idManager - The definitive DOS launcher - v1.9

[Gibbon]

So Myself and @OpenRift have been working on sprucing up the old Deathmanager (now idManager) to add the following things, for the ultimate vanilla DOS launcher:

 

1. DeHackEd and DeuSF support (for Doom)

2. HeHacked and DeuSF support (for Heretic)

3. SeHacked and DeuSF support (for Strife)

4. Ability to use many different executables

5. Upgrading the GUI's and fixing some bugs in the code

6. Making separate versions for Heretic and Strife.

7. Ability to record a demo

 

I've been working on them since early this year and Rift has been pretty much 'the boss of it' and has done a great job of testing them and making sure all the features that were possible, got in.  The usages of these is the same as the original Deathmanager 1.2, F2 has a Help menu to get you started.

 

At this point, idManager and ravManager (Heretic) are ready for usage, while rogManager (Strife) is still a little bit behind, mostly due to the differences with SeHacked.  But we thought it was better to release them now, rather than potentially hack on them forever.  They have some help pages and text to assist folks in how things are used in the progam, too.

 

Rift had the code for it given to him by Romero, under the stipulation that the code can never be publicly released, so these releases are binary only.

 

I have to say, working with Turbo C again after all these years was quite the throwback, as well as irritating at the same time :P

 

Screenies!

Spoiler

 

DOS Executables (zip contains all three):

IDMANAGER.zip

IDMANAGER_FUNKY_BLUE.zip

 

(update April 30) - ROGMAN now has COOP ability removed.

(update May 1) - Removed the lock on starting network games with yourself.

(update May 2) - Added new options for Demo Playback and position change for demo recording.

 

HeXen was not done due to the very poor support it has from its DeHackEd fork (mostly old v1.0's), so this was not really a viable choice.

 

Edit: Since this is a DOS program, please use BACKSLASHES!

 

Enjoy!

Edited May 3, 2022 by Gibbon
version 1.9

[xX_Lol6_Xx]

Fantastic

[Walter confetti]

Awesome stuff!

[Alex S.]

You've made something that will forever live on. Great work guys!

[Alex S.]

1 hour ago, Gibbon said:

I have to say, working with Turbo C again after all these years was quite the throwback, as well as irritating at the same time :P

I noticed there is a copy of The Laughing Dog screen maker inside the IDSetup repo on Github. I tried it out and now see how they made all the screens and menus for some of their utils. Maybe check it out; It's capable of outputting C and QuickBasic code.

[OpenRift]

The DREAM LAUNCHER has arrived! Vanilla Doomers REJOICE!

[Doomkid]

Looks extremely useful for DOS Doomin’! How exactly does the DEH support work, and how does the “Game 1 - 7” selection work? In other words what do the numbers represent?

 

Only two questions I have looking at this, great effort here!

[Edward850]

3 hours ago, Gibbon said:

Strife does not have co-op (it's not hidden, it's gone), so the game type is redundant.

Edited April 30, 2022 by Edward850

[OpenRift]

3 hours ago, Doomkid said:

Looks extremely useful for DOS Doomin’! How exactly does the DEH support work, and how does the “Game 1 - 7” selection work? In other words what do the numbers represent?

 

Only two questions I have looking at this, great effort here!

The numbers denote which EXE it uses, you can find more info on it in the F2 menu.

[Gibbon]

4 hours ago, Alex S. said:

I noticed there is a copy of The Laughing Dog screen maker inside the IDSetup repo on Github. I tried it out and now see how they made all the screens and menus for some of their utils. Maybe check it out; It's capable of outputting C and QuickBasic code.

 

This is also made using it, however Romero coded a .PUP decoder which renders the panels within a custom codebase, which is Turbo C.

 

2 hours ago, Edward850 said:

Strife does not have co-op (it's not hidden, it's gone), so the game type is redundant.

 

Yep, that is why it is a beta version for Strife.  It'll be removed.

