Joystick Capabilities

Joysticks can support two- or three-axis movement and up to four buttons. Joysticks also support different ranges of motion and polling frequencies. The range of motion is the distance a joystick handle can move from its resting position to the position farthest from its resting position. The polling frequency is the time interval between joystick queries.

Joystick drivers can support either one or two joysticks. You can determine the number of joysticks supported by a joystick driver by using the joyGetNumDevsJPOCNG function. This function returns an unsigned integer that contains the number of supported joysticks or zero if there is no joystick support. The return value does not indicate the number of joysticks attached to the system.

You can determine if a joystick is attached to the system by using the joyGetPos67KIE_ function. This function returns JOYERR_NOERROR if the specified device is attached. Otherwise , it returns JOYERR_UNPLUGGED.

Each joystick has several capabilities that are available to your application. You can retrieve the capabilities of a joystick by using the joyGetDevCapsC8V8O5 function. This function fills a JOYCAPS19ISN8B structure with joystick capabilities such as the minimum and maximum values for its coordinate system, the number of buttons on the joystick, and the minimum and maximum polling frequencies.