Odd DVD menu problem

[tacitus]

This is my very first post -

I have been happily generating dvds with simple menus for about
6 months using a DVDAuthorGUI and MPEG Video Wizard with
a lot help from the internet and this site in particular (thanks!).
I am also learning more about the "parts" spumux and dvdauthor
and have actively played with dvdauthor xml. Now, I am interested
delving into some of the odd details that have been noticed.

I have a Pioneer DV-578A DVD player and have noticed that
my created DVDs that the menu item never start highlighted.
Once I push an arrow button a menu item is highlighted. This
problem does not occur on other DVD players I have tried including
2 different Toshibas. I remember reading somewhere that
there is a bug with the Pioneer players; but I have been unable
to locate the reference. Does anyone know what the problem is
and is there a way of forcing the DVD to highlight properly?

[guns1inger]

I have always had Pioneer players, but I don't remember seeing this problem. Could it be related to the way the authored ?

[borax]

You can try to set the "default" highlighted button explicitly in your author.xml file.

Example:

    <menus>
    <video format="pal"></video>
      <pgc>
      <pre> { button = 1024; } </pre>
        <vob file="e:\Temp\MMMenu.mpg" pause="inf"/>
        <button name="MMB1">g1=1;jump title 1;</button>
...

[tacitus]

Thanks Borax!

It partially worked - with "{button = 1024;}" the first menu item is selected but still not highlighted. So I still can't see that a the button selected, but before not only not highlighted but it wasn't selected until I hit an arrow ... its a definite improvement. I will have to run a few more test cases.

The 'name="MMB1"' is not compatible with DVDAuthorGUI. I get the following error "ERR: Cannot find button '1' as referenced by the subtitle." I am assuming that that it has to do with how the button has been setup with spumux and DVDAuthorGUI sets things up differently with different references.

[borax]

The 'name="MMB1"' is not compatible with DVDAuthorGUI...

Yes, I know. It was just an example I used from my GUI for dvdauthor. I don't remember exactly how dvdauthorgui handles the button naming...

[liquid217]

DVDAuthorGUI does not label the buttons. Just keep them blank (without a label). To do what borax suggests, just insert the following text before the 'VOB' tag in the menu.

      <pre> { button = 1024; } </pre>

[borax]

According to another user in a german forum (molevcd) this problem can be solved by using "still menus" with ~ 1 second length (25 frames in PAL)

[tacitus]

Thanks Borax -

I finally noticed your final response and changed the still menu framecount
to 30 (for NTSC) and it works wonderfully. Did not even need any of
the other highlighting changes.