Re: [Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers wrote: Hi guys, First post on the mailing list after lurking for a while. My name is Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers and I have been active for about five years in a niche of the flight sim world, the (very active) community around Aerowinx 747-400 Precision Simulator (www.aerowinx.com). This is an extremely detailed systems and IFR sim, with nearly no outside view. I wonder about two things: 1. Many people nowadays slave the Microsoft sim to PS1 to get a full outside view on a secondary system without having to fly the MSFS. This gives them best of both worlds. I wonder whether FlightGear at present time would be capable to fulfill the role of a scenery generator? Yes, it has been used for that in other projects. http://flightgear.org/Projects/ 2. I saw comments about VATSIM/IVAO floating by. I wrote a fully certified client for both networks that is built in such a way that connecting it to FlightGear should take an hour at most (www.hoppie.nl/sb747). Would there be interest to do this and offer it to VATSIM/IVAO for re-certifi- cation (re-, as the base software won't change at all)? Portability is no issue as everything is in Tcl/Tk -- however we still suffer from the security by obscurity dogma of both networks, so I can't release all sources just yet. I don't find it very useful if it can't be made available for all of FlightGear's supported platforms. If you browse my site, you might find other goodies that could be interesting for FlightGear. I won't do MSFS, so it looks like I'm stuck with you for a while :-) Good to hear :) Erik ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
Re: [Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers wrote: Hi guys, Hi ! First post on the mailing list after lurking for a while. My name is Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers and I have been active for about five years in a niche of the flight sim world, the (very active) community around Aerowinx 747-400 Precision Simulator (www.aerowinx.com). This is an extremely detailed systems and IFR sim, with nearly no outside view. I wonder about two things: 1. Many people nowadays slave the Microsoft sim to PS1 to get a full outside view on a secondary system without having to fly the MSFS. This gives them best of both worlds. I wonder whether FlightGear at present time would be capable to fulfill the role of a scenery generator? Yes, I've seen such an interface for MSFS to be used with PS1, too... I think it is *theoretically* possible, basically one would need to disable the standard FDMs (flight dynamic models) and let PS1 export the corresponding values via some simple IPC/sockets mechanism - how is this currently done ? I'd believe, they use FSUIPC for that purpose ? So that FlightGear gets the FDM-speficic data from PS1 and FG serves only as visual frontend for what PS1 wants it to do - probably one would also need to fetch/use values that are responsible for values such as weather, date/time etc. - so that this is also reflected within the outside View of FlightGear. Probably, it would be helpful to know what the MSFS - PS1 app essentially exchanges between the rendering simulator and PS1 itself ... I don't remember the webpage of that application anymore, but certainly you do - if you could come up with a listing of variables/data that needs to be exchanged, I'm sure people here could tell you in more detail HOW feasible it would really be to adapt FlightGear and where exactly in the source code you have to modify things ... My current impression is that this might not even be SUCH a big issue, but I may very well be wrong :-) 2. I saw comments about VATSIM/IVAO floating by. Yes, this is currently a topic of interest for some people here, mainly not because of these two particular networks, but rather because of the desire to offer virtual ATC capabilties to FlightGear's users. I wrote a fully certified client for both networks that is built in such a way that connecting it to FlightGear should take an hour at most (www.hoppie.nl/sb747). It sounds interesting, indeed we are already in touch with with either of the two networks, VATSIM also indicated that they were interested to cooperate for FG-client, on the other hand they put their emphasis on CLOSED SOURCE collaboration... Would there be interest to do this and offer it to VATSIM/IVAO for re-certifi- cation (re-, as the base software won't change at all)? It's certainly an interesting option, I think. Portability is no issue as everything is in Tcl/Tk -- however we still suffer from the security by obscurity dogma of both networks, so I can't release all sources just yet. that's exactly the kind of problem we faced during our 'negotiations' with them ... But how can you use CLOSED SOURCE with TCL/TK ? Do you additionally use binary libraries ? (that's what we were suggested to do ...) --- Boris ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
