Some documentation issues

[rb6502]

I promised some people I'd write these up so they can be addressed. This stems mostly from a recent comp.emulators.apple2 thread "MAME 0.222 Apple II highlights".

Some of this may be covered in the latest docs, but I wanted in particular to cover all of Andy McFadden's pain points because he wanted to use MAME, and did, but had a lot of trial and error.

• How to set up ROMs needs to make it clear that you should leave them zipped or 7zipped.
• The fuzzy matching for set names needs to be documented as an option to find games.
• The default keys documentation (https://docs.mamedev.org/usingmame/defaultkeys.html) lists keys for navigating MAME's user interface, but crucially, doesn't mention the default keys for actually playing games (1 for start, 5 for coin, and so on).
• There's some useful user-written debugger documentation here that we might want to incorporate: https://6502disassembly.com/mame-dbg.html

[Firehawke]

Added to list of things I'll be working on.

[Firehawke]

A few points for @rb6502:

The docs already do say .zip in many places in the "Using MAME" section. I'm adding an additional reference at the top to make sure people see it. In fact, the last line on ROMs and CHDs specifically says not to compress a CHD to ZIP/7Z like you would ROM sets. When I get ready to PR this whole set, I'll tag you so you can take a look.

I'm redoing the key tables now. That part's going to take a bit since I'm reformatting the tables entirely and RST tables are a little bit of a pain, especially at this size.

I'll look into the debugger stuff when I get the tables done.

[rb6502]

Thanks, I appreciate it!

[Firehawke]

Key tables have been updated locally, but I'm expecting a desire for further changes per usual. I'll be putting in a PR very soon to allow @rb6502 and @cuavas to put in opinions.

Covering other elements from the conversation:

• Fuzzy mapping is in usingmame.tst already.

Remember that if you type a name which does not correspond to any emulated system, MAME will suggest you some possible choices which are close to what you typed; and if you don't know which switch are available, you can always launch

mame.exe -listmedia

If you don't know what are available, there are a few things you can do. First of all, you can check the command line options section of this manual. You can also try one of the many :ref:frontends available for MAME.

• Debugger is next on my list after I get the PR in and then do another Apple softlist update.

[rb6502]

Great, looking forward to it.

[atan2005]

I have read the MAME Documentation 0.227 and I have found some errors. I have just joined github today and is this the right place to report them?

[stilett0]

I have read the MAME Documentation 0.227 and I have found some errors. I have just joined github today and is this the right place to report them?

May as well.