Hacking Wii backup Manager for Windows

[fig2k4]

@redia
So a rename titles option on the files page would rename .wbfs as usual and ISO/CISO would get the filename changed to something like title_id.iso. RAR files would be ignored.

@pontomedon
Good idea. At least it would be a rough estimate of what the transferred size would be, instead of not bothering at all.

@Tristar
Sorry about that. I removed the silly check I had as part of the invalid file detection. Anything under 10MB would show as invalid just now. 2 second fix.. BTW, what kind of forwarder ISOs do you mean?

Just to point out, that's how actual invalid .wbfs files would show up. As red with "invalid". I thought it was a better idea than just ignoring them because you can easily see them and delete them if you want.

 

[XFlak]

I believe Tristar is referring to the forwarders on this page

http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=181011

 

[fig2k4]

Oh right, I see now, cool.

 

[redia]

@redia
So a rename titles option on the files page would rename .wbfs as usual and ISO/CISO would get the filename changed to something like title_id.iso. RAR files would be ignored.

I am sorry I am not clear.
the option I personally care about is to rename the iso/ciso to their titles.txt name.

in an ideal world I would see this :
- on the fly rename for everything (I love the color schema you presented a few post back)
- wbfs drive internal name to titles.txt
- wbfs file internal name to titles.txt
- wbfs filename to a naming convention (see my remark below)
- iso/ciso internal name to a naming convention
- iso/ciso filename to a naming convention
- rar filename to a naming convention (not the actual compressed file, only the container)
(to be honest I do not need all these, I am simply trying to think out of the box and to list everything I can think of... lol)

naming convention should be combination using (for example)
- ---- the gameid
- ---- the current name of the file
- ---- the name extracted from the titles.txt
- --- just an idea as I am typing
- --- another idea that came as I was typing.. it could be something like G for gameonly, A for all partition, etc

so we could define templates and rename using the template depending on the specific need of the moment (using some kind of drop down list)
a couple of template example :
-
[]



remarks :
- I do realize that renaming wbfs file could be a non sens, it could be useful only for storage purpose.
- offering that many option (including the multiple templates) could offer the flexibility that would please everyone.

here, I hope this is possible.
cheers,
R

 

[fig2k4]

Renaming RARs and .wbfs could be problematic.

RAR files could have multiple volumes, with different extentions and stuff. If you've downloaded the RAR, it'll probably already have a readable name and/or will be in folder with a readable name anyway.

Renaming .wbfs means you'd have to rename everything again when you transfer to a FAT32, if you use explorer. IMO, it's better to leave it in a format that can be easily copied back and forth from a working FAT32 drive and backup storage drive.

Thinking about the file naming convention, there really is only 1 combination that makes sense to me.. "Title-ID.ext", so it's sortable by title. I was trying to think of other tags too. The only ones I could come up with are the same as you mentioned. But, is there much point showing the region? Since it doesn't make much difference now with USB loading.

Edit:
I suppose "ID-Title.ext" could be useful too..

So after all that thinking, that would leave these functions from your list.

- on the fly rename for everything
- wbfs drive internal name to titles.txt
- wbfs file internal name to titles.txt
- iso/ciso filename to a naming convention

 

[redia]

Renaming RARs and .wbfs could be problematic.

RAR files could have multiple volumes, with different extentions and stuff. If you've downloaded the RAR, it'll probably already have a readable name and/or will be in folder with a readable name anyway.

Renaming .wbfs means you'd have to rename everything again when you transfer to a FAT32, if you use explorer. IMO, it's better to leave it in a format that can be easily copied back and forth from a working FAT32 drive and backup storage drive.

Thinking about the file naming convention, there really is only 1 combination that makes sense to me.. "Title-ID.ext", so it's sortable by title. I was trying to think of other tags too. The only ones I could come up with are the same as you mentioned. But, is there much point showing the region? Since it doesn't make much difference now with USB loading.

Edit:
I suppose "ID-Title.ext" could be useful too..

So after all that thinking, that would leave these functions from your list.

- on the fly rename for everything
- wbfs drive internal name to titles.txt
- wbfs file internal name to titles.txt
- iso/ciso filename to a naming convention

yeah your comments makes sense.
after reading them I believe only 4 naming conventions would be fine
ID.ext
title.ext
title - id.ext
id - title.ext

R

 

[fig2k4]

OK, still enough combinations to make it editable. There's no reason not to use the region etc. in it too..

 

[giorgosh]

I have installed all games on an external USB Drive, and now want to replace that drive with a bigger one.. Do i have to do the whole procedure from the beginning (create partition, format, copy all games) OR is there a way to CLONE that drive to another one???

 

[fig2k4]

From what I know, the block sizes of 2 different sized WBFS drives is most likely different. This means that blind byte for byte cloning just wouldn't work. For a clone to work, it would really need to copy every disc and rewrite a new info block, header etc. Essentially, it wouldn't really be a clone..

Format the new drive in "Tools->format drives". Then mount the new drive to "Drive 1", mount the old drive to "Drive 2". On "Drive 2", "Select->All" and "Transfer->Drive 1".

