Hey, that's a good idea for my "More Hotkeys - misc" mod (if I ever get round to it...).
But when you think about it, it becomes difficult. Because the turrets vary a lot depending on the ship. You could of course use the standards, but that would be confusing. Maybe just a few. And an intelligent version where the turrets search for targets depending on their size...
Or I could make a kind of "save" for the turrets with several settings. But for that I would have to find out how to save something per ship in the savegame (because it belongs specifically to the ship). That would be something for the planned "More Hotkeys - Favourites" mod...
Hey the Hosas inputs arent working, once I had the game click to follow enemies now thats gone, Id love to use this as the sensitivity doesnt land well
Please excuse me, but I don't understand "Hosas". What exactly do you mean? All the functions work perfectly for me, including the autopilot. Please specify your problem, perhaps by describing a specific case... Thank you very much.
I did all the required steps, assigned my hotkeys in the new "extension" section under controls, deleted old vanilla ones, and made sure I have no duplicates. yet in the end non of them are working while flying..
the pipe server exe is working in the background.
is there anything I missed that I was supposed to do in the settings or in the files in order to make work? any help will much appreciated!
I just noticed your reply, I'm away from my pc for the next couple of weeks.. but I'll be sure to check once I'm back from my work trip, because your mod seems like a must have my friend..
Hello, I'm loving the options this mod provides, thank you.:) Is it intended that these functions cannot be assigned to joystick buttons? My marco buttons work fine, but none of my X56 inputs are registered.
Hi, glad you like the mod :-) The keyboard usage is based on SirNukes' MOD, joystick support has often been requested there, but it's probably not that easy. Anyway, you would have to contact SirNukes. We all hope that Egosoft will finally add native hotkey support to the mod engine again...
But where is the problem with the X56? It has great software (I use it myself and am very satisfied)... You can even set the potentiometers in ranges, and when a range is "entered" or "left", trigger an action. That's how I switch through weapon settings, for example.
Hey, not sure if anybody else has had this problem, but I can't get the hotkeys to save. Anytime I load a game I have to set them again. They all work once I set them, but this and SN Hotkeys will not remember the actual controls I set. I am on the beta (which I think is just the normal hot fix currently?) Pipe Server is in X4 Foundations folder and it has admin permission so everything works, it's just a real bummer to have to set them after every load. I don't know if it's this mod, or SN hotkeys, the pipe server itself or something else that is at fault, but was just wondering if someone knew what was going on and could help me out. I tried looking it up here and on the other various mod pages but haven't found anyone else with this problem.
Does anybody know what's going on with that? or where do the key binds get saved to?
the problem must be related to the API of SirNukes, because only the API stores the keyboard settings. My mod has nothing to do with it, I only call routines that already exist. You should therefore ask SirNukes about this. Sorry...
Amazing, unfortunatly i wont use it as it is too complicated installing whatever the pipe server is and even more complicated assisnged hotkeys as it would mess up all my current hotkeys. I just wanted to say TY for the work as ES dont seem to give a s#*! about making game better now only pumping out more paid DLC
Hi, as Mycu has already written, it is absolutely simple. Drag the exe onto the computer, start it before the game and reassign the keys (normally in the menu, where you usually do it, at the bottom)...
I shall give it a go ty. Sadly i cant agree with you on ES as good a job as they do it just isnt enough and if it was not for great modders like yopurself the game would be boring.
I agree with deeks87, unfortunately. This was a vital component of the game for many people. I reported this issue in 2018 and they had still been ignoring it, like many other things that were requested over and over and argued in discussions. I do not think it is fair to see egosoft acting like that, call what that is in vanilla a "targeting system" and get away without a few frowns.
Recently, there was a special podcast for German-speaking players, where many questions from the community were answered. There, CEO Bernd kanz specifically called on people to write to him personally and also to name macros from the "Quality of Life" area, which Egosoft should use as a guide for new ideas and improvements. E-mail should be on the net. Therefore: Please draw his attention to this macro and write that you would like to see such a target switching for the game. AND (please) also complain a little that Egosoft doesn't want to allow modders to use buttons - it can't be right that a modder like SirNukes has to write an external programme for a basic function of a macro environment, can it? Thank you. And I'm glad you like my work...
Greetings Trajan from Olb
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Marvelous work TrajanVonOlb. Just checked it briefly (I should work now but psstt...) and it improves vanilla target selection significantly. And finally I'm able to deselect targets! Great.
