Customize the alt launcher

[Icarus]

I open CH, simshaker, trackir, mfde, rtt remote, discord and voice attack. I have all the shortcuts in a folder for each sim and just click on them all. Takes all of 7 seconds to click on 7 icons.

[redviking]

@Icarus said in Customize the alt launcher:

I open CH, simshaker, trackir, mfde, rtt remote, discord and voice attack. I have all the shortcuts in a folder for each sim and just click on them all. Takes all of 7 seconds to click on 7 icons.

That’s what I am doing right now. This is the way I guess.

[oakdesign]

@Icarus said in Customize the alt launcher:

I open CH, simshaker, trackir, mfde, rtt remote, discord and voice attack. I have all the shortcuts in a folder for each sim and just click on them all. Takes all of 7 seconds to click on 7 icons.

You could just add all to a single .bat file and open them with one click.
With some advanced cmd line scripting could even check if any of the programs isn’t already running and skip that

[Atlas]

@oakdesign
Please share how to do this skip thing!

[Icarus]

@oakdesign I guess so, but I just dont understand what the big hassle is. Its nothing to click on the icons. I suppose it would be if they were plastered all over my desktop and had to find them all, but they are in a dedicated BMS folder. One click on folder and 7 clicks on icons. Done. I know exactly whats running. Am I missing something?

[Atlas]

@Icarus
1 click vs. 7 clicks. Convenience. Just like having shortcuts on the desktop rather than having to go to each folder of each program just to click on the .exe for those programs.

[Icarus]

@Atlas No worries if it helps you go for it. A few clicks seems so trivial to me so I thought I was missing something.

[oakdesign]

@Atlas said in Customize the alt launcher:

@oakdesign
Please share how to do this skip thing!

@echo off
setlocal

:: Example for BMS++
set PROCNAME=FalconBMS_Alternative_Launcher.exe
tasklist /nh /fi "imagename eq %PROCNAME%" | find /i "%PROCNAME%" > nul || start "" "F:\Falcon BMS 4.37\LauncheR\FalconBMS_Alternative_Launcher.exe"

:: Example for opentrack
set PROCNAME=opentrack.exe
tasklist /nh /fi "imagename eq %PROCNAME%" | find /i "%PROCNAME%" > nul || start "" "E:\Spiele\Headtracking\opentrack-2.3.11-beta3\install\opentrack.exe"

:: Add similar blocks for other applications you wish to start, modifying the PROCNAME and path as necessary.
set PROCNAME=Control Center.exe
tasklist /nh /fi "imagename eq %PROCNAME%" | find /i "%PROCNAME%" > nul || start "" "C:\Program Files\Helios Virtual Cockpit\Helios\Control Center.exe"

endlocal

in Terms of the OP question: The AL is still a seperate open source Project hosted on github, so you could add your own buttons and compile it to have those changes. But it would require some basic C# programming skills and an IDE such as Visual Studio to complile your own version

The buttons are basically defined in the MainWindow.xaml

private void Launch_Third(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
        {
            try
            {
                string target       = "";
                string downloadlink = "";
                string installexe   = "";

                switch (((Button)sender).Name)
                {
                    case "Launch_WDP":
                        target = "\\WeaponDeliveryPlanner.exe";
                        downloadlink = "http://www.weapondeliveryplanner.nl/";
                        installexe = Properties.Settings.Default.Third_WDP + target;
                        if (File.Exists(installexe) == false)
                        {
                            System.Windows.Forms.FolderBrowserDialog fbd = new System.Windows.Forms.FolderBrowserDialog();

                            fbd.Description = "Select Install Directory";
                            fbd.RootFolder = Environment.SpecialFolder.MyComputer;
                            fbd.ShowNewFolderButton = false;
                            System.Windows.Forms.DialogResult dirResult = fbd.ShowDialog();

                            installexe = fbd.SelectedPath + target;
                            if (File.Exists(installexe))
                                Properties.Settings.Default.Third_WDP = fbd.SelectedPath;
                            else
                            {
                                System.Diagnostics.Process.Start(downloadlink);
                                return;
                            }
                        }
                        System.Diagnostics.Process.Start(installexe);
                        break;
                    case "Launch_MC":

[Atlas]

@oakdesign
Thank you very much! Will give this a try soon!

[airtex2019]

@redviking @Atlas @oakdesign just following along to say, I think this is an excellent feature-request for AL and I’ll put this on the backlog

AL would be easily capable of (a) remembering which apps you wanted to launch alongside BMS, and (b) detecting which are already running.

(we can also do a better job of auto-detecting which companion apps are installed…)

AL does a little of this already, with the VR runtimes. Just needs some refactoring to make it data-driven and extensible for other companion apps like OpenTrack, RTT or Helios, etc.

In fact this would justify its existence as a “launcher” … vs just making a small cluster of shortcut icons on your Windows desktop.

[Atlas]

@airtex2019
If you could do that, as well as giving users the ability to add their own programs to the list, that would be awesome!

[redviking]

@airtex2019 Thanks! This will be a nice addition.