Re: [Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
On Thu, Sep 30, 2004 at 10:49:33AM +0200, Boris Koenig wrote: I think it is *theoretically* possible, basically one would need to disable the standard FDMs (flight dynamic models) and let PS1 export the corresponding values via some simple IPC/sockets mechanism - how is this currently done ? I'd believe, they use FSUIPC for that purpose ? Eventually yes (as that is/was the only known interface to MSFS; the monster now seems to have an official NetPipes entry, too). But all data flows through my Broker over plain ASCII TCP, and it is trivial to find out what they use. As far as I know, weather tends to be gathered via existing MSFS real weather programs, as MSFS can obviously do more tricks than PS1. But even this can be arranged for, I'm sure. Unlike most other flight sims, PS1 really is only treated as the systems engine. It is a plane sim, not a flight sim. It certainly is no operating system. All data exchange with the external world is not done by PS1 itself, but by an external, specialised program (the Broker). All the other add-ons are separate programs, written by a dozen or more authors in any language imaginable, capable of being run anywhere on the network. So the complete data interface is extremely thin: one single TCP pipe to the Broker, where interested other applications can subscribe to particular data items and get near-real-time updates. The system scales beyond imagination; I never thought it would be able to drive Matt Sheil's rig: http://www.hyway.com.au/747/747.html But it does! I've been there, flew it, it really works very well. And my recent visit to Lufthansa's sim base in Frankfurt (14+ hours in the sim, as much time with my head inside the computers one floor below) revealed that the real stuff uses nearly the same approach. My current impression is that this might not even be SUCH a big issue, but I may very well be wrong :-) If FG would have a socket somewhere that will eat control data for the position, attitude, and maybe some other variables to steer the virtual windshield camera around, this certainly should be easy. We don't want any panel in view, just the forward view (and some people some side views on separate machines). But how can you use CLOSED SOURCE with TCL/TK ? Do you additionally use binary libraries ? (that's what we were suggested to do ...) From the start I used TclPro, which has the required capabilities. It can either compile Tcl source to a binary format and source this in instead of plain ASCII (but the users must install TclPro, which I hate); or it can wrap all Tcl source together with a virtual filesystem with other files into one single executable for a great many platforms. I chose the latter way since about January 2000 and VATSIM/IVAO never even blinked. Jeroen ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
Re: [Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers wrote: On Thu, Sep 30, 2004 at 10:49:33AM +0200, Boris Koenig wrote: My current impression is that this might not even be SUCH a big issue, but I may very well be wrong :-) If FG would have a socket somewhere that will eat control data for the position, attitude, and maybe some other variables to steer the virtual windshield camera around, this certainly should be easy. look into $FG_ROOT/data/Docs, specifically you'll find the following files of interest: README.introduction README.IO README.properties README.protocol This will give you some basic information about how FlightGear handles its variables. In summary pretty much anything can be made available within the so called property tree, which can be pretty much seen as some kind of file system-like hierarchy, that you can even literally browse - either by using the in-built telnet server or the httpd, both of which will give you a basic impression how FlightGear offers total freedom that simulators like MSFS can only achieve by loading external (binary) modules that pseudo-export the variables in use. So, in many cases interfacing with FlightGear does not even require code modifications as long as the required variables are already exported to the property tree - then you can simply use either the telnet or http server to remote-control FlightGear using the programming language of your choice, you've mentioned Tcl/Tk, it's actually not complicated to create a simple socket connection to the FlightGear telnet server to access/modify the exported properties. We don't want any panel in view, just the forward view (and some people some side views on separate machines). This isn't a problem either: you can modify the view at runtime, indeed there's even a separate 'view' node within the property tree - despite from that, you can also disable the panel view easily. But how can you use CLOSED SOURCE with TCL/TK ? Do you additionally use binary libraries ? (that's what we were suggested to do ...) From the start I used TclPro, which has the required capabilities. It can either compile Tcl source to a binary format and source this in instead of plain ASCII (but the users must install TclPro, which I hate); or it can wrap all Tcl source together with a virtual filesystem with other files into one single executable for a great many platforms. I chose the latter way since about January 2000 and VATSIM/IVAO never even blinked. Okay, I see - thanks for the explanation ! -- Boris ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
