DosBox; Mapping mouse to PS3 Analog Stick

Mayki

Yes, I noticed it. We're currently investigating a problem with the PC, then I try it likes. Thank you for the warning.

GetKeyOpenDoor

I've successfully created all the necessary files etc. (and it somewhat works in dosbox) but how do you figure out which button id comes from which button?
I've used Kodi's logging before to get id's etc but the dpad returns a hat value and I can't find anything in the joymap docs about hat values.
Also the buttons id's from Kodi's log aren't the same as what joymap recognizes.
i.e button id 10 is my startbutton in kodi, but when I map
button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=10 target=kbd button="enter"
it doesn't work

dudleydes

@GetKeyOpenDoor You can use jstest. From the command line, run:

jstest /dev/input/js0

GetKeyOpenDoor

That works, thank you.

so dpad left is -32767 and dpad right is 32767 on axis 4
same for dpad up/down. up = -32767 and down is 32767 on axis 5
and the same for the thumbs. but on axes 0-3
No idea how to map this in joymap, I don't understand how
src=0 target=mouse axis=0 interprets the axes values

because how does this work when dpad up and down is both on axis 5
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=5 target=kbd button="up"
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=5 target=kbd button="down"

EDIT: read something in the docs about plus and minus but no explanation on how to use it.
I've tried axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=5 minus target=kbd button="up"
but that doesn't seem to do anything :EDIT

Also did you guys already figure out how to use the extra values like deadzone and speed?
Do you just paste that on the same line as the button config?

GetKeyOpenDoor

Ok, so I just tested this with the game Abuse after getting all the values from jstest

button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=2 target=mouse button=0
button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=0 target=mouse button=1
Using a 360wired, I've mapped X to mousebutton 0 (left?) and a to button 1 (right?)
nothing happens in game when pressed

I'm about to give up lol, i've been at it for 2 days already and it's proven to be way to difficult.

Concat

You're asking so many specific questions it's hard to understand what you're even trying to do. lol. You should start there. And post your entire mapping file in something like pastebin for us to look at. If you have one error in the file, it will fail to load any of it.

As for plus and minus, look at this mapping:

axis vendor=0x054c product=0x0268 src=0 target=kbd plus="k" minus="i"
axis vendor=0x054c product=0x0268 src=1 target=kbd plus="l" minus="j"

First line is axis, because I'm targeting an axes on my controller.
Vendor and product define which controller.
src defines what input on my controller I'm targetting. In this case, 0 is the X-axis on the left joystick, and 1 is the Y-axis on the left joystick. I've already told the script it's an axis, so it won't look for button 0 and button 1.
On the left joystick, when I push right, the input delivers a positive value, so it's mapped to k. Left is negative, so i.
Y axis is reverse on the ps3 controller. Up is negative and down is positive.

That's how plus and minus work. It's used to map joystick axes to buttons (either keyboard, or a different controller button). I had a hell of a time making this work until the developer released a new version with a "trinary" flag. I dont really understand what it does, but there is documentation on it. so my mapping becomes:

axis vendor=0x054c product=0x0268 src=0 target=kbd plus="k" minus="i" flags="trinary"
axis vendor=0x054c product=0x0268 src=1 target=kbd plus="l" minus="j" flags="trinary"

I have not mapped a button to a mouse click, but this looks fine (at least the format does):

button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=2 target=mouse button=0
button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=0 target=mouse button=1

I just don't know what the numbers are for a wired 360 controller. I googled PS3 and found one that works.

This is gibberish:

axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=5 target=kbd button="up"
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=5 target=kbd button="down"

You are trying to map axis 5 to both up and down without specifying + is up/down, and what - is. I find it strange that your dpad is registering as an axis in general. The ps3 dpad acts as buttons.

Deadzone is a new feature. I put in 1000 and the file failed to load. 100 loads, but I swear it doesn't do anything. I gave up on that because it wasn't needed in my case. At any rate, you would just put Deadzone=100 at the end of an axis target. I never looked into speed.

Overall it is a difficult tool to use. You have to cobble together information from the wiki, the documentation and topics like this. If you think 2 days is bad... look at when I posted first posted this topic. I had to harass the developer because I could not get joystick to keyboard mappings to work without chaos. He listened, found a bug or two, and introduced new features. With the trinary flag , it finally works for me and now I can play shadow warrior with dual joysticks.