I have to ask SirNukes if possible to bind joystick buttons with his Hotkey API cause it's not possible to use it with HOTAS directly.
https://i.imgur.com/Ovsfmwi.png - "line of sight" hotkey doesn't select guidance marker but station to the right. Can those markers be included in target selection?
Is it possible to disable (even as XML var) asteroids from all selections except direct hotkey (Adv.targeting: asteroids)? It often unnecessary clutters target arrays.
Hi, thanks for the praise, was a lot of work (but a lot of fun)....
Oh yes, joystick assignments with SirNukes mod would be great. Otherwise I'll slowly run out of "transfer" keys, especially as I still have a lot of plans with the hotkeys :-)
Thanks for the typo tip, it's already corrected, but I'm still collecting for the next release.
As for the asteroids, I'm thinking about it. In principle I can understand that, as asteroids can quickly get in the way. But with the line-of-sight search, it goes against the philosophy of being able to select everything you see (which somehow feels right because it promises control). But maybe I can reduce the range there, e.g. to half the radar range, although I don't really like that - after all, there are also huge astros, they are visible far away - why shouldn't you pick those if you can see them? So it would be even better to make the detection dependent on the size of the astro, but I don't know how I'm going to read those out yet (since that's more visual). The rule-free search at next and prev is a bit different, that would make sense, so why not? Another way would be to make this available as an option in the settings (for both). Which gives me the idea of adding more options in general, because people's wishes are certainly different. I'll have to look into it though, because I've never programmed a setting like that before. So it will take some time, especially since I'm also working on other mods, besides the More Hotkey series, for example on "More Betty", which is really a lot of fun. And right now RL is hitting me again... But in any case, thanks for the suggestions, they are very welcome :-)
Greetings Trajan
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Asked SirNukes and his great package supports keyboard and mouse currently so I've assigned hotkeys to joystick buttons via manufacturer's (VKBDevCfg) software. And I have to praise this mod more... ;)
The convenience this mod gives with target selection is fantastic. Tested "line of sight" selection and for joystick it shines and works exactly as I've expected: I see an object, point a crosshair and press button and viola. It is selected. As some Todd would say: "It just works!". I couldn't say that about vanilla target selection logic.
Also tested a short while with subsystems selection. Mapped to my CASTLE button, so:
`left`/`right` is prev/next target,
`up` is select nearest turret
`down` is select engines
`press` is deselect
And it's very convenient to switch targets in a dynamic boarding operation. And cycle through selected type (turrets/shields/engines).
---
One more suggestion that I'd like to leave is a slider/option to define max range for enemies targeting. I often press assigned button to check if there are enemies in ship range. And currently it selects enemies even ~100km away, which is unnecessary IMO.
Hope to test this mod in normal gameplay today or tomorrow (till now made just a few 10 min tests) - but so far it seems essential for a HOTAS player like me.
So, in the new update I have limited the range of the enemy search to the radar or, in the case of capital ships and known ships, double the radar range. Just to try it out. However, I took another look at the routines for the rule-free search and discovered that asteroids don't even appear there. Did you really only mean the line-of-sight search? Thanks for testing!
Haven't played at all recently (RL duties) but this week should be better in this regard so I should finally test 1.1
Limiting enemy targeting to a radar range seems like a perfect solution. As for asteroids - IIRC I was able to select it by using previos/next target hotkeys.
This should really only have affected the Astros with "content", i.e. space fly eggs, etc. These can indeed be targeted via next/previous target, which is how it should be...
All other Astros, i.e. those for mining, should not be selectable. Please test again in which special cases this occurs... Line-of-sight is of course something else, but I had already described that...
Made a proper gaming session yesterday with 1.1. Played with "line of sight", "enemies" and "prev"/"next"/"no target" hotkeys.
Now I am sure that this mod is essential. Line of sight makes targeting with joystick/kb as simple as when using a mouse. Also had no objections to asteroids, they didn't interfere with target selection. Same with targeting enemies. I really wonder why this mod isn't more popular.
Only have two suggestions/questions with "line of sight" targeting:
On this image https://i.imgur.com/bCTvfkZ.png I pressed "line of sight" hotkey and it selects Claytronics Factory ~38km away. Good. But when moved ship nose little to upper-right https://i.imgur.com/Rp1fSvd.png - it selected High Tech Factory ~290km away. My Question is - is it possible to make "hitbox" smaller with distance? So in this case for this far station, instead of current green "hitbox" - the red one would be used https://i.imgur.com/BZ2WZQh.jpg
Currently it's not possible to target this yellow guidance markers: https://i.imgur.com/vRz8eRl.png Could it be included into "line of sight" targeting no matter the distance?
