Initial Mac install and set up - SO painful!

[Andre]

I would love to rewrite the Mac install guide if I could actually figure out how to get v0.80 set up on my Mac ;)

After many hours I finally have mpf running and Godot running. 

I created a basic attract screen per the instructions, started Godot, started mpf.

Mpf says it's running.

Godot says "Connected to MPF"

Terminal says "22:52:50.817 : INFO [Machine] Starting the main run loop with active modes: [<Mode.attract>]"

That's where everything stalls. I never get my attract screen.  Can't figure out what I'm doing wrong or how to fix.

[Andre]

figured it out. the instructions do not make this part known at all. 

My directory is:

mpfenv

---bin

---include

---lib

---project (this is the Godot project folder I created)

-------------addons

-------------config

-------------data

-------------logs

-------------modes

-------------slides

I had updated the config.yaml file located in project----config, and I created my attract slide and attract.yaml in both the modes folder and the slides folder because I couldn't figure out the instructions. This didn't work.

In order to get my attract screen to show, I had to update the attract.yaml file buried under mpfenv----lib----python3.11----site-packages----mpf-----modes----attract-----config----attract.yaml to add the "slide_player: mode_attract_started: attract" code.

I NEVER would have figured this out based on the instructions - just got lucky poking through every folder and subfolder.

[Anthony van Winkle]

I'm sorry you had challenges with the tutorial, we are always trying to make our documentation clearer and easier to follow so any improvements you have would be greatly appreciated.

You should never edit the core MPF files in the site-packages folder, those are the MPF installation and will be overwritten any time MPF updates. The step you were missing is the creation of your own attract mode config file (at modes/attract/config/attract.yaml) where you would put in your slide_player and any other attract-related code. In MPF, anything you have in your mode configs will be added to (or overwrite) the default yamls deep in the installation folder.

Side note, it's a good idea to keep your project folder somewhere OTHER than the virtual environment folder. The joy of virtual environments is they are self-contained, so you can switch to a different environment or delete an old one without any ramifications. Keeping your project separate will make that easier in the future.

[Andre]

No - I didn't miss the step to create my own attract.yaml and I did try everything you suggest. Godot somehow won't look anywhere other than the virtual environment mpf folder for the attract slide. I never even copied or created the attract.yaml file into the virtual environment but somehow it ended up there. 

I have deleted everything and re-tried installing from the beginning by following the instructions 3 separate times, each with the same result.

[Andre]

Possibly figured out the problem. The instructions say "In your attract.yaml mode config, add the following block: slide_player: mode_attract_started: attract"

At this point in the tutorial, there is no "attract.yaml" and there are no instructions on how to create one or where to put it. I had been creating a blank text file, pasting in that block of text, and then trying to save it in various locations.

I think the missing piece is that the .yaml file must start with "#config_version=6"

After discovering this, I assume all .yaml files must start the same way? I think that's a critical piece of info that should be added to the instructions.

[kaydeeH]

All files EXCEPT for show files, that is correct about the config version line. For show files, it will be #show_version=6

[Andre Bouchard]

Thank you for confirming - critical but missing piece of info (maybe obvious to people with python experience)

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[uncivilengineer]

You know what would be really helpful for those of us struggling with learning MPF and GoDot at the same time would be a "Tutorial Machine" fileset that would work with MPF,   So it would more or less have all the bare minimum config files needed to start MPF.