[Feature Request] Better layout management

[Tsudico]

I am currently trying to create a layout, and set of keybindings to match the layout, for dual Virpil Constellation Alphas. I have received an error that I don't have enough space for all the bindings I am trying to configure, but when I increased the layout space it actually reduced the amount of space for listing each action because it went from two columns to three columns for some controls. This lead to the "language" chosen for actions to be cut off or wrapped and horizontally cut off so that it made it impossible to read the full action. It appears that if 2 controls have the same layout dimensions then they have the same number of columns and lines regardless of whether the added columns for more actions are necessary or not.

It seems to me that the space needed should be based on how many actions the control has and how much space the actions take up. This means if a control only has 5 actions mapped to it, it shouldn't use more than 2 columns when it has more than 3 lines of space. It also means that if the space is set up for column usage than any action that takes up more than a column of space should take up 2 lines if possible within its column.

[bm98]

For the layout. It will not scale to the number of items in the particular box but does it the same for all boxes
It scales from the font size and the dimensions of the box and does quite a bit of guessing what the max. length of an item could be. So you don't get it scaled to the content - would be a rather hefty job to program that one...
In general the smaller the font the more columns but with rounding it may get sometimes strange effects.
If it cannot fit all items assigned to any of the boxes it complains about. So it is either one or many that will be missing.

The only way out is to make larger boxes in the layout so more lines/cols can fit but the VPCs have an 'absurd' number of buttons to map (how can you memorize them ??) Well then you need the layout I assume.

If you try to create an image for that VPC Alpha - here is one I created with some of the boxes larger than in the Delta.
Though I did not found any button assignment - you would need to let me know which is which.
Also if you have the VID/PID to insert for the left and right one - else the prog. will not find it.
Let me know...

[Tsudico]

The Virpil Software allows one to change the button configuration so that may be why it is difficult to get a specific button assignment, but the default buttons should be here:
Virpil Constellation Alpha button assignments
My sticks arrived with two different button configurations so I don't know if they might differ for each hand. The left stick had buttons 6-11 on the top (red button then 5-way to the left of it) and the right had the (black button and 5-way next to it) as 6-11 so I altered one to be the same as the other hand. Perhaps including button numbers would give a better indication of what users should set them to for consistent behavior. I think setting the buttons according to the "default" layout linked above will cover most users or at least give them some idea of how to reconfigure their sticks to match.

The VID/PID can also be changed with the configuration software. Default for VID seems to be 3344 for both, my sticks PIDs are 412C (L) or 812C (R), but that can change from firmware to firmware. Since it can be set by the user, adding a comment to the graphic for the specific VID/PID for the layout might work or indicate how they can change it in the json file. Similarly, if you are trying to find them via their device name as it appears in Windows that is another option that can be changed in the software so if you need the device name to match then indicating how they should appear in the layout might be required.

My first attempt at a layout was what follows. It appears, judging from what you have indicated and shown in your layout provided, that it is better to add space for rows of text versus increasing width of the boxes so I may see how much I can fit in the vertical space more like you have done.

As an aside, and likely a possible different issue entirely, if using vJoy Devices (like through Joystick Gremlin) they get unique GUIDs but have the same name so they show up the same in the program. This makes choosing them via layout a matter of guessing which device is what. Not sure yet what a good solution to that would be.

I did try to get a copy of your repository functioning for me so I could possibly give solutions as well, but even downloading Visual Studio Community 2017 and loading the repository in that I was getting a bunch of errors about not finding .NET 4.5.2 after the project was loaded.