3 hours ago, Doomkid said:

Looks extremely useful for DOS Doomin’! How exactly does the DEH support work, and how does the “Game 1 - 7” selection work? In other words what do the numbers represent?

 

Only two questions I have looking at this, great effort here!

 

Dehacked support works by calling DEHACKED.EXE with the proper arguments to load the dehacked file that is user-specified.  You need to have the dehacked exe in the same directory as this.

[Noiser]

This is gigantic! Have to deal with DOS is a pain in the ass sometimes (especially the whole DeusF merging stuff). Having all of that on an easy interface is very useful for new modders. I recommend pinning this thread somehow.

Edited April 30, 2022 by Noiser

[brightentayle]

Just tried it, it does simplify running mods quite a bit, BUT you can't switch from modem to either IPX or serial without editing idman.dat.

Edited April 30, 2022 by brightentayle

[Gibbon]

2 minutes ago, brightentayle said:

Just tried it, it does simplify running mods quite a bit, BUT you can't switch from modem to either IPX or serial without editing idman.dat.

You can, you just cannot do it if players is less than 2.  I added this into it because I thought it a bit daft to start a modem or serial game..  with yourself.

[brightentayle]

Just now, Gibbon said:

You can, you just cannot do it if players is less than 2.  I added this into it because I thought it a bit daft to start a modem or serial game..  with yourself.

That's a... very specific lock, but okay, good to know it's not a bug

[brightentayle]

Update: DeHackEd pathing [sic!] seems to be pretty borked, at least for me. Worked as intended when the .deh patch was in the same folder as everything else. Using it with something like Doomkid's vanilla WAD pack is a problem, though.

 

With relative path:

 

And with full path:

 

From what I've deduced, it only looks at the first eight letters of the path and treats it like a filename, which is uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh why

 

maybe make idManager copy the patch over, first of all?

 

Also, suggestion to maybe disable the F10 key instead of Network Type radio buttons to at least try to alleviate confusion? If playing with yourself only matters when you actually connect to a server, then maybe it's better to cockblock that instead since, you know, you still can hit F10 with only one player set and watch the thing trying to start a game.

Edited April 30, 2022 by brightentayle

[YeOldeFellerNoob]

The master of DOOM Programs have finally made something that ISN'T a source port!

[Gibbon]

2 hours ago, YeOldeFellerNoob said:

The master of DOOM Programs have finally made something that ISN'T a source port!

Heh, as long as it’s about Doom then it’s fair game :)

[Gibbon]

18 hours ago, brightentayle said:

Update: DeHackEd pathing [sic!] seems to be pretty borked, at least for me. Worked as intended when the .deh patch was in the same folder as everything else. Using it with something like Doomkid's vanilla WAD pack is a problem, though.

 

With relative path:

 

And with full path:

 

From what I've deduced, it only looks at the first eight letters of the path and treats it like a filename, which is uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh why

 

maybe make idManager copy the patch over, first of all?

 

Also, suggestion to maybe disable the F10 key instead of Network Type radio buttons to at least try to alleviate confusion? If playing with yourself only matters when you actually connect to a server, then maybe it's better to cockblock that instead since, you know, you still can hit F10 with only one player set and watch the thing trying to start a game.

 

So, this isn't a bug :)

 

Why?

 

Because your filename is longer than 8 characters.

 

See here:

Spoiler

 

This works fine.

 

 

Oh no!  With a directory longer than 8 chars, it fails to find it (because it cannot resolve internally the entire directory name)

 

 

The WAD loading code also behaves in this way (which is untouched Romero code from Deathmanager 1.2).

 

Make your files and directories no longer than 8 chars and it will be fine.  I also tried to do it directly using DOOM.EXE and yes, it also fails there too using long paths.

 

[brightentayle]

 

1 hour ago, Gibbon said:

 

So, this isn't a bug :)

 

Why?

 

Because your filename is longer than 8 characters.

  

See here:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

This works fine.

