AutoHotkey Community

[Jabberwock]

Is there a way to create a "virtual joystick" that would combine joysticks, keyboard scripts etc. into one controller?

If not, is such a feature planned?

[Chris]

Although you can't yet simulate joystick movement or button presses, you can have a joystick send keystrokes or act as a mouse. If you want to use a keyboard or mouse as a joystick, I believe there is other software that can do that.

[BaldieJr]

A virtual joystick would be incredibly usefull.

Personally, I'd like to be able to edit my sticks response curve and use hotkeys to switch pre-made responses on-the-fly. Axis shifts would also be handy (button3 + Xaxis = slider1_virtualstick1). While I'm dreaming: use a pair of sliders to alter X/Y axis center (for trim controls ) would be the icing on the cake.

I could think of new ideas all day

[Chris]

Thanks I've made a note of those as potential features.

[BaldieJr]

Awesome.

One problem though: Most games require a constant setting for a joystick. This might cause potential problems when you set out to code something up.

An example would be button+axis = virtual_axis. Once the button is released (returning the axis to its origional function), the virtual axis would have to maintain its set input.

Neat stuff, but probably complex to write.

Honestly though, being able to manipulate axis data on-the-go (axis shaping?) and allowing multiple responses would probably be the Ultimate Flight Sim Function, especially if it can be done with little overhead.

[Chris]

Since it's so useful, maybe there are some joysticks -- especially those specialized for flight sims -- whose software already allows programming the buttons to alter the behavior of the axes.

[BaldieJr]

I've not encountered any. Maybe the really expensive joysticks can do this.

I did find something of interest though: ppjoy.

It has a virtual joystick driver built into it, and is very customizable. It even includes an app that sends mouse data to the OS via the virtual stick.... instant free joystick.

Thats good enough for me

Any chance of getting the ability to send axis data to the virtual stick through autohotkey? The most elegant solution would be a virtual joystick driver provided by autohoykey, but hey, I'm not picky if I can accomplish what I want.

By the way: THANK YOU. I can't say it enough really. I wrote an loop-lock-unlock using two seperate keys but mulitple states (loop runs: Puase loop if key "X" is pressed, unpause if key "y" is pressed twice). I thought it was going to be difficult, but it was actually quite easy.

[BaldieJr]

Docs on sending to virtual stick:

http://www.geocities.com/deonvdw/Docs/PPJoyMain.htm?Page=http://www.geocities.com/deonvdw/Docs/Diagrams/Virtual/IOCTL.htm



FYI: That site uses frames poorly.

[Chris]

That's a nice site, thanks. It might be useful when the time comes to add joystick simulation (though hopefully that can be achieved without needing a special joystick driver, as this program appears to use).

[BaldieJr]

Like I said, the more elegant solution would be low-level support via autohotkey, but if you can have autohotkey just talk to the ppjoy virtual joystick driver, I'd be happy as a pig in poo.

autohotkey could just read real_joystick_axis and send to virtual_joystick_axis (with altrerations, of course ).

I think any sim-junky willing to learn autohotkey would be willing to install ppjoy.

[kasun sanjeeva]