Unless you have a FAT32 drive, where something like Norton Ghost should work fine.

 

[jstevenson72]

I have installed all games on an external USB Drive, and now want to replace that drive with a bigger one.. Do i have to do the whole procedure from the beginning (create partition, format, copy all games) OR is there a way to CLONE that drive to another one???

I would take this opportunity to convert to .wbfs files. I did and haven't looked back.

Now when I plug in my USB drive to my PC, I don't get the "Format ?" prompt, and I can "see" all the games without using a manager.

I also added an autorun.inf file pointing to a .ico icon file, so explorer now shows a Wii icon on that drive when its plugged in...

Allthough WBM is still a convenient way of transferring back and forth between different drive types.

I just finished cloning my FAT32 drive of 200 games 4 times using Ghost (Christmas presents).

Good Luck,

Jason

 

[fig2k4]

As well as the tiltles.txt, I've been working on using MD5 hashes to verify the integrity of data on WBFS drives and WBFS files.

When a disc is transferred to a drive, the hash is calculated and stored inside the "Disc Info Block" at bytes 236 to 255. It consists of an ID "MD5#" followed by a 16 byte MD5 hash. The Hash is calculated from each WBFS sector's data as it's copied to the drive. Or can be calculated for existing entries a drive too.

I had a quick word with oggzee about storing the hash there and it seems to be a totally unused 32 byte area that might as well be used for something.

A couple of screenies.

A typical hash entry..

It only does basic verification just now, but comparing to data on other drives or maybe the original ISO could be handy in the future too.

 

[FoGBaV]

Best idea ever ... Great !

Hope someone puts up a database on internet so everybody can verify the integrity of every game.

thank you so much for the evolution on this great peace of software !

 

[TeenTin]

Suggestion :

The game index column is not useful (for most user, I guess), but it occupies much space.

Introducing (game) region column would be very nice.

Thanks !

 

[thewonderer73]

Would be good to even have the option to choose which columns to show from doing a right click on the column titles and/or a list within the settings of the app.

You could add so many more like a tick box that shows if the cover art has been downloaded for it and when you leave your mouse pointer over that title, it shows you the cover/disc art etc.

So many choices... I guess you want to make sure that as new ideas come in, the basic GUI can accommodate these additions without having to do a re-write of it. Watching with keen interested as your app improves

 

[XFlak]

@fig2k4, just out of curiosity, how much work would be involved in adding a tab for a third drive (or as many more as you like)?

Also, and this is a mundane detail so feel free to ignore it, but would it be possible to minimize the program to the system tray?

 

[fig2k4]

@FoGBaV
My idea was to calculate a checksum for transferred data, so the hash will be different depending on what data is there. Things that determine this are what partitions were kept, the WBFS block size etc.

Maybe it would be better to come up with a way to standardise the hashing function. So it's the same hash, regardless of the size of the WBFS drive. That way it's possible to quickly compare discs on any drive. I can't see any way around the fact that partitions have been removed. The hashes of 2 discs with different partitions will always be different.

@TeenTin
Yeah. Even I don't use the game index very much.

@thewonderer73
Selectable columns would be a good idea.

@xflak40
If there really is a need for it, I could probably rewrite the needed parts of the code to have unlimited amount of drives. A list of drives with dynamically created tabs isn't really much different to having multiple tabs in a browser, which I've messed with before so I've got a good idea of how to do it.

I was thinking of ways allow tabs to be hidden too, maybe this could be the best way to do that. All the tabs could be created dynamically. In the main menu there could be options to "Add drive page", "Add files page" etc. so you can show or hide as many pages as you like. Basically just like creating a new tab in your browser.

Just a thought, but obviously to be implemented much later.

Although, the design I have just now will work pretty well with that idea when the time comes..

The tray icon would be very easy to do. I just didn't bother because with the Windows 7 taskbar, there's no real need for tray icons any more. I'll add it though, with an option to enable/disable it.

 

[XFlak]

sounds great!!

I also wanted to point out, that occassionally my transfer will stop midway through the cue list, i was trying to transfer 40 games from wbfs to fat32, and it stops every 2- 6 games and I have to begin the transfer again

EDIT:deleted the temp folder and the settings file and it seems to be working properly now... not sure what that was about... failed to add a game 5 tries in a row, each time it reached 100%, but just didn't add

 

[fig2k4]

What was in the temp folder? Sounds like it was causing problems anyway.

Since the only time the temp folder is used is for extracting RAR files, I'm guessing it was an old ISO that was extracted. Is it possible it was from an old version, before I started using .tmp files? If that's the case and the RAR extraction was cancelled or interrupted before the ISO was fully extracted, it might be the problem.

I should probably have a prompt to delete the temp files when the app closes.

 

[Bloodlust]

I have this problem too. I queued 8 files from my WBFS partition to be converted to wbfs files and after the 5th one it stopped.

Had to use wbfs_file Simple Gui to convert the one which encounted an error..

 

[fig2k4]

Did you look at the log to see why?