 

 

Oh no!  With a directory longer than 8 chars, it fails to find it (because it cannot resolve internally the entire directory name)

 

 

The WAD loading code also behaves in this way (which is untouched Romero code from Deathmanager 1.2).

 

Make your files and directories no longer than 8 chars and it will be fine.  I also tried to do it directly using DOOM.EXE and yes, it also fails there too using long paths. 

  

h

 

how do you think that is supposed to help

 

LITERALLY NOTHING I'VE POSTED HAD FILES OR DIRS LONGER THAN EIGHT CHARACTERS

"WAD loading code also behaves the same way", yet it somehow loads the WAD from the exact same path, except with .wad instead of .deh, and, unlike .dehs, they work

 

Hell, I don't even get the full path for DeHackEd patches for some reason.

 

Gibbon, I swear to God

Edited May 1, 2022 by brightentayle

[brightentayle]

Okay, I'm gonna make this abundantly clear, just to not take it to the boiling point:

• Tested under DOSBox 0.74-3 and DOSBox-X 0.83.1
• idman.exe and all programs required for running mods were placed in C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/
• There's also C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.WAD and C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.DEH, both files are present
• The WAD gets successfully loaded both with the full path (C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.WAD) and the relative path (EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.WAD)
• The DEH file gets loaded without errors only if it's present in the same folder as DEHACKED.EXE and IDMAN.EXE. Putting the full path (C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.DEH) outputs "File C:/DOOMWAD.DEH does not exist!". With the relative path (EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.DEH), it brings out "File EPIS/AKE.DEH does not exist!".
• Paths actually get truncated, unlike what you've shown on your screenshots.
• I've disabled any outside program that could potentially interfere with DeHackEd, but it's all to same result.
• I'm five hundred percent sure neither path I have contains filenames longer than the allowed eight characters, plus three for the file extension.

Like, really, am I not speaking English? Is it impossible for people to understand me?

 

at which spot is it longer than 8 characters

stop gaslighting me

Edited May 1, 2022 by brightentayle

[maxmanium]

1 hour ago, brightentayle said:

-snip-

 

Bro... relax.

[Gibbon]

9 hours ago, brightentayle said:

Okay, I'm gonna make this abundantly clear, just to not take it to the boiling point:

• Tested under DOSBox 0.74-3 and DOSBox-X 0.83.1
• idman.exe and all programs required for running mods were placed in C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/
• There's also C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.WAD and C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.DEH, both files are present
• The WAD gets successfully loaded both with the full path (C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.WAD) and the relative path (EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.WAD)
• The DEH file gets loaded without errors only if it's present in the same folder as DEHACKED.EXE and IDMAN.EXE. Putting the full path (C:/DOOMWADS/DOOM2/EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.DEH) outputs "File C:/DOOMWAD.DEH does not exist!". With the relative path (EPIS/AKELDAMA/AKELDAMA.DEH), it brings out "File EPIS/AKE.DEH does not exist!".
• Paths actually get truncated, unlike what you've shown on your screenshots.
• I've disabled any outside program that could potentially interfere with DeHackEd, but it's all to same result.
• I'm five hundred percent sure neither path I have contains filenames longer than the allowed eight characters, plus three for the file extension.

Like, really, am I not speaking English? Is it impossible for people to understand me?

 

at which spot is it longer than 8 characters

stop gaslighting me

 

Chill!  I swear, sometimes people have lost the ability to communicate like sensible adults.  But after taking another look, I saw your problem.  I couldn't believe it.

 

1. Yes I see and yes I get it, it is truncated.

2. Yes, what I meant was the WAD code is pretty much unchanged except for a few parts that were changed for Dehacked.

 

But do you see your problem here?  I suppose you have forgotten you are on DOS..  right?

 

Here, I will show a picture with cool stuff.  I am initiating DEHACKED.EXE directly, as it isn't a problem with my code.

 

 

^^ You see.  You are using a forward slash on DOS!  Which treats it as a command-line argument.

 

Here is some history.

