Limiting take_control responses

I've been working on a device for some time now; Originally, I had six buttons on it that controlled up, down, left, right, and two option buttons. However, I've recently realized that by using llTakeControls, I can do all of these commands without using the prims. However, now the command returns a minimum of four times per press, simply because of the number of times it refreshes and gets the command again.
Is it possible to do a simple command to limit it to a single control response, and not four to ten of them in a row? Having so many sent through makes controlling it much more difficult, and causes it to go careening out of control.

You should be able to do this by using the parameters on the control event -

control(key id, integer held, integer change)
{
    if (change & held & CONTROL_UP)
    {
        ... YOUR CODE
    }
}

This executes your code only if the event has been caused by a change in the status of the button, and the button is currently held down. Or in other words, you've just pressed the button.

Thanks a ton; I fiddled with the code a little, used the info you gave me, and now it only sends a message when the button is pressed.