What is JMA?

[bohdy]

A stand alone JMA compresser, separate from NSRT and not yet released to the public, can put multiple files in a JMA. It can JMA any file you want, not just SNES ROMs.

Can you spot where the problem is, for a representative of the public at large like myself?

[Nach]

What is the point of telling us that Zsnes can handle solid multi-file JMA's if there is no way for us to make such JMA's?

It was requested, and has been taken care of already.

Is there an ETA for this feature in NSRT? Preferably at least allowing the user to JMA all roms under each parent name together?

Yes, ETA is for NSRT 3.4, not sure when it will be ready though as I have a lot on my plate.

[Nach]

A stand alone JMA compresser, separate from NSRT and not yet released to the public, can put multiple files in a JMA. It can JMA any file you want, not just SNES ROMs.

Can you spot where the problem is, for a representative of the public at large like myself?

Yeah, your group is too unintelligent to use buggy software. So you'll have to wait till things are ironed out.

[kieran_]

Thanks, Nach.

[MasaMuneCyrus]

Cowering has nothing to do with jma. And he won't have anything to do about it for a while if things keep on being what they are currently.

JMA features an incredible efficiency of compression for roms. For single OR solid archives, jma is better than zip, rar, and 7z.

Aha! In a test of 10 roms, a best compression rar was 200 kb SMALLER than a .jma of Tengai Makyou Zero (J). Oddly enough, the solid rar archive was larger than the non-solid archive, so I used the non-solid archive for comparison.


That said, JMA beat (or matched within 10 kb) the other 9.

[grinvader]

How about you post numbers, so we can at least try to see by ourselves.
Also, mention which JMA level you used for compression.

[Clements]

Aha! In a test of 10 roms, a best compression rar was 200 kb SMALLER than a .jma of Tengai Makyou Zero (J). Oddly enough, the solid rar archive was larger than the non-solid archive, so I used the non-solid archive for comparison.

I think not.

4,480,499 bytes - Tengai Makyou Zero (J) [!].rar (Best, Solid)
4,480,499 bytes - Tengai Makyou Zero (J) [!].rar (Best)
4,439,798 bytes - Tengai Makyou Zero (J) [!].jma (whatever the default is)

[RockyMM]

Only thing from stoping me from switching my rom archive from 7zip to jma is that there is not goodtool that supports jma.
Or am I wrong?

[funkyass]

why would you need a goodtool if you have NSRT?

[RockyMM]

And what about multiple files in an archive. As far as I understand, that is not yet supported. And how ZSNES would handle multiple files in an archive. When that feature is added, I'm definitly going to switch to JMA and NSRT.

[byuu]

why would you need a goodtool if you have NSRT?

Consistency across different consoles? Not that I'm advocating the use of badtools. Just saying...

Only thing from stoping me from switching my rom archive from 7zip to jma is that there is not goodtool that supports jma.

So tell me, what were you going to do with all of that extra space? Store the first 20 minutes of a movie? An extra 1/3rd of a music CD in FLAC format? You simply must take advantage of all that extra space. I mean, you're probably saving pennies on storage space there. Smart, crafty, and on the bleeding edge of technology. Who cares about silly little things like time and convenience? You're my hero.

Let's have some fun though, shall we?

RAR - 4,480,499
JMA - 4,439,798

RAR-JMA = 40701
SNES library size = ~3000 unique games, of which you probably own 10. Let's say you're one of ten people who really own every game ever made.
40701 * 3000 = 122,103,000. Or 122mb.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136003

High end 320GB hard drive, $130. Ok, so then:

$130 / 320,000MB * 122MB = 4.95 cents. Hell, let's say five cents. Congratulations! You're going to spend two hours converting your entire SNES ROM collection to a format that is not supported by any operating system, many SNES emulators, nor your GoodTools program natively, to save a nickel.

[Nach]

Congratulations! You're going to spend two hours converting your entire SNES ROM collection to a format that is not supported by any operating system, many SNES emulators, nor your GoodTools program natively, to save a nickel.

Last I checked all the SNES emulators still in development support JMA, but none of them support RAR 3.x+.

[byuu]

Last I checked all the SNES emulators still in development support JMA, but none of them support RAR 3.x+.

Indeed, thanks to your help :)
RAR is a lousy example (and a lousy format), isn't the actual format closed to the public still? I didn't have Tengai's ZIP file size to compare to. Does SNESGT, MESS and Super Sleuth really support JMA? I haven't checked, and I should. I thought SS was written in Delphi and that you didn't even know GIGO. Then there's all of the VM emulators that are popping up as of late. Jario, JSNES, Infinity, not sure which of those are active and which aren't.

But even that's still not the point. The point is that your compression format is extremely impressive in that it beats out even the best commercial alternatives. However, it is not, and will never be, mainstream like ZIP is. And honestly, who really wants 800 compression formats? For those that do, now think about writing your own emulator / SNES utility / whatever. Do YOU want to add code to support all of these formats?

bsnes for example incurred a 3% speed decrease by requiring the /EHsc flag for MSVC to compile JMA, gained 30-60kb in EXE size, 82kb in source size, and takes 1-2 seconds longer per fresh compile, or 4-6 seconds with gcc. All to save 40kb per SNES ROM. And this is why I'm so bitchy about it.

