[Windows Mobile Software Development] Cobaltikus:
Some Answers

OK - I've been away all weekend - just now getting back. I have to do some real work for my real job and I'll probably do more on this tomorrow night but wanted to take a minute or 10 to answer some questions.

1. The button mapping problem in FPSECE

I haven't tried it yet - downloaded it, but haven't tried it. Is there a way to just use the phones default keypad/keyboard with this program? If so, set it up that way. CobaltController takes care of all the pairing and reading of the controller buttons. It then translates these button presses as keyboard presses. It basically turns your sixaxis into a bluetooth keyboard with 16 buttons. Whatever window has focus will receive the keyboard input just as it would if you pressed a key on your keypad or keyboard. See post #2: If you press the "SELECT" button on the controller, the active window will see it exactly the same way as if you press the "A" button on your keyboard. So if FPSECE doesn't like the "L1", "X", or "Circle" button then it must be because it doesn't like the keyboard keys "F", "X", and "O". To understand this a little better, run the "Notes" application or start a new text message with the sixaxis paired and start pressing buttons.

2. Will this work with other bluetooth controllers?

Not at this time. It is designed specifically for the sixaxis/ds3. I will add wiimote support when I can, hopefully soon. If I finish this app and have nothing else to do I might add XBox controller support, but I don't have an xbox so this one is a big maybe and not anytime soon. Is the xbox controller bluetooth?

3. Is there an Android port for this?

I believe another programmer made something similar for Android (saw it on youtube) which is why I was going to get the HTC Evo if I had been unsuccessful in getting this to work on my Touch Pro2, but then I would lose my built in slide out keyboard, so I'm very glad I was successful.

4. Comments about making the phone discoverable.

It may be different on your phone, but for mine (Sprint TP2) I leave it as not discoverable and it works fine. Tried it both ways with the same results. In fact, if I have bluetooth off altogether CobaltController will turn it on and still connect successfully. But if it only works in discoverable mode for you then that could be the case with others as well so thank you for sharing. It confuses me why it would be so: the PS3 is not discoverable, and the controller does not search for devices, the controller already knows its master's mac address and doesn't require the master to be discoverable. But maybe there's something about your specific phone that causes that requirement...

5. Analog sticks.

At the moment I only have digital buttons enabled. CobaltController receives all output from the controller but is only dealing with the digital buttons for now. L3 and R3 work as buttons if you press them in, but when you move them around nothing will happen. I will without a doubt enable these, but there are other more pressing capabilities needed first.

6. Problem with mac.txt.

My mac.txt looks like this (that's my Touch Pro2)

00:23:76:70:6B:4D

What does yours look like? If sixpair.exe does not like your mac.txt file then I will need to know what is in your mac.txt file before I can help. sixpair.exe will read the first 17 characters in your file so make sure the very first character in your text file is the beginning of your mac address. Also, make sure it is an actual text file and not something else like a word document. Can you post the mac.txt file? That would be even better.

7. sixpair.exe

This was a quick and dirty app that I wrote just to make ends meet. I tried to spend most of my time on CobaltController. I'm starting to wonder if I should take on a better pairing app before enabling the M$ stack phones... Not sure. At the moment I am sticking with working on the M$ stack. There are also some other ways to set the master mac address, I was just unsuccessful in using them where others said it worked. Has anyone tried GlovePie to set the sixaxis master mac address? What do you guys think? What's more important to come first? Enabling this for the M$ stack so phones like the Touch Pro(1) and Diamond can use this, or making a better pairing app so Windows 7 x64 users can use this? I'll probably still do what I want but I'm curious to know what others think. My sister has a Touch Pro (1) so it's kind of more important to me to enable that first...

Sorry if I missed your question. If I did, go ahead and repost it and I will try not to miss it next time.

THANK YOU ALL! to those who donated: you guys are awesome. Thank you for your support - your donations help to guarantee my future development of this application. It will def get better.

I Google'd "CobaltController" and saw that this has been reviewed on a few different sites and I thought that was pretty cool, thanks also to whoever does that.