Merc Zboard “Driver” Version 0.1.1
NEW VERSION FOUND – HERE
Small update to my “driver” for the MERC Zboard on Linux.
READ THE README – and anything the shell scripts say.
Changelog:
==============================================
Zboard Config Changelog
Copyright (C) 2007 Matt Razza
==============================================Version 0.1.0 – Version 0.1.1
Added:
-”status” command
-”checkZboard” command
-Added ability to remove existing maps to keys
-Added Zboard Compatibility testerChanged:
Fixed:
-Changed all references of “Zboard config” to “Zboard Config”Removed:
Download Source (tar.bz2) MD5: 557bb8594795f70cd0210a21ac8e0edc
April 17th, 2007 at 12:20 am
Have you built an ebuild for this? If not would you mind if I did?
How often do you update this?
April 17th, 2007 at 5:40 pm
You’re more than welcome to make an ebuild I was just too lazy. I should be updating this soon with some speed fixes and to get it to use no noticeable CPU (as of now you’ll see about a 3% jump every time it rescans /proc). After that I would like to make it able to import exported Zboard layouts from the Windows Zengine. Once I finish that it shouldn’t be updated often unless there is a bug or feature request. (In other words maybe two updates a month for the next 3 months)
April 17th, 2007 at 9:50 pm
Can I use your driver for a version1 USB Zboard uk version? or what would I need to do to add compatibility? It looks like I have to make xmodmaps for each of the zboard keysets? I’m incredibly new to linux, but if you tell me how to test for keycodes I will have a look at making my own xmodmaps for the zboard for you to add to your drivers?
April 18th, 2007 at 2:01 pm
Try it! I recently added the ability to test for computability. Run zboard-config –help to find the command I don’t remember it off-hand. Let me know how that turns out for you. If you are having any problems let me know and we can exchange AIM/MSN/ICQ/IRC/Yahoo/XFire info.
May 3rd, 2007 at 8:30 am
Hi, I’ve been a little busy and haven’t had the time to start on this until now. I’ve tried both the xmodmap and the zboard-config app. but neither seem to do a great deal for me. At the moment I am trying to get the multimedia keys working in any application, then I’ll move onto the Gaming Keyset after that (Don’t forget my Zboard has pull-out Keysets).
The multimedia keys are part of the base unit, so it would be nice to get those working in both gaming and normal keyset modes.
tbh I’m not sure I’ve even got the keyboard setup correctly in gentoo/kde. I think I have it set to 104 key atm.
I’ve had a look at xev but I get 0 response from it when i press the MM keys, however all other keys are working correctly (numpad etc.) except the Zboard specific keys, MM/Applications and Barlock, keytips and padlock.
I’ve had a little C/C++ experience a few years back and I’m prepared to do the donkey work on this, but as linux is new to me I really need some pointers
I guess the first step is to get the MM keys to output something to xev.
May 3rd, 2007 at 3:50 pm
I don’t know what to tell you about the multimedia keys. I’d image you’d need a real xorg driver you can load in so that xev could detect the key presses. I’d try going through all the xorg drivers although 104 should be good.
I don’t know how I can help you much as I only have the Zboard MERC. Let me know if you have any progress because I’d be more than happy to help you as much as possible.
May 3rd, 2007 at 8:53 pm
Hi, I took a look at the xorg drivers, didnt get any joy at all. didn’t get any joy from watching system logs either, that having been said I did manage to get a bit of a result from lsusb -v
these show up and it seems to be a list of the MM keys on the zboard:
Item(Local ): Usage, data= [ 0xb5 ] 181
Scan Next Track
Item(Main ): Input, data= [ 0x06 ] 6
Data Variable Relative No_Wrap Linear
Preferred_State No_Null_Position Non_Volatile Bitfield
Item(Local ): Usage, data= [ 0xb6 ] 182
Scan Previous Track
Item(Main ): Input, data= [ 0x06 ] 6
Data Variable Relative No_Wrap Linear
Preferred_State No_Null_Position Non_Volatile Bitfield
Which I hope gives me some answers…. I’m going to play some more with this in the morning I think.
