Re: [AD] OSX and Joysticks

[Angelo Mottola <a.mottola@xxxxxxxxxx>]

> I have a MacAlly iShockII
> (http://www.macally.com/spec/usb/input_device/gaming.html).  I plugged
> it in tonight and ran exjoy.

I have a very similar joypad... Mine has 12 buttons though.

> First thing: if I run in digital mode, the stick stays uncalibrated;
> shouldn't exjoy ask for calibration in digital mode?

Not if the driver doesn't explicitely support calibration AFAIK. And
currently it doesn't: just leave the sticks centered at program startup and
it should work fine.

> In analogue mode, only stick I is recognized (the iShockII has two
> sticks).  I haven't looked through the code to see if this is a
> limitation of the program or not.  Stick one works just fine.

Exjoy only works with the first axis. Try the setup program if you want to
test other axis as well!
Ok about exjoy working fine with the first analog stick in analog mode. What
about digital mode? Does it work if you set the digital mode in both the
joypad and exjoy? The directional pad should work then, and the first analog
stick could be an alias for it.

> Something strange: the directional pad (digital) doesn't register as a
> joystick at all, but as buttons 1-4!  This means that the total number
> of buttons on my pad is 17 -- the four d-pad directions, four face
> buttons, four shoulder buttons, three command buttons (start, select,
> etc), and two analogue stick "clicks" (PS2 owners know what I mean).
> Isn't the current limit on buttons 16?  Anyone have any qualms upping
> that to 24?

Heh, if more than 16 buttons are found, last ones are discarded...
About the directional pad seen as buttons, it does the same for me on the
second analog stick (each direction is seen as a button press) if I set
digital mode in both exjoy and on the pad. BTW, please be sure the
analog/digital switch on your joypad always reflects your choice at exjoy
startup!

> I don't know how the "directional pad comes up as four buttons" thing
> should be handled.  Should it be left to the programmer to come up with
> solutions, or should the driver transparently recognize that a specific
> joystick is loaded and translate the d-pad into a third "stick"?

The Allegro joystick driver just relies on what the OSX HID Manager returns
to it. If it says a *button* is pressed when you move a stick, there's
nothing I can do about it :P

> Hope this all helps someone (hi Angelo ;),

Hi Charles :) And thanks for the feedback, it's always welcome!

-- 
Angelo Mottola
a.mottola@xxxxxxxxxx