EVERYTHING FINALLY WORKS!!!!
I want to thank forum users Balala and Yamajac for providing me with the insight, support, and ultimately the solution to this issue. For posterity, here is the complete method you have to use in order to get special characters to display in MediaMonkey 4.1:
1. Locate your "scripts" folder inside your Media Monkey program files.
2. Download the attached script (OutputTextFile), and make sure you change the extention from .txt to .vbs (Save As -> Click the "Save as Type" dropdown -> select "all files" -> append .vbs to the file name -> click "Save")
3. Set the path inside the script to lead to the root folder of whatever skin is displaying your music information (monstercat-visualizer, in my case), then save and close it.
4. Put the script inside your Media Monkey "scripts" folder. Do NOT put it in the "auto" folder or any other sub-folders. Drop it right into that scripts folder, nowhere else.
5. Inside the scripts folder, open scripts.ini and navigate to the bottom of the file. There, you'll need to copy paste this chunk of code:
Code: Select all
[OutputTextFile]
FileName=OutputTextFile.vbs
ProcName=OutputTextFile
Language=VBScript
ScriptType=2
6. Save scripts.ini, and close it.
7. Test run the script. This is to ensure Media Monkey has the permissions it needs to run your script correctly. If it works, and you find your text file in the folder you specified, continue to step 9, otherwise continue to step 8.
8. If your script is giving you a "No Permission" error, or any error related to execution permissions, navigate to your Media Monkey program files folder. Select the folder. Right click, then left click properties. Go to the security tab. Hit the button that says "Edit...". Step through each of the listed entities (CREATOR OWNER, Users, etc.), and grant them "Full control". Once this is done, run your script again and you shouldn't have any permission based issues.
9. Now that your script is running correctly, you're done with the MediaMonkey bit. Now you have to do the Rainmeter bit. Figure out where the code responsible for displaying all your media information in the skin you're trying to modify.
10. It's counter-intuitive, but in order to guarantee that your code substitution works, we're gonna do the modification in the file containing the final meter(s), NOT wherever the original measures are coming from.
11. Now you're going to need to make your parent WebParser measure. I suggest doing all of the following steps at the top of the file, just under the [Rainmeter], [Metadata] and [Variables] sections. Here's my template:
Code: Select all
[MeasurePlayingFile]
Measure=WebParser
URL=file://PATH TO TEXT FILE GOES HERE
RegExp=(?siU)<artist>(.*)</artist>.*<track>(.*)</track>.*<album>(.*)</album>
UpdateRate=10
Codepage=1200
12. Now set up your child measures. Here are my templates:
Code: Select all
[MeasureArtistMM]
Measure=WebParser
URL=[MeasurePlayingFile]
StringIndex=1
[MeasureTrackMM]
Measure=WebParser
URL=[MeasurePlayingFile]
StringIndex=2
I haven't added in the album field for this example, since the meter I've personally frankenstein'ed doesn't support a third info field natively. If you want to include it, go for it, you should be able to extrapolate from this guide.
13. Now that your measures are all set up, go find the meter(s) that are ultimately displaying your media information. Find the measures they're currently using, and replace them with the measures we've just set up here. This shouldn't be too hard, since you're (supposed to be) doing all this in the same file.
14. Save everything, refesh all meters involved. Fire up Media Monkey and smash play on whatever hot new Japanese Future Funk album you've purchased. Check your skin, make sure it's processing everything correctly AND updating an acceptable speed when you change tracks.
With luck, you're going to see some beautiful Japanese sitting right there on your desktop. Right where it belongs. If I missed a step or forgot anything, please bump this thread. Let me know.
Credits:
The original version of the MediaMonkey script OutputTextFile was originally written by MediaMonkey forum user parkint in 2004, and remade by MediaMonkey forum user kireev20000 in 2016. The original thread containing the original script code can be found
here.
The issues with NowPlaying as a measure for MediaMonkey were discovered by Rainmeter forum user balala, which can be found
here.
All of the coding needed to acutally make my trashy web parsing work was provided by Rainmeter forums user Yamajac, in this thread.
Conclusion:
This was a wild three day ride, and it seems fitting that I'm writing the conclusion to it at 1AM. Thanks to the support of forum users past and present, as well as documentation from across the web made by who knows how many kind souls, I have finally put this issue to rest. Special characters now display as just that, special characters. One last massive thank you yet again to the patient folks who helped me out with this. Hopefully this post will pay it foward to somebody down the road who wants this same problem fixed.
Cheers,
Technotastic