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Has anyone seen anything on making an eight way switch or a little thumb axes control, like the ones found on CD-Products and others' throttles, into a mouse?
Real fighters often use such a device to move the radar cursor. I would like to make it into a mini mouse. (mini mouse? wasn't that Mickey's GF :p)
Thanks, I too would like to know about this myself.
I had little success with plugging a joystick into a networked computer and choosing this a s the main human interface device, but could only move the mouse with the x/y axis of the joystick.
Here is just an idea.
If you have a old ball mouse (not the optical ones), open it and see how it actually works. The ball is connected to a shaft and at one end the shaft is connected to a wheel which has small gaps. These wheel with the gaps then go in between a LED /LED Pick-up sensor. It basically block/unblock the light of the LED on the pick-up.
Now what I would have done is take the two mouse wheels out. Connect the swith of the joystick (Assume a HAT type switch) to an oscillator that flickers the LEDs on/off simulating the movement of the mouse. The frequency of the flicker will determine the speed that the cursor is moving.
Now that I think of it, a mouse sensor probably works like a rotary encoder. It probably has 2 Leds per sensor. Will have to simulate some sort of Gray code. This is an ideal project for a PIC microcontroller or similar.
Hope the idea is clear enough. What do you think?
Another idea:
The PIC18F4550 or the smaller PIC18F2550 has a USB interface using the HID driver in Windows. One could easy set it up as a USB mouse. When pressing the HAT switch, a mouse movement could be simulated.
Problem with these ideas is that you must be able to program microcontrollers.
Guess, I am looking for a software solution. What good are those mini joysticks on the end of the throttle for anyway?
Nobody is going to try and FLY the airplane with it.
The hat switch (or Coolie switch) is normally used for looking around.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AndyT
This isn't the coolie. It is a two axes mini joystick. It is located on the end of the throttle right under where the thumb falls. I know it is on the CH-Products throttle. I assume it is on (from pictures) the Thrustmaster throttle. It is also on the real F-16 throttle and used to move the cursor on the radar.
For what sim do you need such thing? In Lock On you can edit commands. I have Saitek Evo Cyborg, and hat is by default used for looking around. But I assigned it to move target designator in all 8 directions. And if combined with CTRL, I can move radar scanning zone.
No need for special hardware - just edited the in-game commands.
If you're looking for a software-based approach to this, check out Pinnacle Game Profiler. It's a generic profiler for game controllers, and it has the ability you're looking for. I'd describe the program as on a par with Saitek's profiler, but it falls short of Ch Products. It lacks support for complex scripting, combining controllers, and setting response curves. That said, it's really quite functional. I was pleasantly surprised to see all that it can do.
It's at least worth a look. It's $20 USD to register, but you can evaluate it for 30 days. I'm pretty sure that you can find some freeware alternatives as well.
Thanks for the HU. I will check it out.Quote:
Originally Posted by xCav8r
Babalui, I am using FSX.
No problem. Hope the info helps someone. Just realized from re-reading what I wrote though that something I said needs to be clarified. It doesn't allow you to combine multiple controllers into one. It does support multiple controllers. You'll see when you take a look. :)