Lab - Mouse Control With Joystick - ITP Physical Computing

2/7/2015 Lab: Mouse Control With Joystick | ITP Physical Computing
ITP Physical Computing
LAB: MOUSE CONTROL WITH JOYSTICK

Last edited 26 August 2014 by Benedetta Piantella
Introduction
In this lab, you’ll build an alternative
Contents [hide]
computer mouse using an Arduino
Leonardo using a joystick to move the 1 Introduction
mouse left, right, up and down. You’ll use 2 What You’ll Need to Know
the joystick’s select button to replace the 3 Things You’ll Need
mouse button as well. You’ll see how to 3.1 Note on mouse control
4 Prepare the breadboard
scale the analog outputs of the joystick to a
5 Add a pushbutton
reasonable range using the map() function.
6 Add a thumb joystick
7 Program the module to read the pushbutton
A joystick is typically made up of two 8 Program the Leonardo to read the Joystick
potentiometers, one for the X axis and one 9 Map the X and Y output readings
for the Y axis. The potentiometers are 10 Add code to listen for the Joystick Select Button
mounted so that when the joystick is at rest 10.1 Note on pullup vs. pulldown resistors
in the center, the potentiometers are at the 11 Add commands to control the mouse
middle of their range. Some joysticks like 11.1 Note on mouse misbehaving
the Thumb Joystsick used here also have a
pushbutton that you can press by pushing down on the stick. (Note: SparkFun and Parallax have
equivalent models as well.)
What You’ll Need to Know

To get the most out of this lab, you should be familiar with the following concepts. You can check
how to do so in the links below:
Digital Input with Arduino
https://itp.nyu.edu/physcomp/labs/labsmousecontrol/labmousecontrolwithjoystick/ 1/11
Analog Input with Arduino

How to control a mouse
Mouse control with pushbuttons
Things You’ll Need

For this lab you will need the following parts:
Solderless Breadboard 22-AWG hook-up wire Arduino Leonardo
10kilohm resistors Switch or pushbutton Thumb Joystsick
Click on any image for a larger view
Note on mouse control

NOTE: The sketches contained in this lab will cause the Arduino Leonardo to take control of
your mouse. Make sure they’re working properly before you add the mouse commands. The
example doesn’t introduce the mouse commands until the end of the lab. Instead, messages
are printed to the serial monitor to tell you what should happen. When you’ve run this and
seen the serial messages occurring when you think they should, then you can add the mouse
commands safely.
The sketches here will work on an Uno until you add the mouse commands. So you can test
this on an Uno simply by commenting out any line that says Mouse.begin() or Mouse.move().
Prepare the breadboard
Connect power and ground on the breadboard to power and ground from the microcontroller.
On the Arduino module, use the 5V and any of the ground connections:
Made with Fritzing
Add a pushbutton
Attach a pushbutton to digital pin 2. Connect one side of the pushbutton to 5 volts, and the other
side of the pushbutton to a 10-kilohm resistor. Connect the other end of the resistor to ground.
Connect the junction where the pushbutton and the resistor meet to digital pin 2. (For more on
this digital input circuit,see the Digital Input Lab)
Add a thumb joystick

Add a thumb joystick, attaching the Xout to analog input 0, the Yout to analog input 1, and the
select button to digital input 3.
Program the module to read the pushbutton

Follow the same steps as you did in the first Mouse Control lab to read when the pushbutton on
pin 2 is pressed. Your code should only print out a message when the button changes state.
Similarly, set up a global variable to track whether or not you’re controlling the mouse, called
mouseIsActive. Each time the pushbutton on pin 2 is pressed, change the state of this variable
from false to true, just like you did in the first mouse control lab.
// Global variables:
int lastButtonState = LOW; // state of the button last time you checked
boolean mouseIsActive = false; // whether or not the Arduino is controlling the

void setup() {
// initialize serial communication:
Serial.begin(9600);
pinMode(2, INPUT);
}

void loop() {
// read the first pushbutton:
int buttonState = digitalRead(2);

// if it's changed and it's high, toggle the mouse state:
if (buttonState != lastButtonState) {
if (buttonState == HIGH) {
// if mouseIsActive is true, make it false;
// if it's false, make it true:
mouseIsActive = !mouseIsActive;
Serial.print("Mouse control state: ");
Serial.println(mouseIsActive);
}
}
// save button state for next comparison:
lastButtonState = buttonState;
}
Program the Leonardo to read the Joystick