On next X4 session I plan to try boarding hotkeys (subsystems targeting).
first: thanks again for testing and the suggestions :-) I think that the mod is not more popular because many do not want to use third-party software (exe). If Egosoft would integrate the hotkey usage into their mod concept, this would look quite different... The Wing hotkey mod has pretty much the same problems, although the other mods enjoy great popularity in relation to the wings.
About the questions: 1. the problem is that Egosoft does not scale the "hitbox" for the search in distance. This means that the point for accurately finding a nearby station is exactly the same size as that of a distant one. In the process, unfortunately, a larger station does not really "cover" the smaller one in the background, which seems to be different for close ships. The search in my MOD now works in several stages. First, a search is made exactly at the centre point with a cone of 1 degree. If nothing is found, the search continues with larger cones in several steps. Sure, I could prioritise nearby stations now, but that would make the search less precise. I would not like that, because from my point of view it is precisely this feeling of control that is important. Therefore, the problem cannot really be solved. But I'll think about it anyway, maybe I'll come up with something. I only came up with the multi-level mechanism when I analysed the weaknesses of the Egosoft search very carefully, point by point..
2. Project goals are unfortunately not objects in space. I cannot select "Empty room". But the hint is correct, the Egosoft search manages that, so there must be a way.
I will look into it, but it may take a while. Lots of RL and stuff, also I'm working on the other More-Hotkeys projects, e.g. there will soon be MoreHotkeys: Misc with direct-to-target teleport and a laser point scanner, with which you can scan distant stations under certain conditions with an extra hotkey and in longrange mode, if they stay exactly in the focus of the target cross for several seconds. That way you don't have to fly around in space forever when you can already see everything with your eye.... Or the old bargain finder, so that trading "by hand" with your own ship is fun again... But all this is quite complicated to program, because Egosoft has built in few possibilities to program menus, for example. You have to do it all yourself in Lua, which is a different programming language than the MODs, which I can't do (yet)...
Greetings Trajan
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Thanks for a detailed explanation of line of sight targeting routine. As I understand it - algorithm would have to collect all objects in front of player ship to some array and then sort it by some radius to distance ratio. It's nothing major so IMO better to invest time into something else like MoreHotkeys: Misc and/or playing X4 :)
As for the guidance - I guess vanilla doesn't allow it too. Made a report some time ago, but without any Ego response: https://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=431435
Nice that you plan more of the series - dunno if direct teleport suits my playstyle (currently using Kuertee's great Teleport from Transporter Room for immersion purposes) but laser point scanner and bargain finder sounds interesting if it won't make things too easy.
Definitely can't wait for SN to add joystick buttons to this! Using an exe from SirNuke is fine. But the joystick software never works properly. I hope he can find the time amidst this much work. Fantastic work, modder, you have my gratitude.
I used to use a software called "joytokey" for X3 (before I had my HOTAS) for my Logitech Precision 3D. It reliably converts joystick buttons (or even movements) into keystrokes. I also found it really exciting that you could set buttons to change profiles (temporarily, as long as the button is pressed). This made it possible to control a lot of things with not so many buttons. For example, I had the target switching on a coolie hat, but if I pressed an additional button (with my left hand), I could now trigger other, less frequent functions with the coolie hat. Yet another key enabled commands to my Wing, again with the same Coolie Hat, etc....
Greetings Trajan
PS: When it's a little less summer again ;-), I'll continue with my other More-Hotkeys macros. There are still sales price and bargain finders, extended scan commands and a new way to operate the menu... Well, a lot of work, give me time :-)
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
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But when you think about it, it becomes difficult. Because the turrets vary a lot depending on the ship. You could of course use the standards, but that would be confusing. Maybe just a few. And an intelligent version where the turrets search for targets depending on their size...
Or I could make a kind of "save" for the turrets with several settings. But for that I would have to find out how to save something per ship in the savegame (because it belongs specifically to the ship).
That would be something for the planned "More Hotkeys - Favourites" mod...
All the functions work perfectly for me, including the autopilot.
Please specify your problem, perhaps by describing a specific case...
Thank you very much.
I did all the required steps, assigned my hotkeys in the new "extension" section under controls, deleted old vanilla ones, and made sure I have no duplicates.
yet in the end non of them are working while flying..
the pipe server exe is working in the background.
is there anything I missed that I was supposed to do in the settings or in the files in order to make work? any help will much appreciated!
hmmm... what does the python window show? Just "started serving" or a larger block of text after the game has started and a score has been loaded?
