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I thought this little piece I'd written may be useful for all of you to understand the panel tracking system in the HCS Voicepack profiles:
Panel Tracking - how to use it and why it breaks
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Why it breaks firstly: Simply, Elite does not provide VoiceAttack with any data as to what is happening in the game. Which means we track where we are in the menu's by guesswork. There are things that happen in game which we cannot track and it's these which break the tracking. The menu tabs in game have no stopping point so going past the last tab roles around to the first instead of just stopping. This means we can't really tell if we are on the correct tab. The vertical selections do have a stopping point so we are able to reset these to the top which gives us a fixed starting point.
How it works: In VoiceAttack we use counters to track events that we trigger in game. So we say open systems panel and VoiceAttack presses the key which opens the right panel menu. In this command we record that we have opened the menu. It's as simple as that.
What breaks it?: Quite a lot of things unfortunately. I'll try to list what does so you have a better understanding. Basically we are able to reliably track keypresses, joystick button presses, joypad button presses and voice commands. The mouse is the bugger which causes most of the problems as we can't tell what option you clicked on. A keypress isn't recognised by Elite but was recognised by VoiceAttack or VoiceAttack pressed a key which Elite didn't catch. Leaving typing mode on so that VoiceAttack can't track keypresses. Issuing a command whilst the game is not focused, i.e you tabbed out to use a browser. You used headlook to open the side panels (this is the most common problem). Exiting the galaxy\system maps with the mouse when you opened them whilst having a panel open, i.e. from the navigation tab or the transaction tab. Elite v1.6\2.1 onwards also changed the way menus are reset when you high\low wake. The current HCS profiles do not track properly anymore but hopefully this will be fixed in future updates.
Things you can do to stop tracking from breaking: In controls, set looking at target\comms\role\systems panels to does nothing. This forces you to use a command we can track to open the menus. You soon get used to it, in fact i think its better as you can look around your ship without menus popping up all the time. Do not use the mouse to exit the galaxy\system maps. Set VoiceAttack to send input to the Elite - Dangerous (CLIENT) as this helps if you issue a command whilst tabbed out. Get used to using typing mode on\off for system and comms entry.
Setting it up to use: Start VoiceAttack, start the game and it's ready to go. For older packs you need to say run diagnostics\reset all systems or press the F3 key when you start as it isn't done automatically for you. Elite always starts in the same state menu wise.
Fixing it when it's out of sync: Turn typing mode on. Open each of the panels and set the tab to the far left. The role panel is odd as this needs to be set to the SRV tab. The vertical selections do not matter, you can leave them as is. Turn typing mode off and say run diagnostics\reset all systems or press the F3 key. That's it, you are back on track!
thanks,
TheThingIs
Panel Tracking - how to use it and why it breaks
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Why it breaks firstly: Simply, Elite does not provide VoiceAttack with any data as to what is happening in the game. Which means we track where we are in the menu's by guesswork. There are things that happen in game which we cannot track and it's these which break the tracking. The menu tabs in game have no stopping point so going past the last tab roles around to the first instead of just stopping. This means we can't really tell if we are on the correct tab. The vertical selections do have a stopping point so we are able to reset these to the top which gives us a fixed starting point.
How it works: In VoiceAttack we use counters to track events that we trigger in game. So we say open systems panel and VoiceAttack presses the key which opens the right panel menu. In this command we record that we have opened the menu. It's as simple as that.
What breaks it?: Quite a lot of things unfortunately. I'll try to list what does so you have a better understanding. Basically we are able to reliably track keypresses, joystick button presses, joypad button presses and voice commands. The mouse is the bugger which causes most of the problems as we can't tell what option you clicked on. A keypress isn't recognised by Elite but was recognised by VoiceAttack or VoiceAttack pressed a key which Elite didn't catch. Leaving typing mode on so that VoiceAttack can't track keypresses. Issuing a command whilst the game is not focused, i.e you tabbed out to use a browser. You used headlook to open the side panels (this is the most common problem). Exiting the galaxy\system maps with the mouse when you opened them whilst having a panel open, i.e. from the navigation tab or the transaction tab. Elite v1.6\2.1 onwards also changed the way menus are reset when you high\low wake. The current HCS profiles do not track properly anymore but hopefully this will be fixed in future updates.
Things you can do to stop tracking from breaking: In controls, set looking at target\comms\role\systems panels to does nothing. This forces you to use a command we can track to open the menus. You soon get used to it, in fact i think its better as you can look around your ship without menus popping up all the time. Do not use the mouse to exit the galaxy\system maps. Set VoiceAttack to send input to the Elite - Dangerous (CLIENT) as this helps if you issue a command whilst tabbed out. Get used to using typing mode on\off for system and comms entry.
Setting it up to use: Start VoiceAttack, start the game and it's ready to go. For older packs you need to say run diagnostics\reset all systems or press the F3 key when you start as it isn't done automatically for you. Elite always starts in the same state menu wise.
Fixing it when it's out of sync: Turn typing mode on. Open each of the panels and set the tab to the far left. The role panel is odd as this needs to be set to the SRV tab. The vertical selections do not matter, you can leave them as is. Turn typing mode off and say run diagnostics\reset all systems or press the F3 key. That's it, you are back on track!
thanks,
TheThingIs
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