Assign Mouse Buttons to SP Buttons?

Mike Truly · Post by **Mike Truly** » Sat May 16, 2009 8:09 am

I am getting a lot of right-hand strain from all my mouse use. I would like to be able to assign mouse buttons to SpacePilot buttons so that I could move the mouse with my right hand and click the mouse buttons with the SpacePilot buttons.

I see that the new SpacePilot Pro is certainly more ergonomically designed (and I am weighing whether to upgrade) but I haven't dug into all the details about it.

Is there a way to assign mouse buttons to SpacePilot buttons?

I also have a Countour ****** device that I use on another system and it DOES have a way to assign mouse buttons to ****** buttons and this takes a large load off my right hand when using that system. But I would like the SpacePilot to be able to do the same thing.

Thanks for any ideas!

Post by **jwick** » Sat May 16, 2009 9:18 am

Hi Mike,

Yes, you can assign Left, Middle and Right Mouse buttons to your 3Dx device buttons. You may have to make a small mod to the config file for your application to make it work.

You can try it out by chosing the "Any Application" config in the 3DxWare GUI while your app is running. This config has the mouse buttons in the button lists.

To make it work in your application, if the mouse buttons are not in the config for your app, copy the three mouse button entries (UI_MOUSE_LEFT, UI_MOUSE_MIDDLE, UI_MOUSE_RIGHT) from the Any.scg file into the config for your app.

Jim

Mike Truly · Post by **Mike Truly** » Sat May 16, 2009 10:24 am

Hi Jim,

Thanks very much for the info.

When I look in the Connexion Control Panel, I can find no entries for mouse buttons. When I do a search of the any.scg file, there are no entries for UI_Mouse, etc. Can I add these entries? Where do I add them?

Thanks again.

Post by **jwick** » Sat May 16, 2009 10:37 am

Hi Mike,

Do you have a recent release?

There should be three lines in the section:

BUTTON_NUMBERS =
{
...
{ UI_MOUSE_LEFT, "Left Mouse", 107 },
{ UI_MOUSE_MIDDLE, "Middle Mouse", 108 },
{ UI_MOUSE_RIGHT, "Right Mouse", 109 },
...
}

If not, add them.

Jim

Mike Truly · Post by **Mike Truly** » Sat May 16, 2009 10:45 am

Jim,

This release is version 3.6.11. Those entries were not there. I added them.

But my machine is currently uploading so I can't further test at the moment. Will test later.

Thanks again.

Post by **jwick** » Sat May 16, 2009 10:51 am

The current release (3.7.something) has a lot of extra button things that were added for the SPP. The mouse buttons have been there for a while, but I probably didn't advertise them (there's a lot of that in the driver).

Take care of that right wing.

Mike Truly · Post by **Mike Truly** » Mon May 18, 2009 3:04 pm

Jim,

Finally got back around to testing and the mouse button assignability works great! Thanks for that.

But one related thing I'm wondering about. I am wondering if there is something about my install that is wacked... let me explain.

My system is XPx64 and when I have done the install of the drivers (currently using 3.6.11), the SP works but when the machine is first started, the display shows 'Any Application - Mike Truly'. If I go into the SP Control Panel, I can pick other configs such as just plain 'Any Application'. This is where I assigned the Left Mouse button and Right Mouse button.

What I'm wondering is if I have too many extraneous configs because of multiple installs. How many should there be after a clean install and where should they be? I would like to have it start with the plain 'Any Application' so the assigned mouse buttons would be ready to use.

Thanks again.

Mike Truly · Post by **Mike Truly** » Mon May 18, 2009 3:16 pm

Ahhh... OK, I was able to add those Mouse entries to the 'Any Application - Mike Truly' config so now they are there in that one.

One other unrelated thing. When I do an install of the driver and reboot the system, the SP starts up properly first showing the logo then ending up showing the config 'Any Application - Mike Truly' and is active and ready to use the buttons (such as the L Mouse assigned button).

But when I later run my registry cleaning software (like after uninstalling some other app), the registry cleaning software will render the SP unusable at startup. So for example it might only show the SP logo but is not active. Only when I open the SP Control Panel and then close it will the SP be active and ready to use.

Is there any thing that can be done so the registry cleaning software will not wack the SP setup? If I re-install the SP drivers, then it will be back to working again at reboot.

Thanks!

Post by **jwick** » Mon May 18, 2009 4:57 pm

Hi Mike,

You are probably wacking the registry settings the driver uses, under HKCU/software/3dconnexion/3dxware/applications. This is where the driver saves what scg file you last used for all the executables you run.

You may also be damaging the Startup folder contents. That is what starts the driver each time you boot. If the driver doesn't start, the SP display will be the logo from powerup.

Jim

Mike Truly · Post by **Mike Truly** » Mon May 18, 2009 6:38 pm

Jim,

Thanks for that. It was killing the file in the Startup folder. After doing a Repair install, that was re-instated so I will have to be careful when using the Registry Cleaner.

Thanks again.