[o-info] Q&A spaceball 5000

From: Alwyn Jones (alwyn@xray.bmc.uu.se)
Date: Thu Dec 14 2006 - 12:09:35 CST


sorry for the delay in replying...

 >I am testing the waters to see what the current
status of using a Spaceball 5000 with O on Linux.
When I last checked, the only driver that existed
was supported by a third party and only worked for
the serial version of the Spaceball (and not the USB
version.)


3Dconnexion now market a new set of devices. two seem to look like  
developments of the spacemouse. 2 others look like little dials,  
maybe with some extra degrees of freedom. one 'dial' is very new and  
seems to be supported under XP. the others are xp, linux, shades of  
unix. all are USB.


 >Has anything developped in this area since that last
post in Jan 2005?  Is it known whether the Spaceball
drivers work through GLUT, or are they using a
separate interface?

when last 'we' looked, the linux driver generated X-events. mark  
harris tried building GLUT to use these events but he couldn't get it  
to work. it's been on ice ever since

 >Finally, in an unrelated question, what is the
status of supporting SGI dials in linux?  Looking
through the o-info archives, it seems as though
multiple solutions exist.  Some of these seem to be
patches to freeGLUT while others are not.  Is there
a preference, and what is the recommended best practice?

ov11 supports SG & SUN/DEC dials out of the box using code based on  
david gohara's test program. you just have to set up the environment  
variable. o has a call-back to glutDialsFunc, so if your glut  
supports dials, so will o. this means that joe krahn's special glut  
for dials will work out of the box.


 >Finally, looking to the future, is there any
indication that these hardware issues will become
standardized and less difficult to diagnose, both in

i have a series of old, expensive input devices that are serial and  
will not work with my linux laptop. i'm prepared to buy a new USB  
device if people wanted to use the new models. i don't entirely agree  
with morten about the powermate. people are different, i prefer my  
nostromo n52, for example. since this is on my desk in the lab, when  
i work at home i just arcade the keyboard. if i had a space pilot  
($400), i'd use it. but $400 is a lot. the space explorer is $300  
(and more like the old space mouse). the space traveller is $200, and  
the latest thing the navigator is either $99 or $59 (driver on XP).

so drop me a line if you would buy any of the above if it is  
supported in O, but don't buy anything until it is supported. tell me  
which one you'd buy.

Alwyn Jones
alwyn@xray.bmc.uu.se
http://xray.bmc.uu.se/alwyn



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