[chimera-dev] 3dconnexion

[Dougherty, Matthew T]

Hi,

I am starting to build a matrix of USB HID devices using controllermate on a mac.

I am planning to use two 3dconnexion devices.  one to handle 6D translation/rotation, and the other to manage color/lighting; or maybe left hand for trans and right for rotation, etc.
.
The current driver in chimera only sees one device. If I touch the first USB 3dconnexion device plugged in, it behaves as expected.  Touching the second device, chimera acts as though it is the first device.  So the driver is not keeping track of the number of devices.  

In controllermate I can see both devices and can program them independently.

For example, I will be able to remap these signals to my choosing and pass it on to a chimera extension I am developing.

The second problem I am having is when chimera starts up it exclusively grabs the low level driver, ignoring the the high level driver which incorporates context management.
Consequently controllermate is unable to intercept and modify the signal before passing it on.  A good reason to do this would be creating deadband zones, or a user defined response curve, or integration with multibutton panel like the logitech g13 so that I can modulate the response (eg, 0.1x,1x,10x,100x, etc).

How do I disable 3dConnexion so that it will not load in chimera?  I could wipe out the code, but would prefer minimally screwing with chimera base code which is a headache for daily builds and has a risk factor of unforeseen consequences.  Something in preferences would be helpful.

In a related question on preferences, the scroll wheel is tied to camera zoom.  I would like to remap that  as a movement in z.  Generally I like to keep my scale factor at 1; I find heavy or casual use tends to get me into camera problems. 
Is this possible? at the moment I disable the scroll wheel.


Matthew Dougherty
National Center for Macromolecular Imaging
Baylor College of Medicine