope I can figure this out, I have about 14 Jaguar games I'd like to take portable.

[Shamus]

Have you tried simply running the emulator by double clicking on it or, typing ./vj in the terminal window (note the preceding ./)? Does it run at all this way? If not, then it's a problem with MacOS not wanting to allow VJ to run for some reason (though I doubt that's the problem)...

[tujucrue]

Shamus, get this. The EMU half executed when I moved it to a different directory from the desktop. Now I get this error. Any ideas?

OpenGL filters : disabled
Bus error

[tujucrue]

After I changed the OpenGL setting to Old Style, I still get the bus error. I am not quite shore what this is, but it is obviously preventing me from using it. Now what?

[tujucrue]

Okay, I got the emulator to run, albeit it's slower than dirt. I think the issue was with my Graphics settings. I had just installed an Acrobat plug-in and I had to restart my Mac, I'd never thought I'd have to say that. Any way, I was now wondering, is their a way to boost the speed of the emulator it's self. It runs like a game of Doom on a 386. My processor speed is a G3 700 MHz and my video set up is an ATI Pro Rage 7500 with 16 MB of video ram. Any suggestions? Again, I appreciate the help.

[Shamus]

If you're running with the new pipelined DSP core, yes, it's going to run very slowly. The old DSP core is still in there if you want to use that for some games (although it won't work correctly for others). And, if you don't mind playing without sound, you have that option on some games as well (which should boost the speed somewhat).

What can I say? The emulator is still under development and the focus at this point is getting the thing to be as accurate as possible before we start to optimize it. There are quite a few debugging hooks that slow things down as well...

If the pace of development isn't going as fast as you'd like, feel free to lend a hand. Unlike the other two Jaguar emus out there, we publish the full source--our code is an open book and you can customize things to your liking, if you're so inclined.

[tujucrue]

I do appreciate the developments of the VJ community. I can't wait for further releases.

[_Em]

Well, I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but I'm not having much luck with virtual jaguar on OS X. I tried compiling from CVS and got all sorts of errors, so then I tried the 1.0.6 binary. The binary runs fine; I can make a game selection, the emulation window pops up, all the I/O appears to work, but upon loading any rom, the screen flashes red, and the emulator exits. I've tried naming the roms .j64, .jag, .rom, etc. but always get the same result. Which is a shame, as I've built a nice little OS X front end for the command line binary, which works fine up to the point where the emulation is supposed to begin. I've tried all the variations in the config file, and none seem to get the emulator past this point. As I've never had this problem on the windows version, I have to wonder: is it an SDL issue of some sort? -- also, I'm running OS 10.2.8; is virtual jaguar compiled against 10.3 without backwards compatability?

[Shamus]

Hmm, strange that you've had problems building CVS--as far as I know, it uses the Makefile.unix which I've tested under Linux (and should build fine on any Unix-like platform). As far as I know, Adam built the 1.0.6 version with the latest version of OSX at the time (which I'm pretty sure wasn't 10.3). Also, 1.0.6 doesn't properly recognize Jaguar file formats (it still uses the wrong .jag == ROM convention).

I can't imagine why you're having so much trouble with it. If I had a Mac, maybe I could offer some advice... Perhaps Adam is lurking around and can offer some guidance (Adam, this is your cue! )?

[Adam Green]

I'll try to compile CVS tonight and get back to you. I'll write in length a bit later.