XNA Content DLL - xna

Where is the content DLL? When I try to build my game (using Primary Output from the Setup Wizard for both my game and content), it gives me this error:
Could not find file 'C:\Users\XXXX\Documents\XNA\PowerChampions\PowerChampions\PowerChampionsContent\obj\x86\Release\PowerChampionsContent.dll' 'The system cannot find the file specified.'
Anybody know how to solve that?

There is a list of things you need to check to solve this error. Let's start with cleaning and rebuilding the whole XNA solution, the one containing an XNA project and an XNA Content project (you have both in your project right?).

Related

Monogame: "could not load fbx model asset as a non-content file"

I recently changed operating systems on my laptop (went from 8.1 to Windows 7). I transferred my game project, and after having to rebuild it (due to Visual Studio 2013 stating it cannot open my project file), I managed to get it to run, but as soon as the code tries to load my cube.fbx model, I get the error in the title.
My settings for the model are as follows:
And the code for loading (which worked flawlessly before the transfer) is as follows:
modelCube = content.Load<Model>("Models/cube");
I have no idea what the issue is. All help points to setting the Build Action to "Content" and the Copy to Output Directory to "Always". The only clue I can think of is that originally, my project was made for Android, and on this iteration I remade it as a normal Windows project (as for whatever reason, I couldn't get an Android project to work this time).
Thanks in advance. This is really confusing.
While I doubt anyone else will have this problem, I figured out the issue. I think Monogame changed the way it loaded assets since the last time I used it. With my install of a newer version, I just had to follow the link below to get it working again.
http://rbwhitaker.wikidot.com/monogame-managing-content

Displaying a Scratch Project (.SB) file within a Delphi EXE FIle

I would like to Display a Scratch Project (.SB) file within my Delphi EXE file. I would like to know if it is possible to display and build the Scratch Project into your Delphi Project.
I wish to make a small game in Scratch and then use the game within my Delphi Application without the need of the Scratch IDE. Perhaps a 3rd party delphi tool or component or something that can help me achieve this would also be nice.
Is this possible?
How can this be done?
It's possible, like everything, but it's not been done AFAIK, which means it's going to be hard work.
You have a few choices:
Scratch is normally embedded within web sites as a Flash object. If
you can embed Flash media, that is a solution.
Some Scratch-inspired systems like BYOB export to exe. You could look into how they do that to use your project (Scratch and BYOB
are compatible enough to load your project and export it after
minor changes)
If you don't like these, then write your own Scratch interpreter for Delphi. Scratch sprites are objects, their behaviour is straightforward enough, the Scratch projects are easily parsed (it's XML), now - off you go!
I am assuming that you want to port a scratch program to .EXE.
If this is the case, then you can install BYOB.
After doing this, you can convert your scratch project to a BYOB project and load it into BYOB.
Then, go to Share->Compile this project, and it will generate a .EXE for you.

Can't open project: "One or more lines were too long and have been truncated"

I'm having some kind of problem with my project that me and my friend is working on. When I try to open the project that I've been working on it gives me an error message saying that "one or more lines were too long and have been truncated" and thus I can't see my code or GUI. When my friend opens the project on his computer (The project is on dropbox so it's the same file) there's no problem at all. I've googled but couldn't find anything. I just did a repair of RAD Studio but no luck. We have 2 forms and a unit that we use, the unit and the mainform isn't working for me but the second form is no problem.
Thanks!
Make a copy of your project directory.
Search your harddisk for XXXX.pas and XXXX.dfm
Hopefully there will be some temperary files that match - like "mylostform.dfm.~1307~" . copy the newest to your project directory, and rename them to "mylostform.dfm" and "mylostform.pas".
Kind regards,
Geir Bratlie
From the comments, you have Dropbox, and the Restore functionality is available, but using it would cost you a week's worth of work.
If I was in that situation, here's what I would do:
Copy the current file to somewhere else (My Documents, for example).
Use Dropbox Restore to get the old version that works.
Make a copy of this, because you're going to be modifying it
Ensure that you can open it in the IDE.
Use Beyond Compare to open the two files side-by-side. (If you don't have this, you really should!)
If they're completely different from each other, you have a serious problem. If not, you'll see the changes you've made. Start copying changes one at a time, and after each change, save and try to open it in the IDE.
At some point, you won't be able to. That's where your problem lies. Now you can fix it!

