Sending single characters to LFS by InSim

[CrazyICE]

I guess it was asked before, but I can't find anything...
I want to send the - key (blocking messages) to LFS by using

struct SingleCharPack // send to LFS to simulate single character
{
char Id [4]; // SCH + zero
char Char; // key to press
byte Flags; // bit 0 : SHIFT / bit 1 : CTRL
byte Spare2;
byte Spare3;
};

what i don't really understand is, what flag to use if i don't want to use SHIFT or CTRL? just 2 or so?

I also wonder why this works sometimes and sometimes not...
I want to send a - (block message) if the race starts, therefore i send this charater if i get the "IS_RST // Race STart" packet, but LFS does nothing...

and is it possible to determine the block state? (if messages are blocked or not)

[Silkswift]

For the flags, it refers to the actual bits (1 or 0) within the byte, not the decimal value. So:
0: no shift or ctrl pressed (in binary 00)
1: SHIFT (in binary 01)
2: CTRL (in binary 10)
3: SHIFT+CTRL (in binary 11)

And to determine the state, the only way I can see would be to send 2 such packets quickly, and parse the output. Not very elegant though :).

[CrazyICE]

thx...
but this sending doesn't work here...
(patch P8)

[Frankmd]

Try sending character 0x2D or 0x7E instead of "-". Maybe - is different on your keyboard settings ... :shrug:

[CrazyICE]

hmmm...
doesn't work :(

i tried this:
c:= Chr(45); //HEX = 2D

but it doesn't work. flag was 0!

i tried c:= 'R' and flag 1 and the restart vote has been done...
strange :(

EDIT:
strage that when i send L with flag 0 nothing happens, but the limiter should be switch on/off.
if i send L with flag 1 the the suspension is shown...

seems that i can't send only characters with flag 0....

[CrazyICE]

btw: i get an error sound, when sending - to LFS...
seems really that i send the wrong character...
i used decimal 45 which is HEX 0x2D which should be - but the same problem :(

[Frankmd]

Maybe it got something to do with the recent language patches, what version are you using?

[CrazyICE]

used P8 & P9

[CrazyICE]

but its really strange:
sending L with Flag 0 doesn't work (Limiter on/off Key L), but sending L with Flag 1 works (Live-Suspension SHIFT+L).
so, I think sending single chars doesn't work correctly.....

SCAWEN????

[CrazyICE]

no idea?
what are you thinking, SCAWEN, VICTOR, ERIC (well, i think eric doesn't have any thing to do with that :) )?

[Scawen]

Try sending the character 0xbd instead of the '-' character. Because now, the in-game keys need a windows virtual key code, rather than an ascii character. The VK_xxx should match ASCII for A-Z and 0-9 and some others. But the - key varies between keyboards... so the virtual key code does not match the ascii character.

I don't think it's related to ctrl or shift. For example have you tried sending a 'T' keypress? It should open a text box (though i haven't tested this). I think the L key and other user-assignable keys don't work because they aren't processed in the same way. It's detecting if that key is held down, instead processing a keypress.

[CrazyICE]

thx for answer...
sendig T works!
but how do i send a HEX as a CHAR?
don't really know how to do that in Delphi...sorry, noob :(
i only be able to send chars....how do i convert hex in a char?
sorry about this maybe stupid question, but i really don't know...

/edit, i tried to send chr(189), but it doesn't work...
in my codetable, 189 should be BD, hope i refere to the correct thing!
my codetable shows the decimal value of an char eg. 065 for A and the hex value 41 (for A)...
so, sending Chr(65) should be the same as sending hex 41...right? so hex 41 should be 0x41....right?

therefor sending 189 should be 0XBD ==> '-'


procedure SendChar;
var c: Char;
begin
c:= Chr(189);
SendMSTPacket(UDPClient, 'Sending char: '+ c+ #0); //shows message in LFS to see what char was recieved
SendSCHPacket(c, 0, UDPClient); //sends key press to LFS via InSim; c = char, 0 = flag
end;


function Chr(X: Byte): Char;

Description
Chr returns the character with the ordinal value (ASCII value) of the byte-type expression, X.

[Scawen]

OK... i don't know Delphi but i think your code is right.

I've just run a test and i've found out that because it was using a signed char, no key above 127 would work - it would just be an unknown key in LFS. So that's why 0xbd did not work. I've just fixed the LFS code so that the higher VK_xxx will work in future. Thanks for the bug find.

[CrazyICE]

good to hear...
i thought it was me :) hehehehe...
thx scawen!