Nach, all of your ideas to date have been impressive and innovative. NSRT, NPS, ZSNES<>mplayer bridge, even JMA. I mean no disrespect, but I still for the life of me can't figure out why you have released JMA into the open, and are allowing people to try and convert all their ROMs to this obscure format. I too have created superior compression algorithms under the basis that file size is more important than compression speed. But I did it for the technical challenge alone. I realized my format would only complicate the lives of any programmer who had to support it.
Even storing the entire SNES library on the most expensive flash memory device would still only cost you an extra three dollars tops with ZIP, and that price is only going down. JMA might be a good idea for DVD ISOs, but never for ~2-4mb SNES ROMs :(

[Nach]

Nach, all of your ideas to date have been impressive and innovative. NSRT, NPS, ZSNES<>mplayer bridge, even JMA. I mean no disrespect, but I still for the life of me can't figure out why you have released JMA into the open, and are allowing people to try and convert all their ROMs to this obscure format. I too have created superior compression algorithms under the basis that file size is more important than compression speed. But I did it for the technical challenge alone. I realized my format would only complicate the lives of any programmer who had to support it.
Even storing the entire SNES library on the most expensive flash memory device would still only cost you an extra three dollars tops with ZIP, and that price is only going down. JMA might be a good idea for DVD ISOs, but never for ~2-4mb SNES ROMs

There are several things most probably don't realize.

I didn't write JMA just to be some simple SNES toy like NSRT or ZSNES or IPSEDIT is. My goal is to improve it enough to the point where I can actually really do something with it. So right now I get free bug testing from hundreds or perhaps thousands of people, and free word of mouth if ever I decide to sell something JMA related.

And JMA just doesn't win on best compression algorithm. If you'd look at the results I'm getting listed on my site of the upcoming changes, I even have it compressing faster than ZIP does for big files.
The library is also easy to use, flexible, and fully portable, something which you only fine in zlib, and libbz2, and they have their issues.

With JMA, I am now also able to fit my entire SNES ROM collection on a single CD, oh sure I get get GB upon GB on a hard drive, but if I go somewhere that has a PC, I didn't bring my laptop, and I'm bored, I got all the games I want to play on one CD.

Also, we've been getting many "requests" for RAR and 7z, which is getting rediculous. JMA now beats both compression wise, and once I work in parent/sibling based solid compression into NSRT, and a way for the emulators to browse a JMA archive like a directory, I never have to hear the please support solid archiving whine again. Because right now without JMA it's rediculous, not a single library available that has solid compression and works nicely, isn't it mind boggling?

[byuu]

My goal is to improve it enough to the point where I can actually really do something with it.

Are you willing to share this, possibly via PM? I don't think a commercial compression algorithm would be publically viable, given the alternatives really aren't that much worse, and they're free. But I wish you the best of luck at any rate.

With JMA, I am now also able to fit my entire SNES ROM collection on a single CD

A DVD would work all the same, burners go for $30-$40 now, disks for $2 tops. It is convenient that your personal archive fits on one CD now though, so that's definitely a good thing, but more an exception than a rule.

Also, we've been getting many "requests" for RAR and 7z, which is getting rediculous.

That's because people are stupid. Some of them more than others. "Hey, can you support GCA compression? Or can you add SNESCD support, preferrably the Sony model and not the Phillips model? How about a button where I can change the menubars from the default color to red and green, which displays a tiny Santa Claus in the bottom right that bounces around and gives me complements and advice while I play games, but only on days that are also Mersenne primes?".

The library is also easy to use, flexible, and fully portable, something which you only fine in zlib, and libbz2, and they have their issues.

Yes, I can definitely attest to that. I've never had even a single warning or bug with JMA compilation. Now if only it didn't require run-time error handling ... ;)

Because right now without JMA it's rediculous, not a single library available that has solid compression and works nicely, isn't it mind boggling?

I'm sure you'd end up with a complete set that's 20-40% smaller with a huge solid state archive thanks to all of the minor variants and regional ports, but what kind of PC would you need to extract "Zoop" from such an archive?

And now we have another problem, how do other emulators implement support for solid state JMA archives? :/

[Jipcy]

Because right now without JMA it's rediculous, not a single library available that has solid compression and works nicely, isn't it mind boggling?

I'm sure you'd end up with a complete set that's 20-40% smaller with a huge solid state archive thanks to all of the minor variants and regional ports, but what kind of PC would you need to extract "Zoop" from such an archive?

And now we have another problem, how do other emulators implement support for solid state JMA archives? :/

I think Nach was thinking more along the lines of solid archiving all ROMs belonging to a single parent ROM, or something like that. So all regions/revisions of one actual game are in one solid archive. Not the entire set...

[pagefault]

The compression you get from compressing all the SFX roms together is amazing.

