Hotkey conflicts

[xylem]

I have been flying LOMAC and using TrackIR3 Pro, but am having a major problem.

Something about the cmds given to wingmen turns the TIR off at the most inopportune times.

I use 'Game Commander' voice recog to give orders to my wingman (& flight), although I suspect it would make no difference wether I did nor not; just using the keys would still be a problem. The main prob, I think, is the F12 key, which is a cmd which turns off the radio mike in the game; it is also the 'Center' hotkey.

In addition the Pause (F9) and Precision (F8)Hotkeys are also in-game cmds, and they may be contributing to the problem too.

LOMAC is a cmd intensive game; all of the single letter (and as far as I can tell, alll of the single keystrokes in general) are USED for something.

Hence, I think it is impossible to find a single keystroke to which to reassign Hotkeys. And the TrakIR software apparently DOES NOT ALLOW for multiple keystrokes. Is there any way that NP could change this so that multiple keys could be used for hotkey cmds? This would make a larger number of cmds available.

Anybody have any other idess? Have I missed something?

Thanks.....

EDIT: to clarify a bit: each Radio cmd contains many keystrokes. Some cmds, such as "Return to Base", given to wing use F8. And some, such as "Open formation" contain the keystroke F9. All cmds end with F12 (closes transmission).

[ May 19, 2005, 03:26 PM: Message edited by: xylem ]

[Barred]

This may sound daft, but have you tried to use a free button to map TIR Center to? This or selecting an unused button for the centre should free up any conflict with F12.

[xylem]

Not daft at all, Barred. But I can't find a 'free' button. Are you aware of one?

That's why I thought a double key press, like ALT-something, would work, bur doesn't seem to be available.

Also, I've tried other voice cmds which do not involve the three keys I mentioned (F8, F9, F12) and TrackIR still cuts out. Oddly,giving another voice cmd sometimes turns it back on.

It's odd - I can't figure it out, but it seems to involve the 'F' keys.

[ May 19, 2005, 05:59 PM: Message edited by: xylem ]

[James Hallows]

Actuall there are more free single keys you can use. Try F13 to F24 for a start. You need to use a keyboard with these on, or a programmable joystick (like the Cougar) to generate them, and then instruct the TrackIR software to use these as the re-centre and toggle on/off keys.

They work fine (well I'm using F14 currently) although the software doesn't display the identified key properly. But that doesn't matter .... it does work.

All sims and games do not assign anything to F13 to F24, but so long as they recognise them, they can get you out of trouble when trying to avoid chorded keys (ef. ALT + F4, SHF c etc.)

Cheers

James

[xylem]

Thanks James, even though I have no idea what you're talking about. LOL

I don't have keys F13-F24 and although I have a programmable joystick, the X-52, I have no idea how to program additional keys. Will give it some thought, though.

I did discover that I had just 3 'free' keys; Ctrl, Alt, and End. And so I've used those and things are better. The TrackIR doesn't cut out so often, but occasioanlly a radio cmd and even announcements from the AWACS seems to cause the TIR to lose contact. Very odd.

Thanks for your advice. I'll keep working on this

[James Hallows]

Contact Saitek and see if they know of a way of programming your stick to generate the extra function keys.

Cheers

James

[Barred]

Good idea Jame I had forgotten about those extra function keys.

[James Hallows]

There are many situations that arise in setting up programmable controllers for flight sims, where you don't want to use chorded keys. (A chorded key is two keys pressed together, eg. SHIFT + c).

In many sims, all the single keys are already allocated and you run out of fresh ones to assign. It then becomes a bit of a nightmare to reassign those allocated elsewhere.

In these situations, if you can't allocate a DirectX button (thankfully you can with TrackIR which is always a good way round this issue) then you need to search for single keyboard keys. And there are in fact quite a few you can use even if you don't have the physical keys present on your keyboard. When we were developing the Cougar, we wanted to ensure that it could also generate heneric USB keycodes just as previous TM controllers could generate RAW (or Scan) keycodes.

Cheers

James

Edit: I've added a thread (Programming the function keys: F13 to F24 - some tips.)over on the Cougar World forums for Cougar users interested in this.

[ May 21, 2005, 06:51 AM: Message edited by: James Hallows ]

[xylem]

Thanks guys; but that's all still a little esoteric for me.

And if I may restate my problem:

I have changed the TIR hotkeys and yet I still am getting cutout of the TIR system (the green light turns red) when I use voice comms. And these comms should not now be using any keys that would interfere with TIR.

So I wonder what's happening? And I wonder if anyone else is having these problems? Or if anyone has any insight.

But thanks for all the help. I do appreciate it.