Desktop Mascot Engine Download Now
Jon Followell
If you remember those old Stick-Fight videos on youtube, where the stick-man's were fighting on Windows Desktop, thats pretty much how the character/mascot looks on your desktop. Think of it as a living Game/Anime/3D-Model Character that overlaps over Windows and other apps.
For now we are adding diverse variety character models as mascots with some animations to allow you to relax/fiddle with the mascots to distract yourself from stress and stuff.
Note: If you have multiple Mascot Server systems with different versions, Mascot Daemon 2.8 can be used to submit searches to Mascot Server 2.1 and later. In exceptional circumstances, it can also be used with Mascot Server 2.0, but this requires the Mascot Server to be updated by downloading file updates from the Mascot support page.
Once Mascot Daemon is installed, refer to its on-line help fordetailed information on configuration and use. The on-line helpis context sensitive, so you can jump to a relevant page at any time bypressing F1.
1. Using a web browser, verify that it is possible to connect to your Mascot server from the PC on which Mascot Daemon is to be installed. If there are any problems submitting a search from a web browser and retrieving the result report, these must be resolved before installing Mascot Daemon.
2. Mascot Daemon requires .NET framework 4.6 or later. This is standard on Windows 10 and Server 2016, and it may already have been installed on earlier versions of Windows by some other application. If you are not sure whether it is present, just run Mascot Daemon setup. If it reports that .NET 4.6 is missing, download and install it from the following location:
4. After installation, when you first run Mascot Daemon, the Preferences dialog will be displayed. You must configure a connection to your in-house Mascot Server before you can proceed. On the Intranet tab, enter your in-house Mascot server URL, up to and including the cgi directory, e.g. _server/mascot/cgi/. If the web server or a proxy server requires authentication by user name and password, enter your credentials on the Authentication tab.
If you have Mascot security enabled, you need to ensure Daemon can log into your Mascot Server as a user with the rights to submit searches from Daemon. Usually, this means being a member of the power users or daemons groups. If necessary, ask your Mascot system administrator for a user name and password, and enter these into the appropriate fields on the authentication tab of Daemon preferences.
5. By default, the task database uses an embedded engine called VistaDB, which is pre-configured and requires no additional components to be installed. If you want to share a single task database between multiple instances of Daemon running on different PCs, you should chooseone of the server-based, high-performance database engines, (Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL). For detailed guidance on the installation of database engines and ODBC drivers, press F1 and refer to the Daemon on-line help: Getting started; Database engines.
6. Choose Save and Mascot Daemon will exit. When re-started, the desktop interface will be displayed and the Mascot Daemon engine will run in the system tray. This is the preferred arrangement in all cases except when you want to run multiple instances of Daemon in separate remote desktop sessions on the same PC, which requires the engine to be configured as a Windows service. For details, press F1 and refer to the Daemon on-line help.
1. Mascot Daemon requires .NET framework 4.6 or later. This is standard on Windows 10 and Server 2016, and it may already have been installed on earlier versions of Windows by some other application. If you are not sure whether it is present, just run Mascot Daemon setup. If it reports that .NET 4.6 is missing, download and install it from the following location:
2. Run Mascot Daemon setup. The same installer handles both 32-bit and 64-bit platforms. If Mascot Daemon 2.4 or earlier is installed, setup will automatically stop the Mascot Daemon Windows service, delete it, then ask you to uninstall the old Mascot Daemon using the Windows control panel. In which case:
Note: If you want to keep your old task database, and it is the default Microsoft Access file (TaskDB.mdb in the application directory) make a copy of it in a safe place before uninstalling the earlier version of Mascot Daemon.
3. When you first run Mascot Daemon, if the previous version was 2.4 or earlier, the Preferences dialog will be displayed. You must configure a connection to your in-house Mascot Server before you can proceed. On the Intranet tab, enter your in-house Mascot server URL, up to and including the cgi directory, e.g. _server/mascot/cgi/. If the web server or a proxy server requires authentication by user name and password, or if Mascot security is enabled,enter the relevant credentials on the Authentication tab.
