Added a video of the glove being able to read which fingers can flex or extend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4zghzCdxok

Have also updated the project log:
Progress has been slow for the last couple of months as I've had to concentrate on other assignments with shorter deadlines. Current state of play is that the glove can now read which fingers can flex and extend – if a finger can flex, a variable is set to 1. If it can also extend, another variable is set to 1. The plan now is to collate those variables and see which fingers can flex/extend and which can't and then use other variables to compensate for the fingers that can't flex/extend. For example if the thumb can flex/extend but the little finger can't extend, assign the variable for extending the thumb to the little finger. This will mean the little finger mimics the thumb's flexibility. Once this is all working as intended I will then devise a method of saving/loading a person's profile so they only have to calibrate the glove once.

Have the compensation system working (not fully comprehensive, but it compensates for little fingers being unable to extend...) and yes! I can move my virtual hand around and pretend that I, too, have hands that work properly once again

Updated project log:
5.02.10
Have devised a system whereby a user can save and load profiles. When a new user uses they system, they are prompted for a profile name. This is stored as a string until the saveprofile() function is called (after 20 seconds of flexing/extending whatever fingers the user can) and each finger's ability to flex/extend is saved as a variable under that profile name. The values are all written out at once and the user simply chooses the name of their profile when prompted to at the start of their next session. Encountered a few problems involving skipping the compensation system if a user already had a profile but solved this by simply adding variables to the compensation functions and these are also saved in the user's profile so the program knows which functions to run if a profile has already been saved:
code example:
if saveprof=0 and compensated=0
movehand()
endif
Which simply means: 'If the saveprof value =0 a profile has not been saved for the user, and if the compensated value is 0 the user has not used the compensation system and so run the movehand() function.
Then, after some time decrement routines are run and after the user has used the compenstion system and a profile has been saved, the code to acknowledge this is run:

if saveprof=1 and compensated=1

movecomphand()
endif
Which simply says 'If the saveprof value is 1, the user's profile has been saved and if the compensated value is 1 too, they've also used the compensation system and so the move compensated hand function should be run movecomphand().

Encountered problems displaying text – messages like 'Now using Thumb as the master' would not display. Solved – they were displaying but only once, this was because I was setting a variable to 1 if a finger/thumb was able to flex/extend and that finger/thumb was selected to be the master and I exited the function once the user had selected the master, so it was brreaking out of the function as soon as the variable was set to one and didn't have enough time to display the message. Have solved this by using a time system – the user has 10 seconds to flex/extend a finger/thumb to be used as the master and the message of which one they've selected (at the moment it's the first one that bends that's chosen as master) is displayed for a few seconds before exiting the function.

And to jimh:
Yes, there's some exciting stuff happening in labs. Give them another 20 years and we might even see the fruits of their labours...

19.03.10
Have made a simple object (cube) and added it to the environment. Might have to abandon the X10 idea as can't find software that wasn't written in .NET. The guy I mentioned above – Scott Hather, turned out to be very helpful and encouraging, however no joy as yet because lthough there's a conversion utility I found to convert .NET DLLs to ones usable by Dark Basic (involved putting a wrapper around the functions in the dll) the technicalities are beyond me at the moment. Instead have decided to simply try and interact with objects in the environment to start with. Can control the crosshairs using the glove and can now pick up the box when the crosshair is on it and the hand 'grips'. However it doesn't seem to stay gripped for very long as I can't move it very far. Not quite sure why that should be happening.
Found that if I update the position of the object that's being grabbed it grabs better but zooms towards the user. I think this is because the object when picked up puts its center at the crosshair position – the crosshair position then moves nearer the user because it's on the outside of the grabbed object and then the object moves again when it's updated to reflect the new position of the crosshair. - meaning the object rushes towards the user because the raycast is from the user to any objec in the environment. At least I think that's what was happening. Whatever it was, it was unsatisfactory. Have instead made a very small sphere object that is now the root of the crosshair object, which is now just a limb attached to the small sphere. This means I can pick up an object by 'glueing' it to the crosshair limb – this means it's position will be almost the same as the crosshair's and therefore won't rush towards the user when it's gripped. It seems to work in that I can now pick up and move objects around.

New youtube video at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahiZKh8h8cM