Also, I plugged the gaming set into the zboard base this evening and the red keys etc. are working without any loading of any xmodmaps at all
The original Zboards have removable keysets, the full ‘normal’ 104 key keyset and the gaming keyset which consists of the 29 or so gaming keys (big red ones) and a normal keyboard without the numpad. It looks like all of the gaming keys are remapped to normal keys by an internal chip (or vice versa).
May 3rd, 2007 at 9:51 pm
The internal mapping with the normal Zboards is nice – it doesn’t require any xModMaps like the MERC does… but then again…. my media keys work. muhhahahah
Anyway, I’m still unsure how to help you… keep working at it; I’m sure others will be interested.
May 4th, 2007 at 1:12 pm
ahahaha
atm I’m not gaming so the media keys are the important bit for me 
I’m not entireley sure how you can help either, but its good to talk to someone who *might* be able to shed some light on things
Mr.Pig, can you do me a favour and tell me what dmesg Zboard/merc related stuff you get? from what I can tell, the usb keyboard should have 2 /dev/input/eventX devices assigned to it when the system recognises it, mine only has 1, which is why I think I can see the keycodes returned from lsusb -v but can’t actually access them. I gues the enumeration is erroring somewhere?
Also, it looks like I might have to write the driver myself (unless its an enumeration or some other loading bug)
May 4th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
Good luck with that. I’ve been gaming lately and haven’t booted into Gentoo in a while. When I do though, I’ll be sure to let you know.
Good luck.
June 12th, 2007 at 12:42 am
Is there any resolution for the issue in Ubuntu with S in the red keypad not repeating?
June 12th, 2007 at 5:57 am
Not that I know of, I think you should contact Ubuntu.
August 7th, 2007 at 10:45 pm
Thank you so much for this handy program!
The red keys don’t seem to work at all and the red down key is a slash (fedora core 7). I don’t need them anyway.
Anyway, it is so very nice to be able to use my number pad again.
August 8th, 2007 at 1:53 am
No problem.
The idea is that the program turns the redkeys on and disables the number keys when in a game, then when the game closes, switches them back.
September 16th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
Hey, nice work on getting some of the functionality back for this keyboard. I’ve been using it with linux for a while and I had pretty much given up on using the numpad or the red keys. There is one nuisance with the numpad tweak, though… Maybe it’s just for me, but I use the home and end keys quite a bit when I type for coding or chatting, whatever… Shift + home (and shift + end) usually selects a line of text, but with the xmodmap tweak this no longer happens. It doesn’t matter if numlock is on or off. Any suggestions to restore this functionality and keep the usage of the numpad?
September 16th, 2007 at 3:54 pm
Ah, yes… the functionality doesn’t exist to toggle between the numpad and the other function keys. I’m going to right myself a note and hopefully I’ll boot into linux and add the functionality then release a new version.
Feel free to prod me at my e-mail address if I don’t respond with another comment in a day or so.
mrazza@valdegames.com
Thanks for the comment.
December 26th, 2007 at 1:50 am
Hi, i play wow, and i have a ideazon zboard.
Can u tell me how to make it work in ubuntu? does this driver can help me?
December 26th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
First make sure that you’re supported by running:
zboard-config –checkZboard
If that says it supports it add the following line to the bottom of zboard.conf:
WoW.exe=gDefault
If the application exe is not WoW.exe (I.E. You’re not using WINE) set it to what ever it is.
July 16th, 2008 at 6:45 pm
Any idea for non-repeat keys? I have this problem and i cant solve. “F” key work fine and repeat, but “ASDW” not repeat in textbox
July 16th, 2008 at 7:01 pm
You may want to read through this:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=385426
Also make sure you have the latest version of my app found:
http://www.valdegames.com/pig/wordpress/2008/02/07/merc-zboard-%E2%80%9Cdriver%E2%80%9D-version-020/
July 17th, 2008 at 6:40 am
I dont see the solution. Im using ubuntu 8.04. Its this the problem? thanks for answer!