No Joystick Capability in MAC Versions of Torque

#1 Here's what I've got in my code which does work with no errors.

activateDirectInput();
enableJoystick();

#2 Right, I have the exact same thing, and it doesn't work. I can create a new project and just hit run. It is broken out of the box.

I just downloaded TGB about a week ago. I'm thinking that they released a bad build. Probably commented out some code or left out an assembly of some kind.

#3 Torque, at present, does not support Joysticks on the Mac. It has been a long-running issue.

#4 There certainly wasn't anything on the website, or even in the product to say that this was the case. When I create a new project it even drops the method call in there as if it exists. All the documentation that I was sold tells me it exists. That was all in the Mac download, not a universal download.

Understand that I am a corporate software architect that creates .Net distributed applications for a multinational corporation. Being that the software industry is my life I'm having a hard time accepting what has happened here.

I feel like Clark Grizwald at the car dealership. I could have sworn I purchased a blue car.

You sold me this product saying that it could do something that it obviously cannot. And now I'm invested in it. I've placed 20 hours of labor in a video game that I will market as 'Not supporting game controllers'

I'm thinking that isn't going to be a big selling point.

You could at least tell people this upfront. It's no different than your visual level designer that you can only download for Windows. There was no way to know that until after it was purchased.

I was not un-informed, I would have been un-informed if this information were available and I chose to ignore it.
I was mislead. And my investment of 20 hours is far more expensive than you perceive.

When a person is paid $65 dollars an hour, their time means a lot. In this case it means $1300.

#5 when the joystick will be supported on Mac ?

#6 Ahhhhhh... so that's what that error was about. I was wondering. It didn't seem to break anything, so I've left it be thinking it would be explained later. And the explanation seems to be that TGB doesn't support joysticks on Macs. So. Why not? Will they ever be?

#7 I've tested my 360 wired controllers with my machines, and they are recognised only as anonymous controllers. Joystick and Gamepad Tester doesn't see it at all, same with with Gamepad Companion.

The problem isn't a lack of joystick capability in Torque, but a lack of support in OS X.

#8 ok ok, I'll bite.

No, the joysticks are not supported in Mac Torque. This is NOT a problem with Mac, this IS a problem with Torque. I know, because I have a developer license for the sole reason that I had to write in joystick support for Mac to make my game work.

So, I've personally seen the code and I can testify to you that the methods that turn on and operate the joystick are completely empty or simply non existent in the Macintosh version of Torque.

I did write some simple code to get my gamepad to work with Mac Torque, and I supplied the code to the developers at Torque so that they could release it. But I guess that they chose not to.

The modifications have to be made in macCarbInput.cc.

I just searched my gmail and I still have the code that I sent to the Torque team. If you are a developer and have the ability to compile torque, email me and I will send you my code. I would ask that in return, you provide me with any enhancements that you add later on.

email me at dalorin(insert at sign)gmail.com

#9 @Ronny - Example HID Manager code has been available on Apple's site for years - it's dated 2002. I've used that code myself, and it works quite well with standard USB game pads. So does the Gamepad Tester app.

The 360 controller is a HID device, but its device class is 0xFF "Vendor Specific", not the standard 0x01 "Generic Desktop" class that is normally used for game pads. Code that was written for standard devices must be modified slightly to recognize it.

#10 I added Dorian's code as a resource after he supplied it to me. We have not had a point release of the engine since so I do not know if it is in the repo or if another solution has made it there.

Here is the link to the resource he provided.

#11 SDL? Why use SDL? Direct HID Manager code isn't exactly rocket science.

#12 I'm assuming it was because he was familiar with it and got it up and running in a manner of around an hour with debugging, I believe he noted. And working well on his test machines.

If you'd like to submit a resource with the HID code, I'm sure the community would love it. I'll point the Torque 2D dev's to it as well.

#13 SDL? Why use SDL? Direct HID Manager code isn't exactly rocket science.

Well then do it! As stated, I know SDL. But no one is holding you back. Please implement the code better than I did and send me a copy of it when your done. I gave you my code so that seems fair.

#14 @Dorian: I haven't done it yet because working with Torque's event loop is rocket science. :-) Yes, I definitely will give back when I'm done. Your code is a very useful example of that part of the puzzle.

@David: T2D is nice, but this really needs to be integrated into an updated Mac version of TGB. Otherwise, non-Pro users of TGB are left twisting in the wind, missing a promised feature and having no way to integrate it themselves.

Dorian is right - the current state of things feels a lot like something Microsoft would do, promising something that doesn't actually work yet, then charging customers for an "upgrade" that finally delivers what we thought we were paying for the first time around.

#15 Ah, good times. In the distant past, I had platformX86UNIX building and running on OSX, and the SDL joystick code in that worked fine on the mac. Already-existing code, just compiled against OSX.

Required X11, though, so "real" mac users don't have a deep love of it.

Gary (-;