Override A Track IR Axis?

[Kageseigi]

Is it possible to use Track IR, but override a single axis with another device?

My throttle can control my pilot's vertical movement when DCS does not detect Track IR. But when it does, my throttle control stops working, even when I disable the Track IR Y-axis both in DCS controls menu and in the Track IR app.

As far as I can tell, there isn't anything interfering with the pilot's vertical movement... there's nothing assigned to control it at all (other than my throttle). In the DCS control options menu, the "Head Tracker : UP/Down" input is blank.

It seems as though DCS just overrides ALL of the pilot's movements with Track IR inputs even if specific axes are not assigned to use Track IR... like it just reads an input of zero. Surely there is a way to bypass that?

[SharpeXB]

It’s possible to move the pilots head up and down with TrackIR running. If I recall the key command is RShift+RCtrl+Num8 or Num5 

[Hiob]

As SharpeXB suggested. All the camera movement options work as usual, even with TrackIR running. You should be able to bind the default commands to any button on your throttle. Not to axes though. If you want to bind the vertical camera movement to an Axis, that probably won't work with TrackIR enabled. (I assume)

Edited April 22, 2024 by Hiob

[Kageseigi]

Thanks, guys.

On 4/22/2024 at 8:59 AM, Hiob said:

You should be able to bind the default commands to any button on your throttle. Not to axes though.

 

Yes, I think that is the problem. I have a perfectly good axis on my throttle, and all of my buttons are already reserved. Once I get a STECS, it may be a different story, but for now, I can't assign "button" functions to my axis.

I've even installed OpenTrack specifically to use my throttle axis as the head tracker's Y axis (and it does work by itself), but when I have both TrackIR and OpenTrack enabled (with the the proper axes enabled/disabled on each, DCS recognizes only Track IR. I'm a newbie with both programs, so I'm not sure if there's a way for both to be used together or not. Though when OpenTrack's output "freetrack 2.0 Enhanced" setting seem to suggest that it may be possible to use them both (at least for some games), but I don't know where to learn more about that.

So I'm not sure where possible solutions would exist. Whether it be in OpenTrack or a program similar to it, or if the DCS input files could be modified to allow such a thing. Hopefully ED will give the option to override individual axes soon. Or at least provide some workaround.

[Baldrick33]

If you are happy to use additional third party programs you could use Joystick Gremlin to duplicate selected axis to a vjoy device axis or buttons. Or use Joy2Key to simply map axis to buttons if you don’t want vjoy.

[SharpeXB]

3 hours ago, Kageseigi said:

when I have both TrackIR and OpenTrack enabled (with the the proper axes enabled/disabled on each, DCS recognizes only Track IR

Yes I imagine DCS interprets this as a double-assigned command.

Question: What are you trying to accomplish? Why do you want to override the axis? There are likely better ways to do this depending on the reason. Some examples: 

- If you want this set permanently per aircraft, adjust using key commands and save the viewpoint as the default.
- For aligning your view to a gunsight or such use the keys mentioned above. 
- If you want to make a seat height adjustment for landing or bombing etc there are commands that move the seat up and down.

All those seem preferable to altering the TrackIR input which will mess up the 6DOF 

[Kageseigi]

17 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

Yes I imagine DCS interprets this as a double-assigned command.

Question: What are you trying to accomplish? Why do you want to override the axis? There are likely better ways to do this depending on the reason. Some examples: 

- If you want this set permanently per aircraft, adjust using key commands and save the viewpoint as the default.
- For aligning your view to a gunsight or such use the keys mentioned above. 
- If you want to make a seat height adjustment for landing or bombing etc there are commands that move the seat up and down.

All those seem preferable to altering the TrackIR input which will mess up the 6DOF 

Yeah, I was hoping to disable the TrackIR Y input (because I don't get much use out of it... and can't get enough control with my seating arrangement to be useful), and just use the axis on my throttle to control the pilot's vertical movement (whether by using OpenTrack's Y input or DCS' "Absolute Vertical Shift Camera View" axis command).

The purpose is mainly for my F-86 gunnery. Being able to raise my pilot's head enough to see over the nose helps a lot when I'm in a turn fight and trying to pull lead. I can walk my tracers to the target.

Being able to use an axis to control that is very handy because I can raise/lower the view very gradually and to the exact amount needed in any given situation, but I can also let go of the axis and it will immediately return my pilot's head back to the normal position (the throttle's axis is self-centering). I originally was going to use a snap view, but I believe that disables my headtracking altogether, so it is also very limiting.

Assigning the axis to "Absolute Vertical Shift Camera View" works perfectly... until DCS detects TrackIR. Then TrackIR overrides the "Absolute Vertical Shift Camera View" control even though TrackIR's Y-axis is disabled and the "Head Tracker : Up/Down" control is unassigned in DCS. If TrackIR would not override ALL the relevant axes by default if detected, or if another device could be assigned to DCS' "Head Tracker : Up/Down" control, or even if the "Absolute Vertical Shift Camera View" control could simply modify the specific headtracking input, then I believe everything would work perfectly.

But yes, it all comes down to improving gunnery and situational awareness.

21 hours ago, Baldrick33 said:

If you are happy to use additional third party programs you could use Joystick Gremlin to duplicate selected axis to a vjoy device axis or buttons. Or use Joy2Key to simply map axis to buttons if you don’t want vjoy.

Thank you for the suggestions. I'll check them out

Edited May 21, 2024 by Kageseigi

[Hiob]

I don't know if this is of any help but maybe it is -

you probably have some button mapped in TrackIR to re-center it. I have the same button mappen in DCS to put the View back to default (whatever you saved as your default position) - that includes the vertical camera position. So whenever I somehow haywired my view, I simply look straight ahead and push the re-center button (bound it to the thumb key on the grip, together with zoom-in and zoom-out).

You could bind the camera up/camera down (rctrl+shift+Num8/Num2 per default) to some buttons on your hotas, and when you want to go back to your default view press the re-center button. It's not exactly the same you had in mind, but somewhat close.

Edited May 21, 2024 by Hiob