Re: [Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers wrote: If FG would have a socket somewhere that will eat control data for the position, attitude, and maybe some other variables to steer the virtual windshield camera around, this certainly should be easy. We don't want any panel in view, just the forward view (and some people some side views on separate machines). FlightGear has exactly what you are looking for (if I understand what you are asking.) Look in src/Network/net_fdm.hxx ... this defines a structure that you can pass to FG. If you run FG with the --fdm=null option you will disable the internal flight dynamics and you will get whatever you pass in with the net_fdm.hxx structure. Additionally we have a net_ctrls.hxx structure which you can also pass to FG. That will enable the controls (ailerons, flaps, gear, etc.) to be animated in the external views. Additionally, FG has a low bandwidth command (aka telnet) interface where you can interactively (or automatically via an external program) examine and modify just about any internal variable in the sim. This gives you a great capability to do external scripting, external operater gui's, etc. For instance, if you have your own GUI for operating the sim and want to use it to set weather conditions, you can leverage the FG telnet interface to have your own program remotely configure the environmental settings in all your FG based visual channels. And, just for fun we have an embedded web server you can activate which exposes the internal property tree via a web style interface that you can browse (and edit) with any web browser. You can literally fly the airplane remotely via your web browser. It's primarily there as an interactive remote debugging tool, but it could be used for many things. Regards, Curt. -- Curtis Olsonhttp://www.flightgear.org/~curt HumanFIRST Program http://www.humanfirst.umn.edu/ FlightGear Project http://www.flightgear.org Unique text:2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
Re: [Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers wrote: Hi guys, First post on the mailing list after lurking for a while. My name is Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers and I have been active for about five years in a niche of the flight sim world, the (very active) community around Aerowinx 747-400 Precision Simulator (www.aerowinx.com). This is an extremely detailed systems and IFR sim, with nearly no outside view. I wonder about two things: 1. Many people nowadays slave the Microsoft sim to PS1 to get a full outside view on a secondary system without having to fly the MSFS. This gives them best of both worlds. I wonder whether FlightGear at present time would be capable to fulfill the role of a scenery generator? FlightGear has been used as an image generator on an FAA Level 3 FTD certified simulator. I've seen people post questions who are also working on leveraging FG as an image generator in one way or another ... either interfacing it to an existing simulator, or trying to import the FG scenery into their existing image generation software, or trying to import their existing image generation scenery back into FG. There are a couple things to keep in mind that you will run into soon enough. 1. You need the airport runway and navaid database to match between FlightGear and PS1. If they don't, you are going to be perfectly lined up on your approach in PS1, and may pop out of the clouds to find yourself severely misaligned with the runway. 2. You need PS1 and FG to agree on the ground elevation. FG can be configured to send export the elevation of the ground in the FG world at the current spot, but you'd need to find a way to import that back into PS1. If you can pull that off, then you can properly taxi on FG's non-flat runways, you won't be able to fly underground, you won't crash into mystery terrain that is in PS1, but not if FG, etc. etc. 3. You will want to pass along weather parameters to FG so that the wind socks are blowing the right way, the cloud layers are in the right place, etc. etc. And if you use multiple displays, you want them all configured the same way and synced with time so they all draw the sun/moon/ stars in the same place, and have the same shading, coloring, and lighting of the scene. 