VelocityOne Flight Yoke

[mjwasser]

I am having a difficult time interfacing this yoke and throttle unit to FlightGear. I have a reasonable understanding of XML...but I am apparently missing the bigger picture.

I seem to have multiple problem...for intance.... FlightGear, and the js_demo tool recognize two VelocityOne yokes. I thought FlightGear may be identifying the each unit, yoke and throttle bank, and individual units, but unplugging the throttle bank does not correct the double listing.

My objective is to get this working to practice flying....not writing interface code. I am a big fan of open source software so I would really like to make this work. I have read what I can find on the Input Device pages but will continue to look for answers.

I am looking for a straightforward discussion of how FilghtGear performs the automatic hardware discovery, the files it is looking at, the order it reads them, and the results....prior to diving into the details of XML tags.

Also....I imagine that somewhere there is a listing of all the XML tags and associated attributes and their meaning....I would very much like to see it.

Mark

[TheEagle]

Open up FlightGear, plug in your two devices, then go to Menu -> File -> Joystick configuration. There you can assign stock bindings to each control axis of your joystick / throttle quadrant - no XML editing should be necessary for this. Please try that and see if it helps. If you get stuck with that, please describe where exactly.

[mjwasser]

I have tried this..... FlightGear sees two joysticks with identical names...."VelocityOne Flight". According to the display...the Configuration file is the same for both.
The Windows 7 game controller configuration seems to understand the difference between the two.

When I run js-demo.....the yoke identifies as JS 2, and the throttle bank as JS 3. The aileron control is JS 2:Ax:0 and the Throttle (black knob) is JS 3: Ax:0. One of the initial problems I am having is the Black knob throttle controls the ailerons....There seems to be no difference between Js 2 and Js 3.

What do you think?

Mark

[mjwasser]

Yes....In the Joystick configuration window.....There are two pull down selections for VelocityOne Flight controller. Changing one changes both.

[mjwasser]

Here is another detail I don't understand.....I have CH rudder peddles...as well as the VelocityOne Flight Yoke and Throttle bank. The file that is read for the CH peddles is as expected C:....FlightGear 2020.3/ data/input/Joysticks/CH/pro-pedals-usb.xml.....while the VelocityOne Flight controller is read from...C?Users/....AppData/Roaming/flightgear.org/Input/Joysticks/VelocityOne-Flight.xml.

While this would explain why a change to the file in the FlightGear 2020.3.....directory has not effect....I don't understand why it's different or how this directory and file got there.

Mark

[wkitty42]

the original unmodified file is read from the data/input directory... when you make changes via the in-sim controller modifier, the original default file is copied to the appdata directory and modified there... this keeps the original in pristine condition... FG will always start looking in the appdata first to see if it finds the file there... if it does, it uses it... otherwise, it will look in the fgdata directory and use the unmodified default one from there...

so, with that said, if you manually edit/modify the file, you should place it in the appdata directory for FG to find and use... you should never modify default files unless you copy them over first...

[zegedam]

It's a long process but after around 2 hours of messing with the XML files, I was able to fix this issue. but then there are other issues you'll run into like not being able to use the default joystick configuration settings or being able to reverse axes which I'm stuck on right now. But what I did for mine was open command prompt and cd to the bin file. in here run the command 'fgjs --fg-root=$FG_ROOT' without the quotations. this should prompt you to wait 10 seconds. once finished, it will either fail or ask you to configure the controller. either way is fine. Mine failed so I had to configure it manually. once it fails/passes, it will create two XML files in bin folder which will be used to setup the controls (these files would be populated with the controls if it passed after the 10 second). now move these files to FlightGear\data\Input\Joysticks. now you will need to edit FlightGear\data\joysticks.xml. right click-properties-security and change the users permission to edit the file. open the file in notepad and add the bottom two lines from the code below.
-----------------------------------------------
<PropertyList>
<!--
<js-named include="Input/Joysticks/Local/X45-modified.xml"/>

<js n="1" include="Input/Joysticks/Local/joystick_0.xml"/>

-->
<js n="1" include="/Input/Joysticks/js1.xml"/>
<js n="0" include="/Input/Joysticks/js0.xml"/>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

n="1" and n="2" should be the names of the two files you edited first and the numbers should correspond. now you can edit these two files and add the controls you want to assign to each axes and buttons.