The developer himself said he made the tool for himself some time ago, so don't expect some polished product with great instructions. Just keep trying and eliminate all sources of error. Try some easy first, like mapping a single button to a keyboard press, then loading dosbox and see if the button returns the key in the command line. If it doesn't, you are doing something fundamentally wrong. Wrong product number, wrong button number, wrong script to load the map file when the game runs, etc.

GetKeyOpenDoor

@Concat Thank you so much for the proper explanation, I'll try to experiment again in a little bit.

As for
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=5 target=kbd button="up"
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=5 target=kbd button="down"
That was just an example to explain what was confusing me about my dpad, not actually something I put in my mapping file. Because my dpad up/down is both scr=5 I didn't understand how to map that.

GetKeyOpenDoor

Ok, so I've been messing around again for a bit. I can confirm joymap loads, and that my vendor and product ID's are correct. This is my runcommand.log

Found device Microsoft X-Box 360 pad (vendor=0x045e, product=0x028e)
Found device JOYMAP Code Device (vendor=0x00ff, product=0x0000)
DOSBox version SVN

So joymap loads, dosbox loads and the game loads. (I tried again with the game Abuse)
Confirmed button A is 0 via jstest and I've mapped the up keyboard button to A on my controller.

button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=0 target=kbd button="up"

But in game pressing the A button does nothing. Tried mapping other buttons as well, like escape to select and enter to start but got nothing.

button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=8 target=kbd button="esc"
button vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=9 target=kbd button="enter"

Then I tried tumbstick mapping.

# mouse to right thumb
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=2 target=mouse axis=0
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=3 target=mouse axis=1

# kbd arrows to left thumb
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=0 target=kbd plus="right" minus="left"
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=1 target=kbd plus="down" minus="up"

That somewhat worked, but it's constantly registering something because the character is jumping and moving around unless I keep the thumbstick in a fixed position.
Same for the mouse, it's constantly registering up and I can't really control it.
So I tried with the deadzone value set to 100 but that had no effect.
Then I read the documentation again and found that you can set the binary flag.
From the joymap docs: The binary flag can be used to trigger events only when the axis is moved completely in the other direction.
But this didn't help either, and neither did the trinary flag.

So unless I'm missing something obvious and I'm being an idiot again, I think I give up.

Concat

Try this:

axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=0 target=kbd plus="right" minus="left" flags="trinary"
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=1 target=kbd plus="down" minus="up" flags="trinary"

Then again, your controller might just have crappy joysticks that really need the deadzone sorted out.

For the buttons, just load dosbox without a game. Map something like "T" to your A button, and see if you can type a T with the button. No idea why a button mapping wont work. Thats the easiest thing to do in this tool...

Also, try using this to help: http://joystickmapper.com/layouts/mac-xbox360controller-layout.png

Buttons all seem to line up with whatre youre saying except for the axes. Maybe you have some of them wrong.

GetKeyOpenDoor

@Concat I've tried the trinary flag, but didn't have any effect either.

For the buttons, just load dosbox without a game. Map something like "T" to your A button, and see if you can type a T with the button. No idea why a button mapping wont work. Thats the easiest thing to do in this tool...

I'll try that later.
Here's another thing I was thinking about trying out though.

• min – The reported minimum value on the axis. Used for determining
trigger levels.
• max – The reported maximum value on the axis. Used for determining
trigger levels

Except I'm not 100% sure how to implement it, but I was thinking something likes this...
Assuming my thumbsticks have 'idle' axis values ranging between 0-2000 and either -32767 or 32767 when hold to the max in a direction, then defining a min/max value close to the max value should work? (in theory)

# so for movement to the left
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=2 target=mouse axis=0 min=-30000 max=-32767
# movement to the right
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=2 target=mouse axis=0 min=30000 max=32767
# up movement
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=3 target=mouse axis=1 min=-30000 max=-32767
# down movement
axis vendor=0x045e product=0x028e src=3 target=mouse axis=1 min=30000 max=32767

EDIT: Well that seemed to have fixed the deadzone issues, but besides that nothing is working like it should.
Currently the mouse cursor is fixed top left and won't move except for when I push the thumbstick all the way to the left, then it moves to the bottom left in a flash and when I release the thumb it moves back to top left.
It seems to me like something is messed up when it comes to button/axes values, and it's not registering the values as presented by jstest
Really weird because DOSBOX's internal mapper works perfectly fine, if only it had the possibility of mapping the mousekeys.

I've also tested running just dosbox with the Y button mapped to the letter y but it's not responding.