Is there an XML gauge programmer looking for a "project"?

[JBaymore]

.......... that can be installed in my aircraft's panel to add an important function that is not available to me at the moment. If any of you XML gauge gurus out there have a some spare time to kill and are willing to tackle it....... I imagine that THIS project would be effective at killing some of it. I know I certainly would appreciate the efforts.

Unfortunately I know "diddly" about XML gauge programming.....and have all my time and my hands tied up with learning all the hardware interfacing that comes with simpit building.

The aircraft I fly (mainly) is a four engine jet....a BAe 146-200. This aircraft also has an APU that powers all the systems before engine start. That is the problematic "fifth engine" that MS FS2004 does not directly support. (Wouldn't you think that situation was common enough that THEY would have thought of it? )

Courtesy of the very generous Martyn Becker (THANK YOU!!!! ) I now have an XML gauge setup that adds the visual exhaust plume from the APU and the APU spool up, run, and spool down sounds. I also created the APU fuel pump , starter, and generator run switches, logic, and annunciators for the overhead panel in a sort of a "hardware solution" in the pit. So now, when I flip the "APU Start" switch on the overhead after configuring the electrical power and fuel supplies correctly, I hear the APU start and if I go to the exterior view of the plane, I see the exhaust plume start up. NICE!

At the moment in the "physical pit" (not reflected in the sim itself), I have SOME of the electrical functions of SOME of the APU generator running emulated in the physical simpit wiring. But that is a rather bogus and half-done solution to the whole problem.

The missing thing that I REALLY need now is the ability to have an invisible gauge (no actual panel visual presence needed) that adds the actual EFFECT of the APU generator being turned on into the FS2004 sim. It needs to cause the batteries to recharge as if a main engine generator was running and to supply the appropriate amperage and voltage levels to the simulated FS2004 electrical buss.

At the moment, I am having to use the "battery always available" dodge in order to sit at the gate and do a realistic pre-flight...... since setting up the simpit is just about as complicated as setting up a real aircraft. Takes a while.

This "APU Electrical Supply" gauge needs to be activated by an assignable keypress, not by a mouse click on a simulated screen gauge on a LCD or CRT screen. There ARE no simulated gauges on screens to click on; all is physical 3-D "real fake" stuff.

One other piece of information that might be helpful is that I run a registered payware version of FSUIPC. So the use of sending "keypress to offsets" is possible, if necessary.

BTW...... I have the specs on the generator in the real BAe APU......but I'll take ANY possibility of making this work even if it is not fully "realistic" in the amps / volts and so on.

I'd certainly appreciate it if anyone is willing to tackle this likely thorny problem. :) And there are many OTHER simpit builders who I am SURE would be equally appreciative. I am not even sure if it is "doable" at all.

best,

.......................john

[Michael Carter]

Microsoft might have thought of the APU, and if they did, they also probably thought that 98%+ customers never would. :(

Wish I could help you and me both. My APU works fine, but I have a problem with one of the AP axes that no one can help with either. Not even the developer. :roll:

[spitfire9]

Have you checked out this Bae 146 ? It has a fully working GPU .

If you haven't seen it yet,, it could be interesting to you.

http://www.baepanelproject.com/

[JBaymore]

Thanks for the reference on the BAe Panel Project. Unfortunately I am WELL aware of that panel and that site.......and have been discussing with Matthias on his forum about making the systems available "externally" to simpit builders.

Unfortunately, he has not yet pursued any real significant hardware control options into his code.

Otherwise that aircraft panel (the new version 4.0 one) is pretty much a "systems trainer". He's got is at about 99% accurate.

But all those fancy systrems are only available by displaying panels on screen and by using mouse clicks. Sigh.

best,

................john

[spitfire9]

If he has only mouse clicks , not keypresses coded into his gauges,, could you not use FsPanelstudio to add some keypresses to the gauges, then use Fsuipc to bind those to real switches??

I would have to do some checking but I thought there was a program that could turn mouse clicks to key presses,,, or was that the other way around ? " key to mouse" or something like that??

Anyway,, I'm just thinking out loud again,, but,, you would think that there has to be a way to use a nice ,,accurate panel like that to work with a sim ??

[Michael Carter]

You have it right, "Key2 Mouse" or, K2M. But it doesn't work without having the monitor on which the panel was progeammed displayed.

This program has been around for a long time, but I dont think it was intended to be used as a lot of cockpit builders are wanting to use it. I.E., without having a monitor display of the panel you are trying to control. When this first came out, there was only a handfull of cockpit builders, and I don't thinkg anyone had a full-blown cockpit shell in their garage yet.

What's the use of having hardware with this solution? But I digress, I've had this conversation too many times.

A solution is to have a hidden monitor somewhere and call it up with a keystroke and displayed out of sight while flying. Another resource wasted.

It is a great idea, and it does work, but not too realistic or resource conservative.

[JBaymore]

spitfire9,

Thanks again for the kind thoughts.....but Key2Mouse, as "Skunkworks" says, is a VERY in-elegant and resource wasteful solution that would be very hard to implement. Plus with the Liebrecht 146-200 panel's.... you'd somehow need to keep switching monitor views of panels to make it "seamless" in the simpit; the controls are scattered around....and you'd need ALL of them accessible.

It would get rediculously complex and "main flight sim PC" resource hungry (multiple monitors that were somewhere other than in the pit).

I really think the simplest thing is to "build" an APU gauge to solve this 5th engine generator thing. And again... I am not even sure that CAN be done. Somehow you'd have to continuiously "override" the normal sim's battery drain without dragging the system to its knees with the data traffic.

I'm still hoping that SOMEONE would be willing to tackle this for me (and others) as some sort of a "they said it couldn't be done" kind of challenge ;).

