I've just posted a new release of the firmware and config tool. If you have the auto-update feature set in the config tool, it should find it and download it for you automatically. You an also grab the new copies manually from the usual place:
http://mjrnet.org/pi...oller_KL25Z.bin
http://mjrnet.org/pi...eConfigTool.zip
New features:
* IR remote control. The IR remote control features on the expansion board are finally supported! The software is now capable of sending and receiving IR remote control commands, which can be used in three ways. First, it works with the TV ON feature: program the remote control code for your TV's ON button, and the board can transmit that code when the system powers up to make your TV turn on. Second, you can assign IR commands to cabinet buttons, allowing you to transmit whatever other commands you might want to send to your TVs or other devices at any time. Third, you can assign PC keystrokes (either keyboard keys or joystick buttons) to be sent when designated IR commands are received. This lets you point a remote control at Pinscape, press a button on the remote, and have Pinscape send a key to the PC. This lets you access extra PC command functions using remote controls rather than adding more cabinet buttons. E.g., you could control your PC audio volume using a remote control.
The firmware acts like a universal learning remote. It's fluent in about 30 common protocols, which should cover most major consumer electronics brands, but there are probably some outliers that it doesn't recognize yet. The software is designed to make it fairly easy to add new protocols, so let me know if you run into a remote it doesn't recognize, and I'll try to add support. Send me details on the make and model of the equipment, plus the "raw signal data" report that you can get from the "learn" dialog in the config tool.
* New Shift button options. You can now configure the Shift button (if you're using one) to act more like an ordinary button, if you prefer. I've noticed that some people don't like the "delay" that the Shift button has in sending its mapped key. By default, the Shift button waits to send its mapped key until you release the button, because that's the only way it can know for sure that you're not going to engage its Shift function by pressing another key. If you prefer, you can get rid of that delay by selecting the new "Shift AND Key" mode. In this mode, the Shift button always sends its mapped key, without waiting to see if you're going to press another button - that lets it send the key immediately when you press the button, just like any other button. The tradeoff is that it always sends the key press, so you have to choose a button whose mapped key won't cause unwanted side effects when you only wanted to engage the Shift function. It's a tradeoff either way, but at least now you can decide which tradeoff you prefer.
* New accelerometer options. You can now control the auto-centering feature, by changing its timing or just turning it off entirely.
You can also change the dynamic range of the accelerometer if you wish. The hardware itself provides +/- 2G, 4G, or 8G ranges, so I exposed the option to select which range you want. Previous Pinscape versions used the 2G hardware range, although they limited it to 1G when reporting it to the PC. The reason the hardware has the range selection is that there's a tradeoff between precision and range. No matter which range you use, the hardware quantizes the analog motion reading into 14 bits of digital data. To get the wider ranges, it drops bits off the low end, meaning that you get slightly coarser readings at the wider ranges. The highest precision is at the 2G range. From what I can see, there's no good reason to use the higher ranges for virtual pinball, because you're just not going to shake the cabinet hard enough to need them - jolts that hard are pretty much just tilts. But the option is there if you want to experiment.
This version also has quite a few internal changes for memory and speed optimization, which aren't particularly visible in terms of features, but could cause unexpected changes in behavior, or just plain bugs. If you run into anything weird or problematic, let me know. I usually manage to break at least two old things for each new thing on any major release, so I undoubtedly added a few bugs along with the new features. If you run into anything catastrophic or showstopping, I left a copy of the last build up there as an emergency fallback:
http://mjrnet.org/pi...5Z_20170203.bin
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