Multiple sets of menu buttons

[vwpassion]

Hi there,

I came across a DVD that contains multiple sets of menu buttons in the chapter menu.


For the expert users, here is the list of the cells containing multiple sets:

---------------
2 sets of buttons detected in VTSM 7, in cell 1/1 (with 11 buttons)
VOB cell used in cell 1 of VTSM 7 , LU 1 (de) , 2 (2:40) 44b. '<MBS>'
Set 1 begins at LBA 0.

Set 2 begins at LBA 152. (HL_status = 1 : all new highlight info)

NOTE: The buttons data are identical in all sets of this cell.
The highlights of the buttons are probably animated, or it's an authoring error.
You can probably ignore the warning above for this cell.

---------------
2 sets of buttons detected in VTSM 7, in cell 2/1 (with 11 buttons)
VOB cell used in cell 2 of VTSM 7 , LU 1 (de) , 2 (2:40) 44b. '<MBS>'
Set 1 begins at LBA 15647.

Set 2 begins at LBA 15833. (HL_status = 1 : all new highlight info)

NOTE: The buttons data are identical in all sets of this cell.
The highlights of the buttons are probably animated, or it's an authoring error.
You can probably ignore the warning above for this cell.

---------------
2 sets of buttons detected in VTSM 7, in cell 3/1 (with 11 buttons)
VOB cell used in cell 3 of VTSM 7 , LU 1 (de) , 2 (2:40) 44b. '<MBS>'
Set 1 begins at LBA 31190.

Set 2 begins at LBA 31367. (HL_status = 1 : all new highlight info)

NOTE: The buttons data are identical in all sets of this cell.
The highlights of the buttons are probably animated, or it's an authoring error.
You can probably ignore the warning above for this cell.

---------------
2 sets of buttons detected in VTSM 7, in cell 4/1 (with 11 buttons)
VOB cell used in cell 4 of VTSM 7 , LU 1 (de) , 2 (2:40) 44b. '<MBS>'
Set 1 begins at LBA 46811.

Set 2 begins at LBA 46983. (HL_status = 1 : all new highlight info)

NOTE: The buttons data are identical in all sets of this cell.
The highlights of the buttons are probably animated, or it's an authoring error.
You can probably ignore the warning above for this cell.

---------------
Summary: PGCs containing multiple sets of buttons/BOVs
VTSM 7 , LU 1 (de) , 2 (2:40) 44b. '<MBS>'


Now when I call the "Remove Useless Stuff" function several pgcs are uncalled, and I would like to remove them. However PGCEdit says "13 uncalled PGCs that are safe to delete cannot be deleted". Why is that? These PGCs contain jumps to obsolete titles, and I don't see why it wouldn't be safe to delete them. Note that these PGCs are in a different VTS from the chapter menu which contains the multiple sets of menu buttons.

Is there a way to manually remove these uncalled PGCs?

What's the deal with multiple sets of menu buttons, why doesn't PGCEdit fully support it and spits warnings? (Don't take this the wrong way btw, I love PGCEdit. Just curious what's the difficulty with implementing support for this into PGCEdit).

[blutach]

First, it's a big implementation to do multiple button sets.

Now, onto your problem. PgcEdit does this as a safety measure (without having your DVD it's hard to tell you precisely why these ones are singled out but usually, it would mean that if they were, the menus would need to be rewritten, thus overwriting the MBS). Yes, you can ignore the warnings, since the commands are the same. So, go on and delete the unreferenced PGCs. Any that are left can be manually remapped to the bottom of their respective domain (using Domain --> Remap PGCs of domain). After doing this, you can use the Domain --> Delete last PGC in domain function to get rid of them.

Regards

[r0lZ]

Currently, if a button command needs to be changed, for example because its command points now to another VTS, Title or PGC, and that cell has multiple button sets (MBS), PgcEdit keeps only the first set, and overwrites the next ones. However, it keeps the number of sets unchanged. So, if the differences between the sets are only located in the subpic stream (for example to animate the button highlights), it should be safe to edit the buttons, but PgcEdit cannot currently verify that. In the other hand, if the number of buttons, a button command, or the position of the buttons change from set to set, you will probably lose that changes, and have an uggly menu!

When PgcEdit needs to modify something that could have an influence on menus with MBS, it doesn't do it, to be on the safe side. It's probably why PgcEdit has not removed some of your uncalled PGCs. You can try to remove them yourself, but at your own risk! To do it, first remap them to push them on the bottom of the domain (or the LU if they are menu PGCs), using Domain -> Remap PGCs. If the PGCs are Titles, you must also Remap the Title Numbers and Rearrange the TTN numbers so that the title to remove is the last one in the DVD, and the TTN is the last one of the VTST. Then, you can remove the PGC using Delete Last PGC In Domain. (The principle is that PgcEdit can only remove the last element in the domain, LU or DVD.) Be aware that it's when you move an element that PgcEdit might need to update the menu buttons.

I haven't implemented the MBS yet, because they are not easy to handle, and are relatively rare. The difficulty is mainly related to the GUI. To fully support them, the user must be able to modify each set individually. But since there can be thousands of sets in a DVD, he must also be able to modify them all at once, for example with some kind of batch processing. That's not easy to implement. There are also some other technical reasons, too complex to be explained here. Anyway, although I would like to implement the MBS, I have always had more important things to do first.

[EDIT] Blu was faster than me!

[blutach]

Just to emphasise what r0lZ said. In this case, it should be safe to remap and delete last PGC (since the commands are the same). Once they have been pushed to the bottom, you can tear off the domain menu and repeatedly click Delete last PGC in domain until the useless ones are gone. This makes it releatively quick.

Regards

[vwpassion]

Remapping uncalled pgcs to the bottom of the domain and then calling "Delete last PGC in domain" function has worked like a charm. Thanks for the insights.

[blutach]

http://www.digital-digest.com/~blutach/yer.gif