[PHoNyMiKe]

You're going to spend two hours converting your entire SNES ROM collection to a format that is not supported by any operating system, many SNES emulators, nor your GoodTools program natively, to save a nickel.

bewm, I think this is the coolest post on the zsnes forums ever. I don't know about you guys, but I don't keep the entire snes collection on my hard drive anymore. in fact, the only snes roms I have is the first goodsnes set somewhere on cd-rs that are blank on one side, and blue on the other. that being said, unless some amazing compression comes out, that can put 3,000 snes roms on 1 700MB cd, then your next best bet is to put them on one single layer dvd, in which case you mine as well use zip, because you don't want to go hunt down some proprietary software to manage your data when you actually use this dvd years in the future for one game.

I love winrar, but would only use rar when splitting large files. I love zip for single files, just like I love mp3 for music. fuck you idiots with your ogg and other shit. mp3 + zip = internets. plus mp3s work in my car.

[Nach]

My goal is to improve it enough to the point where I can actually really do something with it.

Are you willing to share this, possibly via PM? I don't think a commercial compression algorithm would be publically viable, given the alternatives really aren't that much worse, and they're free. But I wish you the best of luck at any rate.

If you want to discuss more details with me come on IRC. I have been talking to technicall buisiness people, and one person was thinking of doing something hardware based, so I don't neccesarily have to compete or only compete with WinZip and WinRAR.

With JMA, I am now also able to fit my entire SNES ROM collection on a single CD

A DVD would work all the same, burners go for $30-$40 now, disks for $2 tops. It is convenient that your personal archive fits on one CD now though, so that's definitely a good thing, but more an exception than a rule.

Yes, but not everywhere I go has a DVD player. There's also the possibility of using a USB memory stick now, but not everywhere I go has a USB port, although USB ports are more common than DVD players.

Also, we've been getting many "requests" for RAR and 7z, which is getting rediculous.

That's because people are stupid. Some of them more than others. "Hey, can you support GCA compression? Or can you add SNESCD support, preferrably the Sony model and not the Phillips model? How about a button where I can change the menubars from the default color to red and green, which displays a tiny Santa Claus in the bottom right that bounces around and gives me complements and advice while I play games, but only on days that are also Mersenne primes?".

Yes that is rediculous, but this is something I'm doing anyway, and worth while to some extent, to add it to all the emulators wasn't that hard.

I'm sure you'd end up with a complete set that's 20-40% smaller with a huge solid state archive thanks to all of the minor variants and regional ports, but what kind of PC would you need to extract "Zoop" from such an archive?

You'd need a PC which has enough memory. The size needed to extract IIRC, is the size of the uncompressed data rounded up to the next power of 2, plus the size of the compressed data, plus half a megabyte or so.
So if you had 10MB of ROMs and compressed it to 2MB, you'd need ~18.5MB to extract. In the actual case of my SFX set which is ~40MB uncompressed and ~6MB compressed, it would be a total of ~70.5MB to deal with. The latter case is rare for an SNES set, but most people shouldn't have a big deal with 20-30MB requirements for a moment especially for those OSs with virtual memory.

And now we have another problem, how do other emulators implement support for solid state JMA archives? :/

I'd handle it one emulator at a time. If loaded via a command line, a simple UI will do which can be supported the same across all emulators. For loading via the GUI, might need some menu editing to make it act like a directory, or perhaps pop up some time of scrolling select box. I'd worry about this bridge when it is time to cross it.

[PHoNyMiKe]

and one person was thinking of doing something hardware based

I can't program a compression algorithm any better than I can finger my butthole, but whoever even joked about the words "hardware based jma codec" must have been smoking heavy crack piled on top of lethal amounts of alcohol, plus a little meth and x mixed in there.

I applaude your effort to advertise jma, but it's something only a mother could love. I can't imagine more than five people on the planet actually using it. it's target base would be hardcore snes emu gamers who are misers when it comes to hard drive space. the eventual removal of the jma decompression from zsnes would save more space (from all users downloading and not using it) then the 5 hardcore snes emu gamers would save on hard drive space.

you mine as well create a toaster plugin for every emulator out there. at least that way it'd be funny, and compatible with more emulators.

seriously, what kind of numbers are we talking about here? is jma not 7-zip just tweaked a little bit?

[kode54]

Since JMA borrowed its primary compression algorithm (LZMA) from 7-zip's LZMA SDK, a hardware implementation would also go towards supporting the 7-zip format. And I think that format is seeing ever so slightly wider use at this time. Still not terribly useful for unpacking juarez.

[nemo]

propaganda++;

I suck at photoshop.
(I lie, I'm a cheap GIMP user)
(On a mac)
(X11 Gimp, didn't even pony up the cash for MacGIMP)
Good to see the community is still thriving. Good luck on your new project, Nach.

edit: Wow, forgot about the purge shortly after I stopped coming here, my post count used to be like 500+ haha. 2 now....

[Nach]

Haha, thanks for the image.

[adventure_of_link]

Too bad it fails at grammar though:

It should be "You're compressing with Hitler."

[sweener2001]

It should be, "You compress with Hitler."

So as to better fit with the scheme. DUH

And who are you to talk about grammar? I've been telling you that your sig is messed up for quite awhile.

EDIT: I just noticed that you changed it. Still, it was messed up and you broadcast it to the world.