I sometimes experience problems with my controller assignments in DCS.
This has happened before, but I’ll present the most recent experience.
Yesterday I updated to the latest DCS open beta. I then went flying in the Spitfire. I changed the controller assignments for booster coil and starter switches, covers and buttons. Everything was ok.
Today, I wanted to fly the Spit again and I decided to change the recenter VR button assignment. Suddenly the controller assignments started to import assignments for a bunch of my DCS modules. I went back in the sim and suddenly the assignments I made yesterday was gone, but also the brake button that I assigned over a week ago, was gone…
Like I said, it’s not the first time something like this happens.
Does it happen to everybody? Anybody know why?
Sounds like your controllers usb identifier strings are getting shuffled around. What a gyp.
I’ve never had this problem, but schurem’s hypothesis makes sense.
The USB Hardware Identifier is used in the folder name by DCS. You could check if this is true by going to the DCS Saved Games folder and then inside the config, controls, AJS37 folder or something, you should see a bunch of folders with the same joystick model name but different sequences of random characters.
Sorry for not being more precise, not at the pc at the moment, this is all from memory
Thanks guys!
I just don’t understand why just some assignments are gone… Others remain intact, for the same controller.
I have hot plug disabled… Could that be a contributor?
I think this once happened to me when I changed hardware, in taking out a PCI USB3 board (powered from the PSU) and the jiggled Id’s completely confused DCS. Like @Freak said, you can often just rename the Save Games controls files to the new ID.
One thing to check on your motherboard USB support is if devices/hubs come and go - that might indicate a driver or system issue. Something like UsbTreeView is good for a nice overview…
While we’re on that topic, remember to look up the thread by IIRC @miRage with a shell script to do it for all modules with one click
Wouldn’t new controller ID’s change all the assignments for that controller and not just a few?
Yes, I would expect to see default mappings only then.
But perhaps there is some spooky interaction with the new profiles feature that makes it more complicated. I don’t know how those work.
Did you check the config folders for your bindings? Any sign of ID’s changing?
Is there a hierarchy for binding files? I seem to remember the potential for DCS to read the files from multiple locations? I am likely mis-remembering something from the old multiple-installs era (2.0, 1.5.x, etc) and the potential to have bindings get lost when those were merged. Just wondering if open-beta/release has two sets of bindings or one shared set. I have a feeling that I have lost bindings in a similar manner but usually fall back on the assumption that I must have done something 
Config, options, joystick, screen, Multimonitor, SLI, etc. (digitalcombatsimulator.com)
Don’t think I understood how I could see if the ID had changed…?
@Fridge, I hadn’t seen that FAQ before. Seems like unsaved assignments is a thing…
I’m not sure if I understand the issue.
Wasn’t there a third party program which would populate your DCS modules (can’t remember its name). Do you use it and could it be intefering with your manual controller assignments?
No, but I have considered it.
The thing is that controller assignments seem to dissapear, some times. I assign a switch on the throttle (or other controller) to a certain control in DCS. It can work perfectly well for several days and then it’s suddenly not assigned to anything, anymore…