The real problem is trying to turn a $60 piece of software into a $6,000,000 simulator! ;) We're all crazy. :roll::cool::D

best,

..................john

[JBaymore]

[QUOTE=spitfire9;56384]If he has only mouse clicks , not keypresses coded into his gauges,, could you not use FsPanelstudio to add some keypresses to the gauges, then use Fsuipc to bind those to real switches?/QUOTE]

Spitfire9,

Can FSPanel studio actually DO that for a fact?

If so... that is the answer to most simpit builder's DREAMS!!!!!!

That would mean that you could take ANY complex aircraft model (like the PMDG stuff) and "map" the systems to hardware switches.

Are you SURE that function is possible?

best,

...................john

[spitfire9]

I've been building simpler gauges with Easygauge. It is c++ based and only builds .GAU gauges. With this program you can't open and edit someone elses .gau file,, like you can with XML gauges using FsPanelstudio.

With panelstudio you can open the xml gauge and change bitmaps and edit the xml code.

Now what I'm not sure of is , at the learning stage I am at ,, is if you could "add" xml code as well as changing code values for example. I don't know if there is a way to add extra bitmaps (like a second needle) to a gauge,, unless you can add the xml code for the bitmap first ???
What you can do for sure is for example,,take a cessna airspeed gauge,, edit or change the bitmap so it resembles a 737 airspeed indicator,, then edit the xml code so the needle travels the appropriate distance around the gauge,, then save it or place it on a dfferent or new panel .
Really,, this program is a must have for cockpit builders.

I am sure that Fspanel will allow for much more than simply using it to place or size your gauges and panels.

With the importance of unique gauge building and use with homebuilt sims ,, it would be nice to have a forum here on gauge/panel building,, a place to share gauge ideas and actual gauges or project files.

There must be some good programmers that lurk around this forum??
It would be nice to have some resident gauge builders to put us on the right track with these types of problems.
The uses of a gauge building program are endless,,, but in some cases a good tutorial or explanation is necessary.

I recently used easygauge to build a invisible gauge for a Convair flap warning horn. When the gear is down and the flaps are less than 15deg. the horn will come on if over 66% of throttle lever is used.
Something that I don't think was available or I couldn't find it.
I've been building the gauges for the annunciator panel,, using a small lcd behind the panel. A much ,much cheaper solution than using the actual panel and wiring the bulbs etc.
Also this way,, I can code the annunciator bulbs/gauges to act like they would in the real aircraft,, using and tweaking the Fs9 token variables.Also assigning Fs Events to the gauges (assigned keypresses).

Here is a picture of the annunciator WIP. You will notice that I still don't have the gauges lined up properly with the panel and some gauges are still missing.But you get the idea.

674

[Peter Dowson]

That would mean that you could take ANY complex aircraft model (like the PMDG stuff) and "map" the systems to hardware switches.

Have a look at the new "Mouse Macro" facilities in the recent FSUIPC updates (3.81 and 4.28 ) . Check the Mouse Macro section in the user guide and see if that meets such needs. You don't need the gauge on screen once you've programmed a switch. The facilities certainly work with most of the PMDG gauge switches I've tried.

Pete

[spitfire9]

Thanks much Peter !

I'm at work but I was able to quickly go over the mouse macro section of the new users manual.

Looks like it is exactly what JBaymore was looking for here .

If I read right,, I could create a gauge and assign (for example ) an ON/OFF switch using a mouse click to activate it.
Then I could use FSUIPC mouse macro to assign a keypress to that mouse click,,, without having to find a Fs9 Token Variable or Event.

This would certainly be a big help in creating functions for cockpits that have different systems than the standard Fs9 fair or Pm 737 systems.

Lots of options on cockpits for payware aircraft like the PDGM series are now open !

[Peter Dowson]

If I read right,, I could create a gauge and assign (for example ) an ON/OFF switch using a mouse click to activate it.
Then I could use FSUIPC mouse macro to assign a keypress to that mouse click

Well, almost. FSUIPC traps the mouse click and has a look in the code to see what it is doing. Then it calls the code directly instead, with the appropriately indicated mouse event. No mousing is then involved, and though of course the gauge code must be loaded (i.e. part of the current aircraft), the gauge does not have to be visible.

Unlike Key2Mouse, it doesn't work with all gauges. It may or may not work with XML gauges -- possibly not. It certainly doesn't work with the default FSX aircraft panels -- they all seem to dive directly into routines in PANELS.DLL. But it does with most every PMDG panel I've tried it on. So it may only be the C/C++ gauges that use the "MouseRect" structures which my mouse trapping is analysing. I don't really know enough about gauges to determine when it would or would not work.

It is essential to test it first (TAB key). If it works you then give the control a name. When you've finished the macro create mode, all that is saved in a MCRO file, and serves to add all the named actions as controls. They all then appear in the Button and Keys controls dropdown -- so you can assign buttons, keys, whatever, or use them as part of other macros. Etc Etc.

Regards

Pete

[spitfire9]

When R/L and work are a little less busy,, I'm going to build a simple C++ gauge and do some experimenting.

Sounds interesting.

[JBaymore]

Pete,

THANKS for the info!!!!! :D

I didn't realize that you were still updating the older version of FSUIPC. I though all your efforts had gone to the new version for "The X". Guess that shows the power of "ASSumptions" ;).

Since my hardware is not up to running FSX at framerates and detail settings that I'd accept...... I'll be with fs2004 for a good long while.

I don;t know what Matthias Liebrecht does with his gauge programming....... but I'll check this idea out for sure.

THANKS again. Might be just what I am looking for.

best,

..............john