Scripting with the Trackball
The trackball is referenced in a CMS script just like a stick.
It's JS1.A1 through JS1.A4 and JS1.B1 through JS1.B4 (if it's the
leftmost tab next to the Program Settings tab). JS1.A3 and JS1.A4
are pseudo-axes that are only available via CMS. They provide the
relative movement values from the trackball. If you reference
JS1.A1 and JS1.A2, you're asking for the joystick values. When
you assign the trackball in a CMS script, it can't tell which
axes you want to use, the double set of axes lets you tell it.
The axes are set up to pass through the CMS without having to
modify the values. If you do something like:
CMS.A1 = JS1.A3;
CMS.A2 = JS1.A4;
and then in the GUI you assign CMS.A1 and CMS.A2 to the Mouse X
and Mouse Y axes, it will work just as if you'd assigned the
trackball directly to Mouse X and Mouse Y in the GUI.
The values for the trackball are set up similarly to all other
axes insofar as their CMS usage goes. In particular, a value of
128 is seen as "center" and so causes no movement of the mouse
cursor. Values below 128 go left and up, values above 128 go right
and down. The maximum value is 255.
Using CMS, you might want to use either of these types of data
when referring to the Trackball. It would depend on whether you
ultimately would be sending it to a CM Device or to the mouse
proxy. CMS makes allowance for this by actually recognizing 4
axes. The A1 and A2 axes act like a joystick X and Y. The A3 and
A4 axes return the movement data like a mouse. You can refer to
either set of values (or both sets if you can think of a reason
to do it). Normally, you would use A1 and A2 if you were sending
the data to a CM Device, A3 and A4 if it's going to the mouse
proxy. If you assign the Trackball axes directly in the GUI, the
Control Manager selects the movement or position data based on
what you assign them to (CM Device or Mouse).
When you send data into a CMS control which ultimately sends it
to the mouse proxy, there's a bit of a problem. The CMS has to
handle things differently depending on whether the data is
relative (like mouse data) or positional (like joystick data).
Unfortunately, the CMS can't figure this out for itself because
it can't know where the data came from or where it's going.
Consequently, there are three flags that need to be set or
cleared (perhaps dynamically) if you're generating mouse data in
the CMS. There will be specially named flags in the CM3 Final,
but for now the B1022 (Z), B1023 (Y), and B1024 (X) flags are
being used. You need to set them TRUE if you are feeding relative
data to a mouse through the CMS Controls. If you're feeding
Joystick data, then the flags should be set FALSE. That's their
default state anyway, so if you don't have a Trackball in the map
that you have to flag as sending relative data, you can just
ignore B1022..B1024. Your current maps should still run fine.
