Calling all lateral thinkers - I have controller question

[matsher]

Hi gents,

A quick summery -
I bought a Saitek throttle quadrant and its a great tool, it also has a great clamp
to attach it to my desk, I also have a USB PS3 game pad which I have attached to
the saitek unit... they work great together... Now before all you jokers tell me to
get an X52, I can't / won't because I'm left-handed and no damned manufacturer
makes a HOTAS for a left handed person... I think the reason for that is because they are all right-handed facists ... apologies, I digress...
Anyhoo, so here is my question...

Is there anyway I can assign axies's to the 2 thumb sticks and get them to act as NON-constant input levers?
ie: If I assign left thumb stick y-axis to elevator trim and x-axis to rudder trim,
is there a way to get the inputs to stay there when I release the thumb stick
and NOT return to the neutral centred value.

I hope I am making sense ...

ie ie: So. lets say I assign an engine throttle to the left thumb stick y-axis...
can I push the thumb stick up (throttle to 100%) release the thumb stick and have the engine stay
at 100% and not return to 50% (being the centre position % value)?

Please help me crack this one, its driving me mad and I don't want to waste a potential extra 4 axis'seses.
The only use I have come up with for them so far is independent L/R wheel brakes...

I've attached a pic so you can understand what I mean better.

Thanks in advance.

[335th_GRAthos]

OK, ok, so no X52.... hmmmmm


Well, first solution would be to buy a second throttle quadrant (that is what I did).

Second is, you can try something that Sokol wrote today:

You can assign the throttle to a combination of KEY+joystick axis(I have not tested it myself but was amazed to read about it):
So allocate:
CTRL+left thumb stick y-axis for your throttle. The moment you leave CTRL your y-axis is no longer active for throttle command.

To make maters easier I would allocate instead of CTRL a joystick button like the one on top of your left thumb.


As said I have no personal experience so thank okol if it worked.

And please post the results (it saves me the efford trying to test it myself) ;-)

Happy Flying

~S~

[matsher]

OK, ok, so no X52.... hmmmmm


Well, first solution would be to buy a second throttle quadrant (that is what I did).

Second is, you can try something that Sokol wrote today:

You can assign the throttle to a combination of KEY+joystick axis(I have not tested it myself but was amazed to read about it):
So allocate:
CTRL+left thumb stick y-axis for your throttle. The moment you leave CTRL your y-axis is no longer active for throttle command.

To make maters easier I would allocate instead of CTRL a joystick button like the one on top of your left thumb.


As said I have no personal experience so thank okol if it worked.

And please post the results (it saves me the efford trying to test it myself) ;-)

Happy Flying

~S~

Interesting... So kinda like a shift function. So hold a button to activate the axis function.
Then release button to deactivate axis function while I am holding the thumb stick at the desired angle. Am I getting it right?

So lets pretend I assign prop pitch on engines 1-4 on the gamepad's 4 button D-pad. (eg engine 1 - top D-button, engine 2 - right D-button etc) Could I hold down a D-pad button move the thumb stick down, release D-pad button, then release thumb stick and have that engines prop pitch stay at the desired %???

Maybe thats asking too much.

Cool I could try it out... How do I assign that functionality?
To my knowledge you can't assign a joy button in the axis control settings.

Thanks for your advice GRAthos... Will most certainly feedback if it proves user friendly.


However, I can't shake the feeling that I am missing something basic here.
I want those 4 extra axisesessss to act like a mouse wheel does...
You can assign a function to mouse wheel scroll up and you can assign a
seperate function to mouse wheel scroll down...

Is there a way to split the thumb stick axis in half - assign a function to +Y axis
and assign a different (opposite) function to -Y axis... Same goes for the X and Z axisesesess.

The old IL2 could separate a single axis into - & + values... Thinking about it
is making my head hurt.

Hope I can get many and interesting solutions to experiment with.

[MadBlaster]

Hi gents,

A quick summery -
I bought a Saitek throttle quadrant and its a great tool, it also has a great clamp
to attach it to my desk, I also have a USB PS3 game pad which I have attached to
the saitek unit... they work great together... Now before all you jokers tell me to
get an X52, I can't / won't because I'm left-handed and no damned manufacturer
makes a HOTAS for a left handed person... I think the reason for that is because they are all right-handed facists ... apologies, I digress...
Anyhoo, so here is my question...

Is there anyway I can assign axies's to the 2 thumb sticks and get them to act as NON-constant input levers?
ie: If I assign left thumb stick y-axis to elevator trim and x-axis to rudder trim,
is there a way to get the inputs to stay there when I release the thumb stick
and NOT return to the neutral centred value.

