Mouse control sucks when using "pointer precision"
BlitzMax Forums/BlitzMax Programming/Mouse control sucks when using "pointer precision"
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| I encountered a problem with my space shooter the other day when I was demonstrating it to a friend on my laptop. The game had become unplayable because the ship would either move really slowly, or accelerate really fast. I traced the cause of this issue to a setting in the mouse control panel called "pointer precision" which causes the mouse's speed to be non-linear. In other words, the speed at which you move the mouse does not correspond 1:1 with the speed the cursor moves on the screen. There's a threshold speed below which the mouse moves at say half speed, and above which it moves at normal speed. Anyway, I was wondering if there was some way to avoid this issue. I know from my days working in DOS that mice don't send screen coordinates to the PC, they send "mickeys" which used to be the little ticks of the wheel. So instead of having to hack the mouse by resetting the mouse cursor to the middle of the screen each frame to try to determine the speed of it that way, you could just read the speed on each axis directly. I would assume there is a way to do this in Windows, which commercial games use, and which is unaffected by silly settings like "pointer precision". So, anyone got any ideas? |
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| The mouse is a pointing device, I've never seen any evidence that it makes an effective analog controller. Since DirectInput was discontinued I don't think there is any way to go low level anyway, oh, look, i'm wrong, why use google when others can do it for you :) http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb206183(VS.85).aspx |
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| Google wouldn't find me a premade blitz lib someone wrote and hasn't put in the code archives. Well, not yet anyway. Give it a few more years. :-) |
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| I remembered reading an article long ago about Windows' mouse acceleration algorithm, and it turned out to be linked from that page. The link is broken, but it offers a re-direct to here: http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/archive/pointer-bal.mspx I believe Enhanced Pointer Precision does the opposite of the acceleration thing sswift mentions, but this article would let you re-implement that acceleration with enhanced precision, since they explain the algorithm used. If only OS X used the same algorithm... I find it almost impossible to get a decent 'feel' from the settings it offers. |
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Okay, I found a list of events in BlitzMax:Const EVENT_APPMASK=$100 Const EVENT_APPSUSPEND=$101 Const EVENT_APPRESUME=$102 Const EVENT_APPTERMINATE=$103 Const EVENT_APPOPENFILE=$104 Const EVENT_APPIDLE=$105 'Reserved by Mark! Const EVENT_KEYMASK=$200 Const EVENT_KEYDOWN=$201 Const EVENT_KEYUP=$202 Const EVENT_KEYCHAR=$203 Const EVENT_KEYREPEAT=$204 Const EVENT_MOUSEMASK=$400 Const EVENT_MOUSEDOWN=$401 Const EVENT_MOUSEUP=$402 Const EVENT_MOUSEMOVE=$403 Const EVENT_MOUSEWHEEL=$404 Const EVENT_MOUSEENTER=$405 Const EVENT_MOUSELEAVE=$406 Const EVENT_TIMERMASK=$800 Const EVENT_TIMERTICK=$801 Const EVENT_HOTKEYMASK=$1000 Const EVENT_HOTKEYHIT=$1001 Const EVENT_GADGETMASK=$2000 Const EVENT_GADGETACTION=$2001 Const EVENT_GADGETPAINT=$2002 Const EVENT_GADGETSELECT=$2003 Const EVENT_GADGETMENU=$2004 Const EVENT_GADGETOPEN=$2005 Const EVENT_GADGETCLOSE=$2006 Const EVENT_GADGETDONE=$2007 Const EVENT_GADGETLOSTFOCUS=$2008 Const EVENT_GADGETSHAPE=$2009 'reserved by Mark! Const EVENT_WINDOWMASK=$4000 Const EVENT_WINDOWMOVE=$4001 Const EVENT_WINDOWSIZE=$4002 Const EVENT_WINDOWCLOSE=$4003 Const EVENT_WINDOWACTIVATE=$4004 Const EVENT_WINDOWACCEPT=$4005 Const EVENT_MENUMASK=$8000 Const EVENT_MENUACTION=$8001 Const EVENT_STREAMMASK=$10000 Const EVENT_STREAMEOF=$10001 Const EVENT_STREAMAVAIL=$10002 Const EVENT_PROCESSMASK=$20000 Const EVENT_PROCESSEXIT=$20001 Const EVENT_USEREVENTMASK=$80000000 But this doesn't seem to have something along the lines of WM_INPUT. Which means, I suppose, that if I want to make use of that, that I would need to get windows events some other way? And that if I did so, it would only work on Windows, and not Mac? |
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| And that if I did so, it would only work on Windows, and not Mac? Yup. This is about Windows' precision pointer setting.. Where did the Mac come in?http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms633573(VS.85).aspx http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=50175#558050 |
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| Yup. This is about Windows' precision pointer setting.. Where did the Mac come in? Well, if you're going to read the speed of the mouse, then you want to read the speed of the mouse, not have a hack on the Mac to do it, and do it a different, but proper way on the PC. That would make for some messy and confusing code. Also, I don't know if the Mac has any mouse acceleration built in, but if it is, I'd want to disable it there as well. In addition, if different Mac mice have different levels of sensitivity, you'd want to take advantage of that as well. But even if all Mac mice are the same, and there is no acceleration built into the pointer, I'd want to read the acceleration for that as well, just so that you can have one cleanly written function that reads the acceleration on all platforms, and you don't have to kludge one of them with mouse recentering hacks. |
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| Since DirectInput was discontinued I don't think there is any way to go low level anyway, It is just a mouse and not overly complex. He could write his own mouse driver. |
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| if different Mac mice have different levels of sensitivity A mouse is a mouse. I currently have a Logitech optical mouse plugged into my Mac. My preference is for my mouse to be very sensitive - slow movements, slow mouse, faster movements very fast mouse - which is of course completely customisable via the system preferences. |
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| "A mouse is a mouse." Nope. Some have 300 dpi, and others have 600dpi. :-) |
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| ...for starters. Some high-end gaming mice will support 3600 dpi.. |
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