Add code to the main loop to read the joystick X and Y outputs and print them.
// Global variables:
int lastButtonState = LOW; // state of the button last time you checked
boolean mouseIsActive = false; // whether or not the Arduino is controlling the

void setup() {
// initialize serial communication:
Serial.begin(9600);
pinMode(2, INPUT);
}

void loop() {
// read the first pushbutton:
int buttonState = digitalRead(2);

if (buttonState != lastButtonState) {
if (buttonState == HIGH) {
// if mouseIsActive is true, make it false;
// if it's false, make it true:
mouseIsActive = !mouseIsActive;
Serial.print("Mouse control state: ");
Serial.println(mouseIsActive);
}
}
// save button state for next comparison:
lastButtonState = buttonState;

// read the analog sensors:
int sensor1 = analogRead(A0);
delay(1);
// print their values. Remove this when you have things working:
Serial.print(sensor1);
Serial.print(" ");
Serial.println(sensor2);
}
Map the X and Y output readings

The Mouse.move() command has three parameters: the horizontal movement, the vertical
movement, and the scroll wheel movement. All movements are relative, so Mouse.move(1,0,0);
moves one pixel to the right; Mouse.move(-1,0,0); moves one pixel to the left;
Mouse.move(0,1,0); moves one pixel down; and Mouse.move(0,-1,0); moves one pixel up. Moving
the mouse more than about 5 pixels in any direction is a very fast move. So the ideal range for the
joystick is if it can move the cursor 5 pixels in any direction.
In order to do this, you need to scale the X and Y outputs from the default range that they return
(0 to 1023) to a range from -5 to 5. You can do this using the map() function. Map takes five
parameters: the input value, the range of the input value, and the desired output range, like so:
result = map(inputValue, inputMinimum, inputMaximum, outputMinimum,
outputMaximum);
So, if your input range is 0 to 1023, and your output range is -5 to 5, you might map like this:
result = map(sensorReading, 0, 1023, ‐5, 5);
Add code to the main loop to map the X and Y outputs to a range from -5 to 5. Print the mapped
values instead of the original sensor values.
// read the analog sensors:
delay(1);

int xAxis = map(sensor1, 0, 1023, ‐5, 5);
int yAxis = map(sensor2, 0, 1023, ‐5, 5);

// print their values. Remove this when you have things working:
Serial.print(xAxis);
Serial.print(" ");
Serial.println(yAxis);
NOTE: If your joystick defaults to -1 at rest on one axis or both, try adding 1 to the result of the
map command. Try different output ranges and see what they do.
When you run this sketch, you should see the Mouse Control State message once every time you
press the first pushbutton, and the values of the X and Y axes of the joystick, mapped to a range
of -5 to 5. You still need to add in the select button on the joystick, however.
Add code to listen for the Joystick Select Button

The joystick select button is a digital input, but it’s wired differently than the buttons you saw in
the Digital Lab or the Mouse Control With Pushbuttons Lab.
Note on pullup vs. pulldown resistors

It is, in fact, wired to connect to ground when you press it. To read it, then, you’d still use
digitalWrite(), but you’d expect it to go low when pressed instead of high. And instead of a
pulldown resistor like you’ve used in those other two labs, you’d use a pullup resistor, so that
it’s connected to 5V when the switch is not open.
You can see the schematic for a pullup resistor circuit below.
The Arduino has built-in pullup resistors that you can use on the digital inputs. When you set
the pin to be an input using the pinMode() command, use the parameter INPUT_PULLUP
instead of INPUT. This will activate the built-in pullup resistor on that pin, so you only have to
attach a switch between the pin and ground.
The advantage of connecting your switch to ground instead of 5V is that you can use the
internal pullup resistor instead of having to add an external resistor. The disadvantage is
that your switch logic is inverted: HIGH means the switch is open, and LOW means it is
closed. Most of the time you can wire your switches either way, but when you have a switch
that’s already wired to ground like the select button in the joystick, you have to use the
internal pullups and inverted logic.
Previously, you wired the select button to digital input 3. To read the select button in this sketch,
add a pinMode command to the setup that makes it an INPUT_PULLUP. Then in the main loop,
check if the mosueIsActive variable is true. If it is, then use digitalRead() to read the select button
and store it in a local variable called button2State.
Add the following at the end of the setup command:
// make pin 2 an input, using the built‐in pullup resistor:
pinMode(2, INPUT_PULLUP);
Then at the end of the loop, add the following code:
if (mouseIsActive == true) {
// read the second pushbutton:
int button2State = digitalRead(3);
The select button’s behavior should be like the mouse control pushbutton’s behavior: you only
want something to happen when it changes. When the select button changes from off to on, you
want it to perform a mouse click. When it changes from on to off, you want it to perform a mouse
release. So you need to check for when the select button changes, just like you do with the other
pushbutton.
To check for the select button to change, set up a global variable called lastButton2State to save
its previous state. Then set up an if statement in the main loop after you read it to see if the
current state and the previous state are different. If they are different, add another if statement
to see if the current state is HIGH or LOW. If it’s LOW, then print “Mouse press” (remember,its
logic is inverted). If the current state is HIGH, then print “mouse press”.
This block of code will look a lot like the code you used for Mouse Control to track the state
change of the pushbutton on pin 2.
Add the following line before the setup command:
int lastButton2State = LOW; // state of the other button last time you check
Then inside the if statement that you added to check the mouseIsActive variable, add the
following code (the if statement is shown here too):

