Oolite Bulletins

Posted: **Fri Oct 22, 2010 10:51 pm**

The 'a' key has nothing special compared to other keys. The most likely reason for it firing short bursts when using it is because it has been assigned to two functions in keyconfig.plist, one of which being the laser fire.

Posted: **Fri Oct 22, 2010 10:54 pm**

I've tried even taking out the line assigning it as the "fire-lasers" key completely, and it still fires a short burst.

Posted: **Fri Oct 22, 2010 10:57 pm**

Ah, that's it then. If you remove that line completely, Oolite will use its built-in key list (which is a copy of the keyconfig.plist) to fill in the blank, thus autoassigning 'a' to lasers.

Posted: **Fri Oct 22, 2010 11:10 pm**

Ah! Duh, I should have thought of that. LOL Thanks, another_commander, I'd been puzzling on that for a bit.

So I'd have to remove it in the "real" keyconfig.plist rather than the copy in my AddOns folder, which I wouldn't advise for most people. I use my joystick and throttle for a number of functions, so I can clear up a lot of the keyboard's "real estate". With modding a keyboard for a specific game, I like to actually pull the keys that are unused, after clustering the keys that are really necessary into distinct groups by function.

Posted: **Fri Oct 22, 2010 11:13 pm**

The things you learn, reading this forum… it’s like the Oopen Ooniversity.

Posted: **Fri Oct 22, 2010 11:41 pm**

Ganelon wrote:
Ah! Duh, I should have thought of that. LOL Thanks, another_commander, I'd been puzzling on that for a bit.

So I'd have to remove it in the "real" keyconfig.plist rather than the copy in my AddOns folder, which I wouldn't advise for most people. I use my joystick and throttle for a number of functions, so I can clear up a lot of the keyboard's "real estate". With modding a keyboard for a specific game, I like to actually pull the keys that are unused, after clustering the keys that are really necessary into distinct groups by function.

Actually, the built-in key list I referred to earlier is not the one in Resources, it is a copy of that, built into the core game code, in order to ensure that if a keyconfig.plist with missing entries is used, the game is still playable. This means that Oolite can work even without a keyconfig.plist and you cannot remove the laser key functionality by just deleting the entry from that file. You can only reassign the functionality to a different key.

Posted: **Mon Oct 25, 2010 8:42 am**

Ganelon wrote:
Little changes like eliminating double keystrokes for functions you use often (or where missing the shift key could have bad results) are pretty easy to do and useful enough. But if you're up for a bit more messing around, and willing to play with paints and your art program to make new labels for your keys and glue them on, you could do something like this guy does..

http://www.rogerdodger.net/diyflightsim ... d_mod.html

... and even make an actual sort of custom control panel (or more than one, as shown in the pic on that site) for Oolite. That is a concept I've been working towards myself as a "back burner" project, so someday I can have a nice control panel for playing Oolite on. But it takes a bit more work and thought than I thought it would at first, since I'm trying to come up with a good sensible layout for the keys where related functions (like all the keys used in combat, for example) would be grouped together in one easy to use cluster. Then there's coming up with short names for the keys for the labels. Pushing a button marked "FIRE" is a lot more fun than "m". LOL

No need to go all the way to some general flight simulator keys, because it has been done before especially for Oolite. Look here to what ClymAngus has posted. I think you can download it from his site, but at least you can ask him directly.

Oolite Bulletins

Friendly fire or what?