topic Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW in LabVIEW

Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

JohannS — Fri, 25 May 2007 12:57:50 GMT

After seeing many movies on the internet of people controlling random devices (eg. roomba) with a Wiimote, I wanted to play too. We wrote a set of LabVIEW VIs to configure and query the wiimote. The VIs call into the Microsoft Windows Bluetooth stack and communicate via a set of proprietary input and output reports. Most of the information regarding the proprietary report formats was obtained from the following sites:

WiiBrew Wiki
WiiLi

The Wiimote VIs currently can:
* Read and write LED status
* Read all buttons (except power button)
* Read calibrated accelaration data
* Read up to 4 IR sources

There is still some functionality missing:
* Nunchuk is not supported yet
* Speaker is not supported yet

The minimum requirements (as tested) for using the VIs are:
* Microsoft Windows XP SP2
* Cambridge Silicon Bluetooth Radio (other Bluetooth stacks may work as well)
* LabVIEW 8.2
* Wiimote controller
* IR Source for tracking IR data

These VIs are a work in progress, and I hope to add more features and examples in the future.

Hope this helps,

JohannS

PS Now go shake a wiimote at LabVIEW

Message Edited by JohannS on 05-25-2007 07:59 AM

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

JohannS — Sat, 26 May 2007 15:35:59 GMT

Here is an update to the existing Wiimote VIs.

Changes:
* Added support for Nunchuk extension controller.
* Updated VIs to allow multiple wiimotes to be used simultaneously.
* Updated examples.

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

Xaq — Tue, 29 May 2007 15:33:22 GMT

JohannS-

I've been using the Wiimote VI's for a while now and love them. Excellent, clean interface. Thanks for all the hard work.

Xaq

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

David.Collins — Wed, 30 May 2007 18:27:22 GMT

Is the source for your dll available? We would like to use a PDA as a bluetooth server for a wiimote and serial to bluetooth adpater on a microcontroller. We would need to recompile the dll for use on windows CE.

David

Message Edited by David.Collins on 05-30-2007 01:28 PM

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

Marc_A — Wed, 30 May 2007 19:24:17 GMT

I've been wanting to play around with this. I have a Wii and bluetooth adapter, and as soon as people started doing this on thier computers I wanted to do it in LabVIEW, I just never got around to it. It's good to see someone else had the same idea, so I may have to give these VIs a try.

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

DjSaara — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 14:35:05 GMT

Hi JohannS

Thank you for the wonderfull App, works great, but want vibration support, are there any plans of implimenting vibration feed back??

Thank you in advance

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

JohannS — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 15:33:15 GMT

Dj

My ultimate goal is to have an easy to use set of VIs that expose the functionality of the Nintendo Wiimote.

I have considered adding support for the rumble feature. It would be a single VI, probably called Wiimote Set Rumble.vi, that turns the rumble feature on or off. Unfortunately there are some undesired interaction with the other functions. The rumble state is updated by any output report sent from the host to the wiimote. If you dig into the code, you will see that we use Wiimote Set Output Report.vi all over the place. So the problems are:

1) Turning rumble on/off would disable any previously set LEDs
2) Calling any Wiimote VI that sets an output report would disable the rumble if it has been enabled.

So I am left with following options:

1) Implement a single VI that enables/disables the rumble, knowing that it would be immediately be disabled once I call any other Wiimote VI that sets an output report.
2) Add a rumble input to each VI which sets an output report in the API so that the rumble state is maintained even if calling other Wiimote VIs.
3) Add rumble state information to the Wiimote session. Use session state whenever setting output report to maintain rumble state. This would become slightly trickier when using multiple wiimotes in the same application.
4) Do not support rumble feature for now.

So I would like to ask you a question (or two).
a) Would you mind if the rumble feature is automatically turned off if you call any other Wiimote VI?
b) Would you prefer that the rumble state is maintained even if you call other Wiimote VIs?

Thanks,

JohannS

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

DjSaara — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 16:42:04 GMT

Hi Johanns

Thank you very much for the reply, i do not mind those issues at the moment, i need implement the rumble due to the feedback, please let me know how to go about it at the moment

Thanks/Regards

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

JohannS — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 17:13:10 GMT

Dj

Try the attached VI. Its quick and dirty. It turns the Rumble on and off. Like discussed in my previous post, the rumble will be disabled if you call any VI that internally calls Wiimote Set Output Report.vi.

Hope this helps,

JohannS

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

DjSaara — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 17:40:10 GMT

Thank you very much Johanns, I really appreciate your help, meanwhile i was looking at the wiki of wii, you can control the rumble even with code 0x13, & sending 0x01 or 0x00 for set/reset respective. Any ways i shall try in the morning, Thank you again

Regards

Re : Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

magestik — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 19:10:23 GMT

Hi JohannS,

I have a question, i'm trying to make the wiimote work with the dll file, with LabWindows, but i'm not good enough 😞

Can you help me with this ?

Thanks

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

JohannS — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 15:10:04 GMT

Here is an update to the existing Wiimote VIs.

Changes:
*Added support for rumble feature
*Updated VI icons

NOTE: These are the VIs that were used in some of the NIWeek 2007 demos controlled by wiimote's.

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

Ralph@NES — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 16:32:15 GMT

Boy I never even thought of interfacing a Wiimote and Labview. Nice. I'm going to play with this sometime quick, I've got an extra Wiimote.

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

JohannS — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 19:21:57 GMT

There is a known issue when using multiple wiimote controllers and for loops. The Wiimote VI's were originally developed so that each wiimote will have a unique instance of the Wiimote Get <Function> VI. This is demonstrated by the first diagram highlighted in green. Using for loop to get data from multiple wiimotes will result in only the first wiimote being correctly configured to return data. This is demonstrated by the second diagram highlighted in red.

In order to get data from multiple wiimote's, ensure that each wiimote has a seperate instance of the query functions.

Message Edited by JohannS on 08-13-2007 02:23 PM

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

lmtis — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 19:29:35 GMT

JohannS,

do you have a copy of the Wiimote VIs that are LV8.0 compatible? Sounds like some cool stuff!

Jim

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

JohannS — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 19:41:32 GMT

Jim,

Here are the LabVIEW 8.0 version of the Wiimote VI's. Please note that I merely saved the LabVIEW 8.2.1 VIs for a previous version. While the VIs should work just fine, I have not tested the wiimote functionality under LabVIEW 8.0.

Let me know if you have any issues,

JohannS

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

lmtis — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 19:42:53 GMT

Thanks Johanns,

I'll give them a try tonight!

Jim

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

BobJerome — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 11:41:50 GMT

I don't suppose it would be possible to save the wiimote viis so that they can be opened in version 7.1 of labview?

Cheers,

Bob

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

Yossarian42 — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 19:45:58 GMT

I was also wondering if someone could explain how to integrate these files properly with labview. Specifically, how does one use the .dll file with labview (8.2).

I hope to use these vi's as a basis for a school project. Thanks for any help.

Re: Using a wiimote with LabVIEW

Yossarian42 — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 13:46:12 GMT

I used the "Call Library Function" node to call the wiimote.dll and no errors are caused from that but when the "Wiimote Get Acceleration Calibration" node is activated in the Useage.vi example it spits out an error code. How can i fix this problem? Am I calling the .dll incorrectly? The wiimote is definately communicating with my computer via bluetooth so I'm not sure whats wrong. Thanks for any help.