4. On good hardware, FG can run at 60+ fps. If I recall, PS1 updates on the DOS interrupt which is 18.2 hz I think. You will get jittery video if you don't sync FG exactly to the PS1 clock, or some multiple of that. I'm not sure if it's possible to run your monitor refresh at an exact multiple of 18.2 so you might just have to live with jittery video which you probably don't mind if you are using MSFS as your reference point. :-) So for the most part, it is all very doable, and you should be able to get something up and running very quickly, especially if you have some socket networking experience, but there are some things that you'll need to consider and handle to really make it work well. Regards, Curt. -- Curtis Olsonhttp://www.flightgear.org/~curt HumanFIRST Program http://www.humanfirst.umn.edu/ FlightGear Project http://www.flightgear.org Unique text:2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
Re: [Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
On Thu, Sep 30, 2004 at 09:14:41AM -0500, Curtis L. Olson wrote: 1. You need the airport runway and navaid database to match between FlightGear and PS1. Been there, done that... the major alignment problems between the PS1 database and the MSFS as real as it gets stuff are well-known. We have the proper solutions in place. Actually, the level-D sims at Lufthansa have the same problem! They have sims from one vendor and visual systems, including the database, from another. It's nearly guaranteed that they do not match. For the airports they use in training, they create special offset files that are included in the sim to slightly modify the sim's database, as they cannot touch the visual database. I saw planes taking off of LPPT's taxiway :-) 2. You need PS1 and FG to agree on the ground elevation. We consider this the same problem and correct accordingly. PS1's internal database follows the exact data of the AIRAC cycles (not DAFIF, we have a better source) but since we can correct this database and not the MSFS world, we then shift the navaids around in a 1 ft grid until they match. This is a lot of stupid work, but has to be done. ... but you'd need to find a way to import that back into PS1. If you can pull that off, then you can properly taxi on FG's non-flat runways, you won't be able to fly underground, you won't crash into mystery terrain that is in PS1, but not if FG, etc. etc. This definitely will be an effort, but not impossible. 3. You will want to pass along weather parameters to FG so that the wind socks are blowing the right way, the cloud layers are in the right place, etc. etc. Should be possible, too. 4. On good hardware, FG can run at 60+ fps. If I recall, PS1 updates on the DOS interrupt which is 18.2 hz I think. Correct. But on the ground the motions are slowish and 18.2 Hz looks sufficient (small steps only), and at FL390 I couldn't care less about the jitter :-) Worst case we have to add an extrapolator of some kind, but I expect no real worse problems than with MSFS here. Thanks for the tips! Jeroen -- dr.ir. Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers, Senior Researcher at the Centre for Research on Information Systems and Management, Tilburg University, The Netherlands. http://www.uvt.nl/people/hoppie ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
[Flightgear-devel] FG as scenery generator/VATSIM
Hi guys, First post on the mailing list after lurking for a while. My name is Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers and I have been active for about five years in a niche of the flight sim world, the (very active) community around Aerowinx 747-400 Precision Simulator (www.aerowinx.com). This is an extremely detailed systems and IFR sim, with nearly no outside view. I wonder about two things: 1. Many people nowadays slave the Microsoft sim to PS1 to get a full outside view on a secondary system without having to fly the MSFS. This gives them best of both worlds. I wonder whether FlightGear at present time would be capable to fulfill the role of a scenery generator? 2. I saw comments about VATSIM/IVAO floating by. I wrote a fully certified client for both networks that is built in such a way that connecting it to FlightGear should take an hour at most (www.hoppie.nl/sb747). Would there be interest to do this and offer it to VATSIM/IVAO for re-certifi- cation (re-, as the base software won't change at all)? Portability is no issue as everything is in Tcl/Tk -- however we still suffer from the security by obscurity dogma of both networks, so I can't release all sources just yet. If you browse my site, you might find other goodies that could be interesting for FlightGear. I won't do MSFS, so it looks like I'm stuck with you for a while :-) Jeroen [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.hoppie.nl/ ___ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
