Gamepad axis not working after calibration

[Kieron Wilkinson]

Binary package hint: jscalibrator

Athlon 64 3000, Ubutu 6.10 "Edgy".

I have a wireless gamepad, a Saitek P3000, which I plugged in, and was detected and installed fine. I then attempted to calibrate it using jscalibrator. All my axis controls and buttons looked like they were working fine. I may then have re-calibrated it one or twice more. I then tried it in several games, like Planet Pengiun Racer, and some games under wine. Although the buttons worked, the axis controls did not. They just didn't function at all.

After looking in the forums, I found a few solutions, one of which was to unplug my gamepad usb cable, and re-insert it, and then *do not* calibrate it. I tried this and it worked fine! So I can only assume that jscalibrator is breaking the axis control somehow.

Here are a link to the forum where people had a similar problem:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=320683

If you need any more information, please let me know.

[Emmet Hikory (persia)]

Thanks for your bug report, and the pointer to the forums thread. There's something funny about axis detection for both jscalibrator and js_demo (in the flightgear package). In general, you don't need to calibrate your gamepad or joystick prior to playing most games.

[Kieron Wilkinson (kieron-wilkinson)]

Hi, that was quick. :)

I don't need to calibrate it? Even when it has analogue controls?

It is this one:
http://www.saitek.com/uk/prod/P3000.htm

You can't really see the analogue controls there, so also see this picture which is very like it:
http://www.saitek.com/uk/prod/P2900.htm

As I said, if you want me to try anything out to help, just let me know. I am resonably technically proficient (I'm a software developer by profession, though I know next to nothing about C/C++ I am afraid), and I don't mind doing some work/investigation to help sort this out.

[Emmet Hikory (persia)]

Well, most of the time you don't need to calibrate it, even for analogue axes (or at least I don't, with the X52). Most games depend on the new linux input drivers, for which calibration can be done with joystick's jscal (if the center is completely off). I believe the only game for which jscalibrator is still needed is searchandrescue, and that the only other program that uses this is oxine (the OSD xine interface).

There is a bug in jscal that causes it not to close properly, which I believe to be fixed in libjsw 1.5.6, but I am not sure that this also addresses your experience (I need to try to replicate your bug in more detail - if I cannot replicate it, I may ask for your assistance once 1.5.6 is in the archive).

[Kieron Wilkinson (kieron-wilkinson)]

That is fantastic. I guess I am just used to calibrating my joypad from Windows.

Interesting about jscalibrator. I just assumed it was "the way" to calibrate joysticks/gamepads. It was the first calibration program I found, so that was why I used it... I didn't know about jscal at all, but I will make sure I use that in the future!

Maybe the program details for jscalibrator should indicate that people should use jscal instead?

Search and rescue was a game I tried, but I couldn't figure out how to get off the ground, so it wasn't a good test. ;-) - My excuse is that I was trying lots of games quickly to see if I could find one that worked.

Yes, please feel free to enlist me should you need to.

[Emmet Hikory (persia)]

Thank you for your offer. Which release of Ubuntu are you running? libjsw 1:1.5.6-0ubuntu1 is now available in feisty, but it would require a recompile for edgy or dapper. I'm curious if this fixed your bug (as it may be related to bug 78059).

[Kieron Wilkinson (kieron-wilkinson)]

I'm running Ubuntu 6.10 "Edgy Eft".

I'll work out how to do that, and test it out.

[Kieron Wilkinson (kieron-wilkinson)]

With Emmet's help (thanks for that!), I tested 1.5.6-0ubuntu1, and unfortunately it did not fix the problem.

In summary, the gamepad axis' (two analogue thumb controls and the 4/8-way directional pad) works fine until I try to calibrate it in jscalibrator. Then the axis's stop working. They start working again by pulling out the gamepad usb cable, and then reinserting it.

I also tried calibrating with jscal, and that appears to work fine.

[Emmet Hikory (persia)]

I've confirmed the same behaviour for a Saitek P990, although the solution remains elusive.