[simpits-tech] Small CRTs (Was: Just a quick update.........)

[dabigboy at cox.net]

---- Cris Harrison <phoenixcomm at gmail.com> wrote: 
>
> Matt
> I saw the working LCD nice.. for your keyboard dont re-invent the 
> wheel.. a ps2 keyboard (downer) with the cable then a ps2 extension 
> cable for your socket or rip one off a old dead motherboard, works 
> really well. Check out my blog: 
> http://phoenixcomm.wordpress.com/category/ps2-keybaord/
> there is a nice step by step tutorial here: 

Cris, you are a wealth of info. :) Thanks for the tips and code snippets, actually I have a couple of encoders out of old junked keyboards that I have been saving literally for YEARS, knowing that someday, somehow, I could use them in my sim....see, it pays to not throw stuff away! ;)

I'm actually going to be plugging directly into the PC itself, not the Arduino...my FMS software will be using Pygame (basically, SDL) on a host PC for now, probably switch to the Raspberry Pi once it arrives in another decade or so. :) It's going to save me a lot of work vs trying to make the Arduino do all the things the PC can already do handily. Pygame can do simple text, dots, and lines, which is sufficient for the old-school FMS and allows me to use an old cheap/free PC for now (actually Pygame/SDL can do all sorts of graphical stuff, including rendering full images, but if I need to do that it's usually simpler and quicker to just go straight to OpenGL and get better performance and features).

I am curious about using a PS2 keyboard directly with the Arduino, it sounds like it's pretty straightforward. I may look into that later on for other projects on the sim.

Matt