XNA 4.0 ClickOnce game does not run after installation

Okay, I have been looking all over to solve this problem before I actually broke down and decided to finally ask for my psecific problem. I am using ClickOnce installation and when I use the setup.exe to install nothing runs, not even on my personal computer that I know has all of the proper libraries and such. I'm not sure what I am doing wrong so it is difficult to explain the problem.
I have included dotNetFramework4.0 client x86 x64 , xna redistributable 4.0 and windows installer 3.1 along with my game and I have it set to install all of that with setup , also I have it set to download prereqs from same location as application. I've tried it on three separate computers , one that does not have XNA or VS C# installed and the same problem occurs.
Here is the problem , after I install the game nothing runs, I try clicking on the ClickOnce application file (the one with my game's icon image) and again nothing happens. The thing that really bugs me is that there isn't any errors or crashes or anything , it's almost like clicking on the desktop screen. (I looked at the properties of the "shortcut" that was installed with the game and the file size of the shortcut is like 300 bytes. Isn't that really small? I was thinking maybe there is a problem with a startup executable? I'm not sure though.)
I've tried tweaking some stuff in the Publish section of my project , such as un-checking the box that says "use .deploy extension files" (I don't know why, I've been grasping at straws here) I've been looking into some other installers such as NSIS but I don't know how to compile a list of files to include in other installers and I feel like that won't solve the problem anyway because I've gotten ClickOnce to work with me before.
On one computer there was an error report that said something about 'deployment and application do not have matching security zones.'
Game.application resulted in exception. Following failure messages were detected:
+ Deployment and application do not have matching security zones.
It's getting late so if I need to provide more information let me know.
ClickOnce can be a fickle thing. There are times that I've had errors occur that could only be solved by recreating an entire Windows user profile. Because there are so many different options for ClickOnce, it's going to be hard for me to diagnose your exact issue, so I can only offer what options I used to successfully install via ClickOnce.
Publishing Folder: local folder
Installation Folder URL: blank
Install Mode: offline
Application Files
Make sure the Publish Status of your game files is set to Include (Auto)
Make sure the Publish Status of the XNA libraries is set to Prerequisite (Auto)
Click Prerequisites
Microsoft .NET Framework 4 Client Profile
Microsoft XNA Framework Redistributable 4.0
Windows Installer 3.1
Do not check for updates
Everything else default under Options (publisher/suite name shouldn't affect anything)
Specify the version number
Publish Now
Install the game through the setup.exe provided in the publish location. I always distribute every file that is publishes. However, you can clean up old versions in the "Application Files" folder if you don't want the history to be distributed.
You can double check the "Application Files" folder to see if your version got published correctly (look at the files that were deployed and see if they match your project contents).

How to use an .xnb file in MonoGame on Windows 8?

I've got an .xnb file from a Windows Phone project made on Windows 7. I'd like to use the same asset in a Windows 8 Metro app. I've got MSVS 2012 RC on Windows 8 with a project from the MonoGameWindowsMetroApplication template. I put the .xnb file in the project Assets folder and tried to load it, but I get an exception telling me that the asset can't be loaded. What properties or configuration do I need to be able to use the .xnb file?
While MonoGame is working on the Content Pipeline piece of the framework, you can simply use the same Content Pipeline engine that you used for the Windows Phone 7 game to create a Content Pipeline and use the associated .xnb files in your Windows 8 XNA MonoGame project.
I have a blog tutorial series on building XNA games with MonoGame for Windows 8, and if you look at Part 3, I provide a step-by-stepy walkthrough of accomplishing this. My hands-on lab and information on my blog was reviewed and approved by the MonoGame team.
See info here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/tarawalker/archive/2013/01/04/windows-8-game-development-using-c-xna-and-monogame-3-0-building-a-shooter-game-walkthrough-part-3-updating-graphics-using-content-pipeline-with-monogame.aspx
The runtime Xna framework has many type reader objects that read the various xnb files. Some of the type readers are for xnb files that were processed from fbx models, others are xnb files processed from 2d image files, etc.
When you call content.Load<T>(xnb file name), The content manager uses the appropriate reader to read the byte information of the xnb file into the appropriate Xna class. The byte information in an xnb file is designed to be used in a specific Xna class, no other. There are no Xna classes in metro.
All this to say there are no type readers in the metro environment that read these xnb files. You would have to write your own. It's not that hard though, that's similar to what I did. I now process an fbx file into xnb by building an Xna project, then my xna project writes the runtime model's data to my own binary file, which I read from my metro app. But I could've simply read the xnb also. I just would have had to study the contentManager's & Model class' type readers to see how the byte info was distributed.
After all is said and done, it just means I don't have to learn the FBXSDK which would be the standard way (and arguably preferred way) of bringing in model info.
EDIT - sorry, didn't clue into the use of the mono framework. I don't know anything about that... Maybe they do have a way of importing xnb files.
Are you on the develop3D branch? I think you need to add a dummy Content project and add it to that project, not your assets, build that project first, then you need to reference that project in your MonoGame project.
I didn't succeed on that yesterday as I'm using the current stable but one of the MonoGame guys told me to do just that yesterday. Here are some instructions:
https://github.com/mono/MonoGame/wiki/MonoGame-Content-Processing
In MonoGame content pipeline is not present, at least as off now.
Its very easy.
1)Create a xna project in VS2010
2)add all your assets over there.
3)Rebuild your project. Go to bin/x86/debug/content and copy all contents from there
Now go to your VS2012 Mono Project bin/x86/debug look for content folder, if its there copy all content there else create a content folder and copy all content there.
Now without changing even single line of code just run your project and you will find everything working great!!!
Let me know if you find any difficulty doing that.

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