 

Back in the cold hard days of the 80's, the backslash was born..  born into a world of forward-slash people.  The forward slash was already in-use for DOS 1.0 as a means of initiating command line arguments (something that in some Windows programs, is still done).  Thus, as a directory separator, the \ is used and is mandatory.  Never use DOS with forward slashes..

 

But why does DOOM run the WADs with a forward slash?!  I hear you cry!  Well, here is the thing.  DOOM is taking it as a command line parameter, while Dehacked is taking it as a directory path.

 

So..  not-a-bug.

[Barky]

Chill!  I swear, sometimes people have lost the ability to communicate like sensible adults.

Like with condencing tone you've yourself displayed? If you don't want him to use your software and assist him then tell him to get lost, no need to dance around it with these phony theatrics. Don't you think?

[brightentayle]

1 hour ago, Gibbon said:

^^ You see.  You are using a forward slash on DOS!  Which treats it as a command-line argument. 

Ohhhh, okay. Now it actually works, ty.

 

...though I'm still gonna call bull on this customer service, since it took two days, several messages explaining the issue in detail and a couple attempts at waltzing it off, only for it to be solved with "use a backslash".

Edited May 1, 2022 by brightentayle

[Barky]

19 minutes ago, brightentayle said:

...though I'm still gonna call bull on this customer service

But do you appreciate all the coding work that has been done?

[Gibbon]

33 minutes ago, brightentayle said:

Ohhhh, okay. Now it actually works, ty.

 

...though I'm still gonna call bull on this customer service, since it took two days, several messages explaining the issue in detail and a couple attempts at waltzing it off, only for it to be solved with "use a backslash".

Who said anything about service?  It was user error.

 

13 minutes ago, Barky said:

But do you appreciate all the coding work that has been done?

 

Probably not because most ‘users’ have zero idea.

[Gibbon]

So one last update for now.  I added demo playback and demo recording (moved position), based on some feedback from fraggle (since COM ports are actually useless now), removing them made a nice useful section for Demo stuff.

 

Serial, Modem and the relevant calling options are staying for now, as removing them looks really ugly with all that blank space..  something nifty could fill that void.  But for now, back to source ports! :)

[Redneckerz]

Fasicinating release you and Rift cooked up there. Being very official-looking without being official. Congratulations.

 

17 hours ago, Barky said:

Like with condencing tone you've yourself displayed?

I think what you are missing here is that the same user on Discord explained himself numerous times aswell and the resultant frustration from both ends is thus a combination of things.

 

But it is nice that you are rooting for the underdog here.

 

17 hours ago, brightentayle said:

Ohhhh, okay. Now it actually works, ty.

 

...though I'm still gonna call bull on this customer service, since it took two days, several messages explaining the issue in detail and a couple attempts at waltzing it off, only for it to be solved with "use a backslash".

You went ham on something anyone of us (because i took a look aswell and you reacted similarily offsite) could easily miss because its the difference between 1 and I. A forward/backward slash isn't easy to spot especially when we are talking DOS here (Which amany do not use). Hell, you yourself didn't even notice it but you call shotgun when the developer also doesn't in the exact moment?

 

So instead of going full on rage, there is this thing called slack.

 

17 hours ago, Barky said:

But do you appreciate all the coding work that has been done?

Say Barky, you really like questioning the status quo of stuff as if it actually means anything that you do, is it now?

Edited May 2, 2022 by Redneckerz

[Gibbon]

I wonder..  how would folks like a Funky Blue (Romero Blue) version?

 

Spoiler

 

I've added three funky blue versions to the OP.

Edited May 2, 2022 by Gibbon

[OpenRift]

16 hours ago, Gibbon said:

I wonder..  how would folks like a Funky Blue (Romero Blue) version?

 

  Hide contents

 

I've added three funky blue versions to the OP.

Funky blue edition doesn't seem to show said color at all for the idmanager variant, looks the same as the regular version. Rav and Rogue are fine, though, it seems.

Edited May 3, 2022 by OpenRift