TitleWriter 4.72 - *** Update 31 July 2008, ***

[Hopeful]

Hmm -- So DvdStyler works (It uses the same DvdAuthor package I do)
thats significant.

Here are some questions Hopeful--
Whats your system screen resolution
While you are waiting for the thread slow or paused message -- Does task manager show mplex.exe, BmptoPng.exe, cmd.exe, spumux.exe or dvdauthor.exe running.
You should see them opening and closing

Well, not DVDStyler (only installs on XP), GUI for dvdAuthor. But I understand your saying they all are using the dvdAuthor engine, so to speak.

Right now, I've got the screen resolution set a 1024 X 768, 32 bit color. I couldn't find a good combination of resolution and color depth to allow normal view of the menu preview. It's pretty trashed when I try that -- at least when I'm using a *.bmp file for a background inside the button frames. And Titlewriter requires the 32-bit color depth.

As to the other questions regarding whether those files are running I'll have to check that. I do know that when I've used Taskmanager to close Titlewriter, after it is obviously hung up, I see an odd entry of "OldWinApp" or "WinAppOld" or something similar, I can't remember now. And if I start and stop Titlewriter several times this way then there are multiple entries of this in Taskmanager when I go to stop Titlewriter again.

I'll do my best to get to this over the weekend, but since I'll be going home for the weekend, as I normally do, it may be Monday or Tuesday evening before I get to work with this some more. It shouldn't take too long to answer the questions you've posed, so hopefully, I can do at least that much. But no certainity for the weekend.

(Don't know if it's relevant, but a year or so ago I installed what is called the "Unoffical Service Pack for Win98SE". It's like a batch file program that someone wrote to install a lot of the patches that MS put out for Win98SE.)

[Hopeful]

OK. This week has not gone as planned and I didn't get back to this until this morning before leaving for work.

As far as seeing processes/threads come and go I couldn't find a way to do this in Win98SE. Apparently, there is a freeware utility, called ActMon, but it requires Net Framework. If you think it will help, I'll download this and see if it does real-time monitoring, etc..

I was able to confirm the odd listing in TaskManager of "Winoldap" that seems to be a remnant of having ended Titlewriter with Taskmanager after it has hung up.

[blutach]

Download Process Explorer from http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s.../bb896653.aspx

Regards

[Hopeful]

Download Process Explorer from http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s.../bb896653.aspx

Regards

Thanks, blutach. I'll give it a shot.

[FallenAngel]

Hopeful
I've located the problem
In my tests the release ver. "As Is" runs on 2000/me machines up
the mpegtools suite are the culprit -- jpegtoyuv.exe is hanging up in 98 Compatibility mode
no errors no cpu usage --just sits -- process manager won't even show it running.

There also probably would be a problem with the win98 Bat line limit (128 chars) (long paths)

I'm looking around for a simple alternative to code .jpg's to .m2v (that works under 98).
I tend to want to avoid recoding TW and just alter MakePage.bat

I'd like to stick to mpegenc for blending (the quality is better than ffmpeg) but unsure if it will even run in 98

[Hopeful]

Hopeful
I've located the problem
In my tests the release ver. "As Is" runs on 2000/me machines up
the mpegtools suite are the culprit -- jpegtoyuv.exe is hanging up in 98 Compatibility mode
no errors no cpu usage --just sits -- process manager won't even show it running.

There also probably would be a problem with the win98 Bat line limit (128 chars) (long paths)

I'm looking around for a simple alternative to code .jpg's to .m2v (that works under 98).
I tend to want to avoid recoding TW and just alter MakePage.bat

I'd like to stick to mpegenc for blending (the quality is better than ffmpeg) but unsure if it will even run in 98

Thanks, FallenAngel!

My time to spend on getting this older system to do some basic DVD work has been spotty since last week. I took a couple of extra days surrounding the weekend to see if I could catch up on things back home.

... and I'm still fighting potential issues with the used DVD burner I picked up for this project... company is out of business, no firmware updates, gives inconsistent results when testing with Nero CD/DVD Speed and even hangs up. But, for all I know, my 98SE installation is likely flakey anyhow. At the end of last week, though, I WAS able to get a basic menu to work using GUI for dvdAuthor (I discovered that it requires a single VTS file, if over 1G -- it can't be broken up into 1G chunks). From that I created an ISO to disk and then used ImgBurn to burn a DVD. It plays in two players I've tried so far, except in one there are skips and pauses. But I used a -RW disk which I realized after the fact was rated for no more than 2X burn speed. I selected a burn speed of 4X. ImgBurn might have used a slower speed without telling me but it never did say it had changed the write speed, so that may also be part of the reason it doesn't play well in the one player.