if (button2State != lastButton2State) {
if (button2State == LOW) {
Serial.println("mouse pressed");
}
else {
Serial.println("mouse released");
}
}
// save second button state for next comparison:
lastButton2State = button2State;
}
When you run this code, you should see the words “mouse pressed” once when you press the
select button, and “mouse released” when you release the select button. If it prints continually,
you have an error.
When you’ve got that working, you’re ready to take control of the mouse.
Add commands to control the mouse
Note on mouse misbehaving

NOTE: The sketches contained in this lab will cause the Arduino Leonardo to take control of
your mouse. Make sure they’re working properly before you add these commands. If your
sketch causes your mouse to misbehave, upload a blank sketch (the default when you choose
File -> New) to your Leonardo and you can start again from the beginning.
The Mouse.begin() command is called in the setup. It initializes mouse control from your
Leonardo.
Modify the setup by adding the command Mouse.begin(). Then, in the loop where check if
mouseIsActive is true, add Mouse.move commands to move as needed. Also add Mouse.press()
when the select button is pressed, and Mouse.release() when it is released.
At the end of the setup(), add the following:
// initialize mouse control:
Mouse.begin();
Then in the main loop, add the following lines to the if statement that checks mouseIsActive:
Mouse.move(xAxis, yAxis, 0);


if (button2State != lastButton2State) {
if (button2State == LOW) {
Serial.println("mouse pressed");
Mouse.press();
}
else {
Serial.println("mouse released");
Mouse.release();
}
}
That’s the whole sketch. When you run this, press the mouse control pushbutton, then move the
joystick and press the select button. You should have full mouse control.
The full sketch for this can be found on the phys comp github repository, called
MouseMoveSimpleJoystick.
In this sketch, you can see the value of scaling an analog sensor’s readings to match the output
range you need. Since the joystick potentiometers are at rest in the middle of their range, scaling
them from -5 to 5 gives you easy control of the mouse movement, which is relative. You can also
see how reading the state change of a digital input is important. You’re doing it for two different
buttons in this sketch.

Lab - Mouse Control With Joystick - ITP Physical Computing

Caricato da

Informazioni sul documento

Titolo originale

Copyright

Formati disponibili

Condividi questo documento

Condividi o incorpora il documento

Opzioni di condivisione

Hai trovato utile questo documento?

Questo contenuto è inappropriato?

Copyright:

Formati disponibili

Lab - Mouse Control With Joystick - ITP Physical Computing

Caricato da

Copyright:

Formati disponibili

2/7/2015 Lab: Mouse Control With Joystick | ITP Physical Computing

ITP Physical Computing

LAB: MOUSE CONTROL WITH JOYSTICK

What You’ll Need to Know

Digital Input with Arduino

Analog Input with Arduino

Things You’ll Need

Solderless Breadboard 22-AWG hook-up wire Arduino Leonardo

10kilohm resistors Switch or pushbutton Thumb Joystsick

Click on any image for a larger view

Note on mouse control

Prepare the breadboard

Made with Fritzing

Add a thumb joystick

Program the module to read the pushbutton

Program the Leonardo to read the Joystick

Map the X and Y output readings

Add code to listen for the Joystick Select Button

Note on pullup vs. pulldown resistors

Add the following at the end of the setup command:

Then at the end of the loop, add the following code:

Add the following line before the setup command:

you have an error.

Add commands to control the mouse

Note on mouse misbehaving

At the end of the setup(), add the following:

Potrebbero piacerti anche