DosBox

= DosBox Emulator = The DosBox emulator for GCW-Zero is a port of DosBox for the PC. The original purpose of DosBox is to allow old DOS Based Games to play on newer hardware.

There are literally hundreds of DOS Based Games from the late 80's and early 90's...and beyond...that can and will run on DosBox. Whether or not the GCW-Zero has the oomph to support any give game, however, is the question.

This document is an attempt to reference the DosBox emulator in general, Games that successfully run under this version of DosBox and their configuration information can be found in the Category:EmulatedApps category on this Wiki. This document is NOT an intent to replace or even minorly enhance the documentation for DosBox itself. The user is expected to be familiar with DosBox and it's configuration...though in most cases I've seen so far, re-configuration of DosBox has NOT been needed to get most games to run.

Uses

 * Run DOS Based Games and Application Software on your GCW-Zero
 * Impress your friends with games they either played as kids or have never seen before! :)

Access
Once installed, DosBox can be accessed from the "Emulators" menu on the GCW Main Interface. It's icon is what looks like a brown box with a "wood" looking border, an X through the center of it and the words "DOS" and "BOX" making a + where the "O" is shared. Highlight this icon and press to start DosBox.

Controls
While controls for each game will be different based upon the game itself, here is what the author of DosBox has posted on the announcement thread.


 * - Cursor Arrows
 * - Ctrl
 * - Alt
 * - Spacebar
 * - Shift
 * - Toggle Screen keyboard
 * - Backspace
 * - Enter
 * - Escape

When the Virtual Keyboard is on Screen (Pressing ):
 * - normal press
 * - 'sticky' press (to do keycombos)
 * - toggle keyboard opaque/transparent
 * + - move keyboard around the screen

To Toggle Mouse Mode on and off (i.e. to enable the D-Pad to move the mouse cursor on screen): +
 * - Acts as the mouse device (i.e. Moves the mouse pointer around the screen).
 * - Left Mouse Click
 * - Right Mouse Click

Important Note! Once you toggle on Mouse Mode, NONE of the keyboard functionality mode (or the other buttons) will work as expected till Mouse Mode is toggled off. If your game requires you to switch back and forth between keyboard input and mouse move/click, you're going to be pressing +  quite a bit.

Important Note 2! Mouse mode is NOT just a DosBox thing, it's a GCW-Zero thing. This means exiting the DosBox interface with mouse movement turned on will cause the handheld to LOOK like it's stopped responding (dpad will not move the highlight, buttons will not work, etc.). Exiting DosBox does NOT turn off mouse movement.

Note 3: If you are stuck with a non-functional virtual keyboard on your screen over the entire interface, the likelyhood is that you need to hit the  +  combo and then the Left shoulder button to close the virtual keyboard.

Interface
DosBox initially creates a default dosbox-SVN.conf at ~/.dosbox. You can modify this file to change behavior for all of your games or DosBox in general. When you open the application you will be taken into the GCW-Zero's file manager (Applications/Explorer). Navigate to your game installation directory on the GCW-Zero handheld and run the .exe (or .com or .bat) file associated with STARTING (not installing) the game to execute that game under DosBox.

Starting an Application
With the DosBox file explorer open (initial screen after starting the DosBox application), Use the to move the highlight cursor over a directory and press  to enter that directory. Press to skip back a folder level / go up a directory. Once you have the Executable highlighted, press the button on it to start the application.

Controlling and Exiting an Application
See the Category:Emulated Software link and see if there is information about the game you are playing for more setup and configuration information about that specific emulated game.

Exiting DosBox
When your DOS based game is done, you will likely be at a DOS Prompt (with "C:\" Showing). Pressing will bring up the virtual keyboard and using {{Dpad} and  you can type "exit" into the prompt, or you can simply hit Ctrl-F9 on the Virtual Keyboard (press  to enable sticky mode and then press  on the F9 virtual button), or  +  to kill DosBox.

Installing DosBox on your GCW-Zero
DosBox does not come pre-installed on the GCW Zero, it needs to be downloads and the .OPK file put onto the GCW Zero. For more information on how to install software see the Quick Start Guide or the FAQ.

The software can be obtained from the official repository for GCW Zero software or from http://www.sendspace.com/file/jflk6d, the maintainer's download link.

Installing DOS Games into DosBox
First, installation routines (such as install.bat or install.exe) that shipped with the original games will NOT work. The best/easiest way to make a game functional through the GCW Zero is to install that game on a PC through the DosBox PC Version or obtain the game pre-installed/setup through DosBox (such as some of the software from GOG.com). Once the game is installed and working through DosBox on your local PC, you can move the entire installation to the GCW-Zero through the FTP/SCP interface.

The GCW-Zero will initially open in a directory called "data" with "apps", "local" and "lost+found" in it. Navigate to local/home/apps. This will put your games in the same location as you will be able to access through FTP/SFTP. There is nothing special about where a game is placed, so long as it can be found easily through the filesystem browser.

Move the contents of the installed PC version into a directory on the GCW Handheld. NOTE: Always create a new directory for EACH GAME you plan on uploading. Not doing so could cause file conflicts and overwrites when installing more than one Game or Application.

That's it! Once the installed game is up on the GCW Handheld, use the DosBox application to execute it as per instructions above.

Exiting DosBox
Type "Exit" on the virtual keyboard (hit to bring up the keyboard,  to highlight letters and  to "type" the highlighted letter) to exit the DosBox interface, you can also use the  +  buttons to kill the application.