Questions about psmove on Windows

[Aeva Palecek]

Hello!

I'm interested in using psmove to build a 3D sculpting program.  I expect that I'll need to use two such move controllers, and a camera to do the 3D positioning, and I'm using Windows as my current development machine.

I was reading through the docs and this google group's conversation log to try to get a sense of how cross platform this library is, and I have some questions that I wasn't able to find clear answers to.  Maybe someone here can help?

1. There's a distressingly large number of posts here complaining that only one move controller can be used at a time with psmove on Windows.  Is that a limitation of the library?  Is this specific to bluetooth and if so is it possible to work around by using USB?  Is there literally anyone here who can say "works on my machine" for two controllers on Windows 10 or is there no hope of making this work at all?

2. https://psmoveapi.readthedocs.io/en/latest/navcon.html Says "This is not tested at all on Windows, contributions welcome."  Does this mean that accessing the buttons on the controller should not be expected to work on Windows at all, or is this documentation just out of date?

3. The docs only mention the PS3 camera as being usable on Windows.  I have the PS4 version and the official USB adapter.  Does this also work on Windows?  If not, can this be substituted for another stereo camera that does work, like an Intel RealSense camera?  Or even a non-stereo camera eg a webcam?

Thanks,
Aeva

[Aeva Palecek]

To amend my second question, I did not realize that "navigation controller" referred to an old peripheral that I neither have nor care about.  So long as the caveat about the buttons doesn't also apply to the regular move controller, I don't think it should be much of an issue.


I gave the pairing workflow a try on Windows 10 Pro.  I was able to pair one PS4 move controller successfully, but pairing the other one via the same method fails:

Here is the command output for pairing the second controller:

"""
C:\Users\aeva\Downloads\psmoveapi-4.0.12-windows-msvc2017-x64\bin>psmove.exe pair
Connected controllers: 2
PSMove #1 connected via USB.

    Unplug the controller.

    Now press the controller's PS button. The red status LED
    will start blinking. Whenever it goes off, press the
    PS button again. Repeat this until the status LED finally
    remains lit. Press Ctrl+C to cancel anytime.
Connection verified.
Pairing of #1 succeeded!
Controller address: (redacted 1)
Calibration data available and saved.
Error connecting to PSMove #2
"""

Event viewer had some generic errors logged from my attempts: "Initial connection to Bluetooth HID device  failed.  The device has been removed as a personal or paired device.  You must reinstall the device."

HOWEVER - it looks like I was able to pair both devices by turning off the successfully paired one first, then pairing the second one.  From there I was able to turn both on and successfully run psmove.exe list with both connected as bluetooth:

"""
Host address: (redacted 1)
Controller 0: ←[ (redacted 2) ←[0m (Bluetooth, battery: 100%)
Controller 1: ←[ (redacted 3) ←[0m (Bluetooth, battery: 80%)
"""

Huzzah!  I don't know that I wont run into other problems trying to use both controllers over bluetooth at the same time, but it seems like I can at least pair them both and have the lights change colors.

So, I think that mostly just leaves my questions about compatibility with the buttons and cameras?