Daedalus WIP News update 30/08/2006

[wraggster]

StrmnNrmn posted a new news update to his Nintendo64 emulator, heres the info:

Display List Debugger

I've been working on a few new features which I'm eager to talk about, but I thought it would be interesting to give some details about some of the tools I use to help me debug various problems with the emulator.

Some of the hardest problems to identify and fix are various graphical issues that crop up when running certain roms. Sometimes it's unhandled combiner modes (this is what results in the purple-and-black textures seen in so many screenshots). Other times there are black or white polygons, or scrambled textures and so on. Sometimes the screen is just totally black

When I'm trying to figure out what's causing a particular problem my first step is to recompile Daedalus with the Display List Debugger enabled. If you've been playing with the source, this is done by setting CFLAGS = $(DEBUG_DLIST_CFLAGS) in the Makefile, and linking in Source/PSPGraphics/DisplayListDebugger.o.

The debugger is accessed by pausing emulation and hitting the right trigger button. You need to have PSPLink set up in order to use it, as I didn't want to clutter up the display with various debbuging output. When the debugger is activated, it keeps the emulator paused and replays the current display list over and over. The first thing is does is dump out a list of all the commands in the display list to a logfile which looks something like this (I've edited it somewhat to create a simple example):

For those interested in the very long newspost check it out Here

[M!ckeY]

wow, that's alot of work

[felonyr301]

thats crazy alot of work there good luck.

[alleyal202]

Cant wait for the next release!StrmnNrmn is the man.This is the best emulator out right now(until the ps1 emu comes out)but even then i think this will be the emulator to beat when were able to play the one of the best games ever made.GOLDENEYE!!!Sh*t id settle for Resident Evil 2 right now.but im happy with the progress!Keep up the good work!!!!!

[lamo_PSP_king]

yes the combiner modes and the polgons,,lol i dont have a clue what u r talkin about mate,mabye because im thick,or u r very clever. anyways keep up the excellent work on deadulus CHEERS!

[Mustang]

Pretty interesting stuff - pains me to see posts on the info page like "yeah very interesting : can you fix [game-x] for me ?"

Cracking read

[Nikolaos]

A faster mario kart would be nice , buh ne ways keep up the good work ur like jesus , your sacraficing your time for us even tho we have sinned

[AtariFreek]

If There Was A Stupified Smiley id Post it Lol. This Looks Complicated, But Im Glad To See Your Taking Your Time To Contribute To Us! Keep It Up StrmnNrmn, We'll Always Respect You Man.

OMG How Corny Does that Sound? I Still Mean It though Lol.

[YourStillWithMe]

Great work man, keep it up! You've made us all very happy psp users from square one of your project.

[bah]

While the implimentation is way above my head, thats a nice clear explanation of the level of work this man puts in to fix not just major, but also minor issues.

When people, mostly on other forums, insult authors about their works not being 'perfect' or 'good enough' they should think about just how complicated the piece of software they're running actually is, and how much work has gone into it.

Thanks StrmnNrmn, your updates are always appreciated, I dont think you dont need to be told how dam impressive your work is