And is SirNUkes' MOD installed and switched on next to the Python exe?
Do the included hotkeys from SirNukes work? (There was a mod on Steam, in which SirNukes itself offers a few hotkeys, just search for it).
Greetings Trajan von Olb
thanks for your effort by the way :D
I'm loving the options this mod provides, thank you.:)
Is it intended that these functions cannot be assigned to joystick buttons?
My marco buttons work fine, but none of my X56 inputs are registered.
The keyboard usage is based on SirNukes' MOD, joystick support has often been requested there, but it's probably not that easy. Anyway, you would have to contact SirNukes. We all hope that Egosoft will finally add native hotkey support to the mod engine again...
But where is the problem with the X56? It has great software (I use it myself and am very satisfied)... You can even set the potentiometers in ranges, and when a range is "entered" or "left", trigger an action. That's how I switch through weapon settings, for example.
Greetings Trajan von Olb
Does anybody know what's going on with that? or where do the key binds get saved to?
Thanks
the problem must be related to the API of SirNukes, because only the API stores the keyboard settings. My mod has nothing to do with it, I only call routines that already exist.
You should therefore ask SirNukes about this. Sorry...
Greetings Trajan von Olb
Then you can bind hotkeys via standard X4 settings menu.
Take a look at changelog for free updates: https://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=402960
Greetings Trajan
I reported this issue in 2018 and they had still been ignoring it, like many other things that were requested over and over and argued in discussions. I do not think it is fair to see egosoft acting like that, call what that is in vanilla a "targeting system" and get away without a few frowns.
Therefore: Please draw his attention to this macro and write that you would like to see such a target switching for the game. AND (please) also complain a little that Egosoft doesn't want to allow modders to use buttons - it can't be right that a modder like SirNukes has to write an external programme for a basic function of a macro environment, can it?
Thank you.
And I'm glad you like my work...
Greetings Trajan from Olb
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Just checked it briefly (I should work now but psstt...) and it improves vanilla target selection significantly.
And finally I'm able to deselect targets!
Great.
I have to ask SirNukes if possible to bind joystick buttons with his Hotkey API cause it's not possible to use it with HOTAS directly.
Found a small typo in key binding menu: https://i.imgur.com/Oq1M5Oo.png - enemys should be: enemies
Got two questions:
Oh yes, joystick assignments with SirNukes mod would be great. Otherwise I'll slowly run out of "transfer" keys, especially as I still have a lot of plans with the hotkeys :-)
Thanks for the typo tip, it's already corrected, but I'm still collecting for the next release.
As for the asteroids, I'm thinking about it. In principle I can understand that, as asteroids can quickly get in the way. But with the line-of-sight search, it goes against the philosophy of being able to select everything you see (which somehow feels right because it promises control). But maybe I can reduce the range there, e.g. to half the radar range, although I don't really like that - after all, there are also huge astros, they are visible far away - why shouldn't you pick those if you can see them? So it would be even better to make the detection dependent on the size of the astro, but I don't know how I'm going to read those out yet (since that's more visual).
The rule-free search at next and prev is a bit different, that would make sense, so why not?
Another way would be to make this available as an option in the settings (for both). Which gives me the idea of adding more options in general, because people's wishes are certainly different. I'll have to look into it though, because I've never programmed a setting like that before. So it will take some time, especially since I'm also working on other mods, besides the More Hotkey series, for example on "More Betty", which is really a lot of fun. And right now RL is hitting me again...
But in any case, thanks for the suggestions, they are very welcome :-)
Greetings Trajan
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
And I have to praise this mod more... ;)
The convenience this mod gives with target selection is fantastic.
Tested "line of sight" selection and for joystick it shines and works exactly as I've expected: I see an object, point a crosshair and press button and viola. It is selected.
As some Todd would say: "It just works!".
I couldn't say that about vanilla target selection logic.
Also tested a short while with subsystems selection. Mapped to my CASTLE button, so:
- `left`/`right` is prev/next target,
- `up` is select nearest turret
- `down` is select engines
- `press` is deselect
And it's very convenient to switch targets in a dynamic boarding operation.And cycle through selected type (turrets/shields/engines).
---
One more suggestion that I'd like to leave is a slider/option to define max range for enemies targeting.
I often press assigned button to check if there are enemies in ship range. And currently it selects enemies even ~100km away, which is unnecessary IMO.
Hope to test this mod in normal gameplay today or tomorrow (till now made just a few 10 min tests) - but so far it seems essential for a HOTAS player like me.
However, I took another look at the routines for the rule-free search and discovered that asteroids don't even appear there. Did you really only mean the line-of-sight search?