Option 1: If you were using Microsoft Access, and wish to stay with it, choose Preferences from the Edit menu, go to the ODBC Connection tab, and select Microsoft Access. The default path to the database file is C:\ProgramData\Matrix Science\Mascot Daemon\TaskDB.mdb. Either copy your old database file to this location, over-writing the empty database file, or change the path to point to your preferred location.
Option 2: To share a single task database between multiple instances of Daemon running on different PCs, choose whichever high-performance database engine you prefer: Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL. These database engines may be running on a different computer, accessed over the LAN. Note that someone with database administrator rights must create an empty database before it can be used by Mascot Daemon. For detailed guidance on the installation of database engines and ODBC drivers, press F1 and refer to the Daemon on-line help: Getting started; Database engines.
Note: To migrate the contents of your existing Access database to a new database engine, refer to the Daemon on-line help: Getting started; Database engines; Access; Migrating to other database engines..
5. If you have to install or update an ODBC driver for your chosen database engine, refer to the help topics for the individual database engines. Details can be found in the on-line help topics for the individual database engines.
Note: Windows 32-bit and 64-bit ODBC components are totally independent. That is, a 64-bit application cannot use a 32-bit ODBC driver and vice versa. On a clean 64-bit Windows installation, the only driver will be for SQL Server, and this may be a very old one.
6. If you connect to a task database from an earlier version of Mascot Daemon, you will be warned that it will be updated. You might wish to make a backup of the file or tables in case of problems. Once the database has been updated, the Mascot Daemon desktop interface will be displayed, and the Mascot Daemon engine will run in the system tray. This is the preferred arrangement in all cases except when you want to run multiple instances of Daemon in separate remote desktop sessions on the same PC, which requires the engine to be configured as a Windows service. For details, press F1 and refer to the Daemon on-line help
I have to preface this by saying I don't know a whole lot about the PC Engine to begin with! As a kid, I had a friend who would occasionally get Japanese magazines and I remember seeing pictures of the PC Engine and its games circa 1988. So it has this mythical status in my mind, because just by looking at the screenshots you could tell this was a big step up from the NES and SMS. Then, of course, I was aware that the TurboGrafx-16 was the Western version of the PC Engine when it came out soon after. But what I've gathered over the years was that the original PC Engine managed to get some serious market share in Japan and was rivaling the Famicom in popularity. (What the actual numbers are, if they are even publicly known, I don't know.) So, it seems like it was quite a successful console in Japan. And as I've occasionally researched buying one, I've become aware of subsequent consoles like the CoreGrafx and SuperGrafx. Although I don't know too many details about them, I've gathered that they didn't have as many games released for them. It's also interesting to me that the PC Engine has an understandable appeal in Japanese culture by being very small and somewhat cute, but the SuperGrafx is so aggressive in its styling it practically looks like an explosive weapon! So I just wonder, what went on here? I assume they struggled with attracting third party developers due to Nintendo's stranglehold on most of them. But even so, NEC apparently managed to become a serious rival to Nintendo in Japan... but then fumbled by following up with too many new platforms too quickly?
The company made the decision to redesign the PC Engine's casing for its introduction to the U.S. Compared to other consoles of the era, the PC Engine was tiny, thanks to its well-engineered internals and the credit card sized HuCARD format. However, "there was a feeling" that American consumers wanted something bigger -- and something more futuristic, Wirt says.
"We did a bunch of research around the name and we decided we had to change the name and the industrial design," Wirt says. The name was a simple change: "TurboGrafx" to refer to the system's speed and the strength of its visuals, which were clearer and much more colorful than earlier systems; "16" to refer to its 16-bit GPU, as "16-bit" was the keyword for that console generation. (Accessories became "Turbo" everything: TurboPad, TurboTap, TurboStick, and the HuCARD now the "TurboChip.")
"The marketing and advertising company came up with some sketches, and they conducted focus groups," says Carol Balkcom, who was part of NEC's launch team. Once the externals were designed, engineering began: "it takes time to do a redesign and a re-layout of stuff," says O'Keefe. "Plastic's not exactly a quick-turnaround item, especially if you're changing the design every so often."
b37509886e