Mapping in-car adjustment wheel buttons...too many functions and not enough buttons!

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Marc Collins, Jun 15, 2016.

  1. Marc Collins

    Marc Collins Registered

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    Given the inability to map multiple functions to one button the way Reiza has introduced with AMS, how are all of you dealing with the many wonderful in-car adjustments?

    I have more than the average number of buttons available, but still. Is there a matrix of which cars can use which functions? I can make a template if it helps, but I am talking about the following:

    Brake Bias (F)
    Brake Bias (R)

    Temp Boost

    Power Demand (not even sure what that is to be honest)

    + Mixture (Air/Fuel presumably)
    - Mixture

    Stiffen Front ARB
    Soften Front ARB

    Stiffen Rear ARB
    Soften Rear ARB

    Raise Track Bar
    Lower Track Bar

    Front Flap
    Rear Flap

    Most cars only have a small (but differing) selection of these available in real life. How on earth do you get the right adjustments for the right cars with a limited number of buttons? 342 different controller profiles that you have to wade through--if you can find the right one if you remember to manually load every time you switch a car?
     
  2. TechAde

    TechAde Registered

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  3. Emery

    Emery Registered

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    Brake bias is on my funky switch's twist. HUD Select & menu choices are the button press & lever directions, respectively.

    I should map Temp Boost & Power Demand & Mixture, but haven't bothered because I haven't needed them yet.

    ARB adjustments could go on an unused 4-way switch (G25 shifter). If you're short of buttons, then pick only front or rear adjustment.

    I'm not into stockcars, so track bar is fairly irrelevant.

    Don't know of any cars using front flap... DRS is rear flap and that's mapped to a button on the wheel.
    ***

    Priority button mappings have been given to Pit Req, Rear flap, HUD on/off, HUD select, Brake bias, Horn, Pit Limiter, Starter, Wiper, Lights, Alternate Exit, Pause, Vote Yes/No, & Live/Delay. I do have 4 buttons and 1 joystick unassigned on the Fanatec BMW wheel plus 2 buttons and the 4-way switch unassigned on the Logitech G25 shifter.

    Mapping a button for reverse so you don't accidentally downshift into reverse is highly recommended. I haven't done that for some silly reason, probably because I seldom drive the cars where it matters.
    ***

    If I were building a button box, I would use heavy duty SPDT momentary contact toggle switches for many of these functions to reduce the total button count. Toggle up becomes the + value and toggle down becomes the - value (or left/right toggle if that's preferable for some reason) and center position is "unpressed" button. Second choice would be a rotary encoder, like the funky switch; probably only second choice because I never bothered learning how to connect one (are they different from toggle switches?).
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jun 15, 2016
  4. Marc Collins

    Marc Collins Registered

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    A great option if you want to spend money. Like Emery, I have quite a few buttons, but it's trying to figure-out how to use them most effectively that is the trick. Especially when so few cars have the various options. I guess another way to think about it is which car has the most options (modern F1 presumably) and how to map those.
     
  5. Associat0r

    Associat0r Registered

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    This has always been possible in every isiMotor sim and therefore rFactor 2, by manually editing the controller files to map multiple functions to a single button. I've been doing this for years.
    Still it would be nice to have this exposed in the UI, and/or have rF2 auto-load controller configs per car.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jun 15, 2016
    OneMoreOdd likes this.
  6. Marc Collins

    Marc Collins Registered

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    Wow, I did not know that. Do you have any good examples or suggestions of which functions/button mappings are best to "overlap?"

    And yes, the auto-load configurations per car is something we've all been waiting 10 years for...
     
  7. MikeeCZ

    MikeeCZ Registered

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    i am still hoping for addition of onboard differential and throttle map adjustments aswell :) but you would need full functioning F1 wheel rim for all that.. something like the T500 F1 addon with the DYI re-haul to fully functioning one, but its really costly

    right now we just dont have enough of onboard adjusments to change the car from dry to wet, making driving in wet still ever so more challenging than it should be in cars where these adjusments exist
     
  8. wgeuze

    wgeuze Registered

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    Same here, but a reply from Tim made me lose that hope a bit. It appears they were afraid of losing physics fidelity when including more in-car controls such as those. Optimisation of the system or the fact that
    iRacing has had those and more, for years, were not responded to.. That was the state of affairs back then however. Because, at the time, it felt nothing more could be introduced, yet here we have fuel mixture. Nothing
    is set in stone ;)I'm wondering if this is all preparation for an LMP car which has been rumoured to be in production, and if this might include some sort of ERS as well, and if that could lead to a new F1 car which
    works as intended.

    You can hopefully understand my frustration when in the same discussion it is said that rF2 is catering to the harcore racers, but in the same discussion, numerous features which hardcore racers request by popular demand are met with excuses or reasons not to do them... Frustrating at the very least. However, knowing how software development works, it is not as easy as it seems from the outside most of the time.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jun 16, 2016
  9. F1Aussie

    F1Aussie Registered

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    That's what I did to my f1 add on wheel, modded it, I now have around 38 fully functioning buttons on it, I also have 2 dsd p1 button boxes, only around 100 bucks each. A total of about 90 buttons to play with now. View attachment 20181 View attachment 20182
     
  10. Emery

    Emery Registered

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    Hah, it's good to look through the possible button assignments from time-to-time! Just discovered there are alternate shift up/down assignments, so it's possible to use both paddle shifter and G25 sequential shifter without loading different controller files.
     
  11. smbrm

    smbrm Registered

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    Very cool! Does this leave you any time to drive? It must take some time to extract value from all those adjustments? :cool:

    Cheers!
     
  12. Marc Collins

    Marc Collins Registered

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    Back to the original question...assuming you don't have 50 buttons on your hardware, but you might be willing to painstakingly edit your controller files, can we rationalize the list of options?

    For example, could Temp Boost, Power Demand and Rear Flap all be categorized as PTP (push to pass) and therefore assigned to a single button? Are there any cars that use more than one of these at a time? Is Rear Track Bar and Rear ARB essentially the same thing? Any cars that have both of these at the same time?

    Which controls should be prioritized to be on the steering wheel itself versus on accessory button boxes or controllers?

    Is there a priority listing for the various other adjustments--as in which ones are the most commonly available on real race cars and therefore might be worthy of a valuable/limited available button? For example how many cars have a front flap? How many have a front ARB adjustment?
     
  13. F1Aussie

    F1Aussie Registered

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    I have the buttons setup the same for each sim so it doesn't take long to remember what does what. I have labelled some buttons too.
     
  14. Emery

    Emery Registered

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    AFAIK, no real-life cars have a front flap activated separately from rear flap. Possibly none have a front flap that can be activated. It is entirely likely that some car has a cockpit adjustable front ARB. I sure wouldn't want to classify rear track bar the same as rear ARB... they do very different things.

    ***
    And I do the same as F1Aussie: label the buttons and assign them the same in each sim (though it's a pain when some games don't support things like Alternate Exit).
     
  15. Marc Collins

    Marc Collins Registered

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    Not suggesting rear track bar and rear ARB are the same...but do they ever overlap in the same vehicle?

    And thanks for input on other items. I, too, try to keep everything consistent, but thought I would re-think rF2 since it seems to have the most choices and requires the most tedium to overlap functions. So I will use rF2 as the base to set all the others.

    If we had to rank the various items in terms of most likely to be an active real life function, weighted by how many racing series actually use it, what would the list look like?
     

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