Thanks for testing!
Greetings Trajan
Limiting enemy targeting to a radar range seems like a perfect solution.
As for asteroids - IIRC I was able to select it by using previos/next target hotkeys.
Thanks for updating Trajan.
All other Astros, i.e. those for mining, should not be selectable. Please test again in which special cases this occurs...
Line-of-sight is of course something else, but I had already described that...
Greetings Trajan
Played with "line of sight", "enemies" and "prev"/"next"/"no target" hotkeys.
Now I am sure that this mod is essential.
Line of sight makes targeting with joystick/kb as simple as when using a mouse.
Also had no objections to asteroids, they didn't interfere with target selection. Same with targeting enemies.
I really wonder why this mod isn't more popular.
Only have two suggestions/questions with "line of sight" targeting:
But when moved ship nose little to upper-right https://i.imgur.com/Rp1fSvd.png - it selected High Tech Factory ~290km away.
My Question is - is it possible to make "hitbox" smaller with distance?
So in this case for this far station, instead of current green "hitbox" - the red one would be used https://i.imgur.com/BZ2WZQh.jpg
Could it be included into "line of sight" targeting no matter the distance?
On next X4 session I plan to try boarding hotkeys (subsystems targeting).
first: thanks again for testing and the suggestions :-) I think that the mod is not more popular because many do not want to use third-party software (exe). If Egosoft would integrate the hotkey usage into their mod concept, this would look quite different... The Wing hotkey mod has pretty much the same problems, although the other mods enjoy great popularity in relation to the wings.
About the questions:
1. the problem is that Egosoft does not scale the "hitbox" for the search in distance. This means that the point for accurately finding a nearby station is exactly the same size as that of a distant one. In the process, unfortunately, a larger station does not really "cover" the smaller one in the background, which seems to be different for close ships.
The search in my MOD now works in several stages. First, a search is made exactly at the centre point with a cone of 1 degree. If nothing is found, the search continues with larger cones in several steps. Sure, I could prioritise nearby stations now, but that would make the search less precise. I would not like that, because from my point of view it is precisely this feeling of control that is important. Therefore, the problem cannot really be solved. But I'll think about it anyway, maybe I'll come up with something. I only came up with the multi-level mechanism when I analysed the weaknesses of the Egosoft search very carefully, point by point..
2. Project goals are unfortunately not objects in space. I cannot select "Empty room". But the hint is correct, the Egosoft search manages that, so there must be a way.
I will look into it, but it may take a while. Lots of RL and stuff, also I'm working on the other More-Hotkeys projects, e.g. there will soon be MoreHotkeys: Misc with direct-to-target teleport and a laser point scanner, with which you can scan distant stations under certain conditions with an extra hotkey and in longrange mode, if they stay exactly in the focus of the target cross for several seconds. That way you don't have to fly around in space forever when you can already see everything with your eye.... Or the old bargain finder, so that trading "by hand" with your own ship is fun again... But all this is quite complicated to program, because Egosoft has built in few possibilities to program menus, for example. You have to do it all yourself in Lua, which is a different programming language than the MODs, which I can't do (yet)...
Greetings Trajan
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
As I understand it - algorithm would have to collect all objects in front of player ship to some array and then sort it by some radius to distance ratio.
It's nothing major so IMO better to invest time into something else like MoreHotkeys: Misc and/or playing X4 :)
As for the guidance - I guess vanilla doesn't allow it too.
Made a report some time ago, but without any Ego response: https://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=431435
Nice that you plan more of the series - dunno if direct teleport suits my playstyle (currently using Kuertee's great Teleport from Transporter Room for immersion purposes) but laser point scanner and bargain finder sounds interesting if it won't make things too easy.
Fantastic work, modder, you have my gratitude.
I used to use a software called "joytokey" for X3 (before I had my HOTAS) for my Logitech Precision 3D. It reliably converts joystick buttons (or even movements) into keystrokes. I also found it really exciting that you could set buttons to change profiles (temporarily, as long as the button is pressed). This made it possible to control a lot of things with not so many buttons. For example, I had the target switching on a coolie hat, but if I pressed an additional button (with my left hand), I could now trigger other, less frequent functions with the coolie hat. Yet another key enabled commands to my Wing, again with the same Coolie Hat, etc....
Greetings Trajan
PS: When it's a little less summer again ;-), I'll continue with my other More-Hotkeys macros. There are still sales price and bargain finders, extended scan commands and a new way to operate the menu... Well, a lot of work, give me time :-)
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)