I totally agree that you wouldn't want to recode TW! If you can find a relatively simple way to get things to work under Win98 that would be great; otherwise I'll use the GUI for dvdAuthor path for projects on this computer and continue to use TW on my "better" computer at home on weekends, as time allows.

Thanks, again!

[FallenAngel]

Uploaded New Ver 4.65

Rev 4.65
Added -- HappyFace (Simplify Menu) Option to Fix Intra Chapter Page Navigation (IE the movie Rendition)
Notes: This will only work on Chapter Pages where the Intra page Navigation buttons are in sequence
And there are individual selector buttons for each page
Chapter Pages -- Main Menu button can also be simplified (0 means to skip it)
Do not use for Chapter pages using Next or Back buttons to select new pages
Fixed -- Some Small foibles

http://www.dvdshrink.info/titlewriter

[pnail]

Thanks for the great tool FallenAngel. Will be great if you can link earlier versions on the site too - if its already available somewhere could you please provide the link...

Thanks,
pnail

[FallenAngel]

pnail -- Actually I don't even have prior versions. Except deep in my backup disks. Its not really a good idea to run the older vers.
The latest contains up to date bugfixes in all areas -- Many tweaks don't make it to the changelog.

I Know TW has mutated a bit since the early days. But the main codebase is still under 500 Kb. (Barely)

(DDLooping)/DvdShrink.info is carrying TW on their site (Many Thanx)-- Adding Prior Ver would abuse storage to no real purpose.

If I've created a buglet in the newest Ver. just post it --Typically I can fix it.

[OhWOW]

On Menu Create -- Error (Undefined)

Hi, FallenAngel:

Using TitleWriter V4.65 on Windows XP SP2

Open folder created by DVDShrink 3.2
Click "Make Menu" button to get to "Menu Seclector Menu Creation" dialog window.
Click "Create Menu" and a COMMAND BOX with error messages saying file not found ......\TitleWriter\Menu\background.jpg
I look at this directory and I see a background.bmp and 3 other .BMP files = BUTTON_HIGG.BMP, BUTTON_SELECT.BMP, BUTTON_NORMAL.BMP, but no backgroud.jpg.
The background.bmp looks exectly like the menu image.

On the main window, at the lower left side, the log says "On Menu Create -- Error (Undefined)".

Attached you can find the image of the COMMNAD PROMPT window that displays the error (background.jpg not found).

Looks to me the batch file (MAKEPAGE.BAT) that is invoked by TitleWriter has errors -- it should convert "background.bmp" to "background.jpg" first.

I added 3 lines to the beginning of "MakePage.bat" file as follows:
CD %1
"c:\program files\titlewriter\tools"\BmpToPng -F Background.bmp -JPG
CD "c:\program files\titlewriter\tools"

and looks like it soves the problem.

Anyway, is there a better way to resolve this?

Many Thanks,
OhWOW.

[FallenAngel]

OhWow Your solution is correct (smart of you to pick up on the BmpToPng usage) jpegtoyuv wants a jpg.

FYI -- Typically the line (In TW main code) is ...BmpToPng -F filename -Depth 4 -JPG.

(But shouldn't be necessary) that conversion (bmp to jpg) should be happening (and is here) prior to MakePage.bat in TW--MakeMenu code and an error kicked if jpg creation failure before MakePage is invoked

Just recently I was uploading a test ver to (attempt) fix for win98 MakeMenu problem for a user-- Did you stomp on the 4.65.exe installed with that code
-- If so Uninstall and reupload (I really screwed around with the code in that Test ver)

I notice you have "iso" in your path -- Are you "Squishing" to an Iso -- Don't do that (Squish to hard disk folder) -- If so I'm amazed TW will open it at all

BUTTON_HIGG.BMP

Hunh -- where the hell did that come from

You could try losing the spaces in your compiliation path (some sys get glitchy in that circumstance) -- though I thought I fixed that long ago.

I just Uploaded 4.66test to site its not a release still needs help files updated
The MakeMenu preview has been expanded to include subpages
Uninstall 4.65 and Install 4.66
Note: this will wipe out your changes to MakePage.bat
(It just runs create menu subsections and throws the background.bmp on the viewer)
--- after each preview is created do you see background.jpg in compiliation \TitleWriter\Menu dir in 4.66

And does 4.66 Create Menu ... work?