I hope I am making sense ...

ie ie: So. lets say I assign an engine throttle to the left thumb stick y-axis...
can I push the thumb stick up (throttle to 100%) release the thumb stick and have the engine stay
at 100% and not return to 50% (being the centre position % value)?

Please help me crack this one, its driving me mad and I don't want to waste a potential extra 4 axis'seses.
The only use I have come up with for them so far is independent L/R wheel brakes...

I've attached a pic so you can understand what I mean better.

Thanks in advance.

yes u can using Glovepie/PPJOY. you must write a script. but need to clear something up.

the left ministick on the gamepad controls x and y axis
the right ministick on the gamepad controls roll and z axis.

So, this is what i did for elevator trim. I post below.

when I move the left ministick down in the y axis direction, an audible "click" is made and my elevator trim is adjusted by 10% for climb. If I keep holding the stick, 1 second later another audible "click" is heard and my elevator trim is adjusted to 20%....and so on and so on until I release my ministick. Now, I want to neutral my elevator trim...so I press the button on top of the x/y ministick and my elevator trim is now neutral. Now, I want to trim for dive, I move my ministick up....and it's the same way as for climb. See my other posts for glovepie on this board to figure other stuff out. I go take nap now.:)

*ELEVATOR TRIM
if (said("nose up",5) or helddown(joystick2.Pov1=180.00,.1 second)) and var.etlock<1 then
var.etlock=var.etlock+.1
say"click"
wait .25 second
elseif (said("nose down",5) or helddown(joystick2.Pov1=0.00,.1 second)) and var.etlock>-1 then
var.etlock=var.etlock-.1
say"click"
wait .25 second
elseif said("elevator trim neutral",5) or said("all trims neutral",5) or said("neutral",5) or released(joystick2.Button11)
var.etlock=0
say"elevator trim neutral"
elseif said("climb",6)
var.etlock=.4
say"climb"
elseif said("dive",5)
var.etlock=-.4
say"dive"
elseif said("full elevator trim",5)
var.etlock=1
say"full elevator trim"
endif
if var.etlock>1 then
var.etlock=1
elseif var.etlock<-1 then
var.etlock=-1
endif

*OUTPUT TO GAME AXIS
PPJoy1.Analog7=joystick1.y+var.etlock/*Joystick3+AXE_RY=1trimelevator*/

[matsher]

thank you thank you thank you ... That sounds pretty awesome Mad Blaster.

Please explain to me how it works, how I can use it, where can I get it, how to write a script ...
In fact, tell me everything... When you wake up of course.

yay!

[MadBlaster]

Download this http://glovepie.org/GlovePIEWithoutEmotiv043.zip to your desktop or wherever.

after you download it. unzip it to an empty folder. rename the folder "GlovePie". move that unzipped folder to your programs directory.

Now open that folder. you should see green/yellow icon called glovepie. that is the program (executable). make a shortcut for the

program (right click send shorcut to desktop). Okay, now you can easily open and close glovepie from your desktop.

2)okay now that you the program, open it and go to the tab/window called "untitled". type this in the window:

debug = key.a


now click the "run" button at the top. in the window, you should see it say "true" and "false" when you press the "a" key on your keyboard. if you get this far, you are on good start. glovepie sees your keyboard. let me know and i will go to next step...installing ppjoy.

Also, there is a "readme" that is in the glovepie folder. read it just for some background. also you tube has videos on how to script in glovepie. btw, after learning glovepie, you will start to wonder in amazement why people buy expensive rudder pedals and joysticks to play this game.;)

[matsher]

You're the man Blaster... I have downloaded Glovepie from my Mac.

Iam waiting for my iT GURU friend is coming over to install my new hardware into my PC.
So that might take a while... Getting Win 7 64bit new MOBO and NEW DDR3 Ram
New faster harddrive so that might take a while to get everything working properly again.

But as soon as I have it all running COD smoothly I'll put GlovePie in the PC and, in the meantime
should I download PPjoy while I have some time?

Thank you Grathos and Blaster for taking tha time to help.
All the best
Mat

[MadBlaster]

Yes. Here this site is hosting both PPJOY and Glovepie download: http://www.squarephoenix.com/ppjoy_setup.html. See the "downloads" tab. Also, it walks you through how to install PPJOY. Set up one virtual joystick as the site instructs you to. That will give you 8 new virtual axis. I actually have 4 virutal joys set up and run all my controls through up to 32 virtual axis. I think you can do even more!!! Anyway, gives me much more flexibility for script writing for the game. You can always do it later though as you needs and desires change.

This you need to know as it has been this way as long as I can remember. PPJOY, doesn't used signed drivers. So you will get a warning sign when you try to install it. Just click on the "continue anyway" button.

