Posted By
TLC
on 2004-08-14
18:03:14
|  Re: Mouse emulation
Hmmm... So...
As a short introduction: C= mice operate in either of two operating modes; joystick ("compatibility") mode or proportional mode. (On the original 1351 mouse, you could select mode at power-up; the 1350 supported joystick mode only). In joystick mode, the mouse movement generates standard length 20ms pulses on the appropriate joystick direction lines. Whilst for proportional mode, the designers mis-used the C64 paddle inputs to transmit true 6-bit movement data continuously.
You can use a 1350 or 1351 on the Plus/4 in joystick mode, provided that you have a suitable joystick interface for it. Common, simple joystick interface cables won't work (due to the differences between the nature of the C64 and Plus/4 joystick ports).
On the emulator's side, emulating a joystick-mode mouse would be just emulating joystick movements from the PC mouse.
The 1351 won't work -- at all -- on a stock Plus/4 in proportional mode, since the Plus/4 has no paddle inputs.
(The 1351 certainly works together with the joystick port of Solder's SID card. ...There are little quirks because of the slower clock of the SID, but it works. As for whether some software actually _supports_ the native 1351 mode mouse through this interface, honestly, I don't know  . Some german GUI stuff -- presumably -- could).
Emulating it won't be a hard task, as I guess. The operation is fully known and is also pretty simple.
There could be also other -- nonstandard -- mouse interfacing methods, like hooking a standard serial mouse directly to the user port (the ACIA would be an obvious chance to handle a serial mouse directly). Serial mice could have been promising, if people were seriously after mouse support back then. (More intelligent, and less problematic than interfacing a 1351 in proportional mode; still not mentioning mouse availability and price). But AFAIK there is no Plus/4 software supporting such mouse solution.
|