If none of the above work during Create Menu -- Pls send me the log (TW Main >>RClick On log window >>etc) -- I need the specific subsection of MakeMenu to look at (Switcher, Main,Chapter etc)

Its very odd though that I don't see that behavior in 4.65 here -- And no one has mentioned it prior to this (4.65 has been out for awhile)

Pls respond if one of the above work and which fix it was

[OhWOW]

same problem with V4.66

I am now using c:\DVD-TEMP\CLIP\ as the path to the DVD folder where DVDShrink re-authior created 2 titles.

After each preview is created I do not see background.jpg in compiliation \TitleWriter\Menu dir but I see 4 files - BACKGROUND.BMP, BUTTON_HIGH.BMP, BUTTON_NORMAL.BMP, BUTTON_SELECT.BMP and Menu0.xml.

Create Menu has the problem as described before.

Log:

07:47:22 Enabling Unicode
07:47:22 TitleWriter Ver. 4.66 -- Boot Directory: C:\PROGRAM FILES\TITLEWRITER\
07:47:34 (Re)Loading :C:\DVD-TEMP\CLIP\VIDEO_TS\VIDEO_TS.IFO
07:47:35 Creating New Backup Point:,C:\DVD-TEMP\CLIP\TITLEWRITER\Undo_0
07:47:35 New Backup Point Created:,C:\DVD-TEMP\CLIP\TITLEWRITER\Undo_0
07:47:35 Dvd Does not Contain Menu
07:47:35 Directory C:\DVD-TEMP\CLIP\VIDEO_TS Size: 328288256 Bytes 313.08 MB
07:47:35 Single Layer Ok -- Free 4150.92 Mb
07:47:35 Number Vts 2
07:47:35 VIDEO_TS.IFO Filesize: 6144
07:47:35 Last Sector VMG: 5 Last Sector VMGI: 2
07:47:35 Target Does not contain DVD_TEXT -- Creating Dummy
07:48:13 Changing To New Menu
07:48:20 Changing To New Menu
07:50:29 Creating Movie 1 Root Menu
07:50:30 Warning Compressing Text "Scenes" 18% To Cell Size
07:50:30 Warning Compressing Text "Movies" 17% To Cell Size
07:50:30 Warning Compressing Text "Resume" 27% To Cell Size
07:50:40 Creating Movie 1 Chapter Page 1
07:50:53 Creating Movie 1 Audio Subtitle Menu# 2
07:51:57 Building Menu Page 1
07:52:00 Building Spumux -- Movie Selector Page 1
07:52:00 Converting Page And Audio to Mpeg
07:52:06 Thread Slow or Paused -- Displaying Sub Thread
07:52:36 On Menu Create -- Error (Undefined)

Thanks.

[OhWOW]

moving everything to c:\CLIP works

Hi,

Looks like the problem is a long path name.
If I use c:\CLIP\VIDEO_TS\ as the DVD folder, it works.
But, C:\DVD-TEMP\CLIP\VIDEO_TS\ does not.

Even if it works, the resulting DVD on hard disk folder C:\CLIP\VIDEO_TS\ have problems. When I use PowerDVD to run it, it comes up with the menu ok. I can select 1 of the 2 titles but when I try to use the "Goto" function of PowerDVD to select a title, it shows Title 1 and Title 2 both greyed out. Also, when I click "Next" or "Previous", it doe nothing. Normally, "Next" will advance to the next title in sequence.

Thanks.

[FallenAngel]

Nope -- Not the long filename --but the "-" character within the complete command string (should have seen that one)
BmpToPng -- When Command line parser was processing -F it was truncating the path to the next "-" it found of course it was a Not Found illegal filename. (It should have kicked an error)

I knew I should have delimited my sub function calls with the "/" character --nobody uses that in filenames -- its what I usually do


My Bad -- will fix in 4.66 release ver using the / character for sub commands
Also fixing BmptoPng to work with paths containing spaces


Sorry but PowerDvd is a bad joke

Try Windows Media Player,KMPlayer, or Media Player Classic (almost anything else)
All these are much closer to the actual Dvd (Hardware) Specs

[FallenAngel]

Re: Tw and The Golden Compass (Importing Original Menu)
The chapter menu area actually works as is don't use TW Happyface to fix
(It will drive you nuts --Zathura style menu again -- Individual Pgc's per chapter with forced links -- Aargh) just fill in the "main Menu" area

The Chapter Menu won't work in WMP (either pre/post TW) as its direction arrow based -- Not mouse based

It will Play properly in KMPlayer using the direction keys