Oh wait! Had a thought, if your going to 64 bit, that version at squarephoenix might not work for you. just second let me search web....http://ppjoy.blogspot.com/2009/11/finally-new-version.html Ok, this is the blog from guy who actually created ppjoy I guess. there is link for latest version where it says "update, lateest installer". Also, if you read that blog, the reason he doesn't use signed drivers is because it costs too much...lol. Ok, that makes sense.

Once you get it installed and one virtual joystick setup up, the next step is modifying the confUser.ini. Back in 5 min. to post something on that.

[MadBlaster]

Before you do anything, save a backup of this file My Documents\1C SoftClub\il-2 sturmovik cliffs of dover\confUser.ini.
somewhere safe. Also, turn Steam offline mode so it doesn't patch and write over anything your trying to do now. Also, as you
update this file with new stuff, back it up periodically in separate location so you don't lose all your work when STEAM
patches the game. Also, disable the STEAM cloud. I save all my conf.ini files and scripts on separate drive so if I lose anything
I can get it back easily.

Okay, this is from my confUser.ini:

[HotKey pilotMove]
Joystick3+AXE_RX=1pitch
Joystick3+AXE_RY=1trimelevator
Joystick3+AXE_RZ=1throttle
Joystick3+AXE_U=1brakes
Joystick3+AXE_V=1flaps
Joystick3+AXE_X=1aileron
Joystick3+AXE_Y=1elevator
Joystick3+AXE_Z=1rudder
Joystick4+AXE_RX=1leslats
Joystick4+AXE_RY=1underc
Joystick4+AXE_RZ=1trimrudder
Joystick4+AXE_U=1brakesrt
Joystick4+AXE_V=1brakeslt
Joystick4+AXE_X=1radiator
Joystick4+AXE_Y=1oilradiator
Joystick4+AXE_Z=1mix
Joystick5+AXE_RX=1throttle_wep
Joystick5+AXE_RY=1trimaileron
Joystick5+AXE_RZ=1airbrake
Joystick5+AXE_U=1compressor
Joystick5+AXE_V=1tankselector3
Joystick5+AXE_X=1carbheater
Joystick5+AXE_Y=1tankselector2
Joystick5+AXE_Z=1tankselector0
Joystick6+AXE_RX=1tankselector1
Joystick6+AXE_RY=1impellerretr
Joystick6+AXE_RZ=1bombbaydoor

You say you want to add 2 new axis. Okay, pick the actions above that you want to map
and change the number in front of "Joystick" to???

Okay time to point out that Windows names controllers by starting with "zero". So, if you only have one
real joystick controller attached to your computer, that is numbered "zero" for windows purposes. However, Glovepie
would name this as "joystick1". So this is where the confusion happens. The game wants to know the windows number.

So how to know for sure if you have bunch of controllers attached? Go to control panel and select game controllers.
when the window shows up, it lists all your game controlles in descending order, including any virtual joysticks which
looks like another real controller to windows. So the one at the top is windows=0, Glovepie=joystick1. The next controller
would be windows=1, Glovepie=joystick2...etc. Anyway, this is the part you have to figure out is how your gamepad is named by
windows and glovepie, depending on where it lies on that list. When you figure it out then>>>

Pick the actions you want to map from above, copy paste them under [HotKey,pilotMove] in your confUser.ini (lol,it really isn't so confusing!)
and put the "windows" number in front of the "Joystick" part of the string. Your confUser.ini used for the game is under
My Documents\1C SoftClub\il-2 sturmovik cliffs of dover\confUser.ini. Once you do that save the file, close it and start up the game.
Go to the game options/controls\aircraft\axis...you should see them listed there. If not, you did something wrong. Let me know when you get this
far.



Tip for future consideration: If you don't have rudder pedals (and I would never use them anyway lol),
I would detach that gamepad from your throttle quadrant. Find yourself a 3 inch in length piece of
PVC pipe (1 inch diameter) and mount that underneath your gamepad using sticky velcro so that you gamepad
sits at an angle to your desktop, giving you the perfect rudder/throttle/proppitch/whatever controller.
Lay your right hand on top (cuz your left handed) so that your right thumb is on top of the left (x/y) ministick.
make that x-axis your rudder. I promise, You won't get any better rudder accuracy than that! Your shooting
accuracy will be superior to rudder pedals and 3d twist sticks in every way with a little practice and feels stange
at first, but becomes quite natural in time.

Good reading: there is a word file in your glovepie folder called "documentation" it tells you everything glovepie can do and
basics on scripting and glovepie capabilities (e.g., voice command..you need to install sp51 (name?) and need headset with mic).