PS1 emulators

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

http://board.byuu.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2119
^This topic has some interesting info about research done for the PS1.  It turns out there are bits of pSX code in the MAME/MESS codebase, and it looks like someone did some PS1 work for Mednafen, though it seems like it's still experiemental.

FYI, I'm xibalba on that forum.

[formerdeathcorps]

I think http://board.byuu.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2119&start=45 is where you mentioned us.  But I'm personally in the dark on all this.

I. Which hacks in particular DO NOT work with:
1) ePSXe?
2) pSXfin?
3) eBoot of modded PSX ISO onto PSP
4) Patched PSP ISO?
5) Real Machine?

II. Out of the hacks listed in 1), which ones:
1) Have not been corrected for load delay?
2) Have not been checked for overriding key registers?
3) Have not been checked for improper logic (infinite loops, invalid calls/returns, incorrect math/variable usage, etc.)?
4) Have not been checked for invalid offsets (invalid jumps/loads/stores)?
5) Have not been checked for improper ROM expansion?

Right now, we only have data but no organization of the above.  I think we need a table listing the problems on every hack we have as well as regular reports from bug testers.

The link you posted comes in handy only if there exists a hack
A) Passes all the conditions in II.
B) Fails to run on one or more of the given systems listed in I.

In short PGF, we're currently swamped by known problems with potentially known solutions that AREN'T being used.  Until we can verify that some of them cannot be resolved by known solutions, it's hard to even contemplate further unknowns that may mess up compatibility.

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

http://board.byuu.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2119&p=48987#p48987
Posted your message, and linked to this topic.  I want to see if there are any forum add-ons which can do what you describe.  I'd google it myself, but I don't know what I'm looking for.

[formerdeathcorps]

More tools would be nice, but without the manpower and organization to use them properly, we still won't get anywhere.

1) We don't have enough people doing tests.  Many ASMers release their hacks with little or no testing.  Too often, they release hacks that have niche use.  Thus, the community doesn't know about such bugs until some newb comes onto the forum years later, wanting to use that very hack, only to discover that it crashes his emulator/real machine.
2) Most ASMers don't test on the real machine or PSP because the biggest audience for playing hacks from FFH is on emulators.  This is why we didn't learn about load delay until this year.  Because of this, we have a serious quality control problem with any hack made before this year.  It's even worse when most patchmakers and playtesters see this as a frivolous and tedious waste of time and thus don't see the need to contribute their time in testing such hacks so we can generate reliable data.
3) Bug reports are not centralized and pinned down to a specific hack/specific address.  This is compounded by the fact many patchmakers don't keep very tight records of what ASMs they used.  This is why we end up with CCP, which is fun to play, but a mess to debug.

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

What will be required of volunteers?  What skills and access to hardware and software is needed?  What further organization is required - to the forum?  To a specific sub-board?  Is a new sub-board specifically for releasing, testing, and bug reporting hacks needed?  What sort of organization procedures will you require?

[formerdeathcorps]

Since we are a large forum with members of different talents, we should divide the labor.

Testers:
1) You need to have a system to test on.  Added points if you are testing WoTL on PSP, a PSX eboot on PSP, or on the real machine since we have no data there.  (Wasabi, I'm looking at you.)
2) You need to know how to apply a patch.
3) You need to know how to test thoroughly.  This means if an ASM affects say...items, you don't presume it functional until you have tested all the items it affects both in and out of battle.  If it's a skill, you test it on all unit types, including hard-coded ones like mime or monsters.  If it's a mechanic change, you all types of skills affected by the mechanic (and not just damage).  It also means you test more than just if the game freezes, you also check the quantity/power/animations/... both in battle and before/after the battle.
4) You need to test ASM patches one at a time.  Only then can we consider the likelihoods of the dysfunctional union of two or more hacks in creating problems (usually this is just one hack being written to another's offset, though register usage problems and overriding unit RAM bytes can occur as well).

Debuggers:
1) You need to know the basics of programming in MIPS; in particular, you need to know how to setup breakpoints in a routine or otherwise recognize what the modified routine does.
2) You need to know what kind of errors can occur.
3) You need to be patient.
4) Although not strictly necessary, if you know of the latest routines we've managed to discover in BATTLE.BIN and SCUS, it'll be much easier for you to fix many problems as you can probably generate a more elegant solution than a hack made 3 years ago.

Organizers:
1) You need to present data in neat tables.  Such tables should clearly display the limitations of a given hack and which patches use a given hack.
2) You need to graphically display where all our current ASM hacks reside.  This way, we can remove the offset conflict problem.
3) This needs to have its own subforum under Bugs and Suggestions.

Patchmakers:
1) Any change you make to FFT that is not readable by a tool that isn't a hex editor must be documented as an ASM change.  If you must, compare your modified BATTLE.BIN and SCUS with a unmodified one your hex editor's byte compare tool and use LEDecoder to find the ASM routines specified.
2) I was thinking of centralizing the "bug report" threads that most patches tend to have into this forum.  This way, it's easy to cross-reference similar problems between multiple patches.

Process:
1) ASMer makes ASM.
2) Patchmaker or tester tests that ASM.  If it fails, they post that ASM on the subforum for all to see.
3) Debugger (who may be the original ASM maker) fixes the ASM.  The defective copies should no longer remain on any publicly released .xml file used by orgASM.

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

If you want to make testing PSX eboot on PSP easier, we should come up with a FAQ for installing custom firmware on PSPs.  Both times when I asked for help, I was told it was easy and to google it.  I wish I could have sold my PSP to a rom hacker, instead of gamestop.

EDIT

I wrote something down in my notebook earlier, and I'll transcribe it tomorrow, but here's the gist: I'll look for a SMF mod which allows you to create custom forms (forms as in things you fill out online) which will then generate a thread in a specific forum, and will create an entry in a searchable and browse-able database.  I'll make a topic at the SMF forums and ask them directly.  Because otherwise I doubt anyone will have the discipline to follow these guidelines voluntarily.

EDIT

Thus a hacker will, when they feel like submitting a hack, will fill out a form (which includes the title, a description, a ppf, a list of the files and hex addresses and data, and perhaps the actual assembly code in human readable form, and maybe an xml for fftorgasm; also they'll check some boxes to tell us more about the hack, it's version, the date of submission, known bugs, space overwritten if any, other hacks it affects or overwrites or interacts with).  The form will create an entry in a database, and a thread which will link to the database entry and provide some of the info in the database.  The thread can then be used to report bugs (and ONLY BE USED TO REPORT BUGS, NOT FOR DISCUSSION OF THE HACK) and fixes for the hack, which will then be apended to the original hack and the version will be updated by the moderator, according to what the hacker directs him to write.

What do you think?  What forms will be required - like, what should the forms say?
Title
Description
????

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=459477.0
^Topic made.

EDIT

And I got a response.  I'll PM Xifanie, and ask her to consider this mod.
http://custom.simplemachines.org/mods/index.php?mod=1279