Cockpit Bulders Hope

[vitabutch]

Dear IXEG team,

can you please think about exporting EADI & EHSI displays content to show on the second screen/second PC?  This neat feature exists in DCS and in Falcon BMS for quite some time already so maybe you can do this as well in your product. In my mind the best option to do it is to copy displays textures in the shared memory like its done in Falcon BMS. And we as cockpit builders can use the same replication software as we already use for BMS. I understand this feature to be welcomed by small number of users, but the option to have at least EADI and EHSI on the second PC (laptop) will attract a lot of users.

Thanks! Cheers, V

[Ben Russell]

2 hours ago, vitabutch said:

Dear IXEG team,

can you please think about exporting EADI & EHSI displays content to show on the second screen/second PC?  This neat feature exists in DCS and in Falcon BMS for quite some time already so maybe you can do this as well in your product. In my mind the best option to do it is to copy displays textures in the shared memory like its done in Falcon BMS. And we as cockpit builders can use the same replication software as we already use for BMS. I understand this feature to be welcomed by small number of users, but the option to have at least EADI and EHSI on the second PC (laptop) will attract a lot of users.

Thanks! Cheers, V

Do you have links to the "replication software as we already use for BMS" ?

[vitabutch]

37 minutes ago, Ben Russell said:

Do you have links to the "replication software as we already use for BMS" ?

Yes I do. There are several ones but I prefer the set of Java tools made by GuGurra from BMS forum tool thread link

There is a simple program (display transmiter) on the host machine to catch shared memory segment. It uses turbojpeg library to quickly compress every frame and send to another PC (or the same PC) where another application recieves the compressed frames and shows it in the several windows with user configured sizes and positions on the PC screen. Performance impact of this set of tools is close to zero - I have 1-2 fps impact on Falcon BMS. Several F16 displays is extracted over the LAN with no delay (two MFD's and also RWR). I believe the same can be done with EADI, EHSI and both FMC screens. Displays texture memory sharing  feature will have the product priceless for 737 cockpit builders and the users who likes to use a second monitor/PC.

Source code of the tools is also available on the project page  https://github.com/GiGurra/gpt/releases

[Ben Russell]

10 minutes ago, vitabutch said:

Yes I do. There are several ones but I prefer the set of Java tools made by GuGurra from BMS forum tool thread link

There is a simple program (display transmiter) on the host machine to catch shared memory segment. It uses turbojpeg library to quickly compress every frame and send to another PC (or the same PC) where another application recieves the compressed frames and shows it in the several windows with user configured sizes and positions on the PC screen. Performance impact of this set of tools is close to zero - I have 1-2 fps impact on Falcon BMS. Several F16 displays is extracted over the LAN with no delay (two MFD's and also RWR). I believe the same can be done with EADI, EHSI and both FMC screens. Displays texture memory sharing  feature will have the product priceless for 737 cockpit builders and the users who likes to use a second monitor/PC.

Source code of the tools is also available on the project page  https://github.com/GiGurra/gpt/releases

Thanks for the detailed reply.

I'll look into the provided links and see what we can do to make it happen.

It won't be in v1.0 but you'll probably see support for this sort of thing before Christmas.

 

(I'm responsible for the plugin(Gizmo64) that underlies all of IXEG's scripting. Big changes like this are going to have to be dealt with by me.)

[Ben Russell]

If there are any other bits of software that people are using to achieve this sort of thing please post them here for review.

Best solution wins.

[vitabutch]

Many thanks Ben for looking into it!  I can post here some of my research results. I use two PC setup: one PC for simulation and another PC for instruments screen (and additional small screens planned for the future development as well). So I investigate heavily the topic of showing instruments on the second screen or second PS.

I think there is no need to talk about MSFS, it was giving the possibility to open different 2D panels in separate windows so users could position it over the second (3rd, 4th, etc…) monitors of the same PC. I don’t know about FSX/P3D capabilities, since I left MSFS towards X-plane quite many years back.

DCS (Digital Combat Simulator)

It uses the concept of the viewports. So user can edit lua file defining a size and position of the main 3D screen as well as instruments viewports. In the multi monitor configuration it gives a bit of a flexibility, but its very bad from performance point of view. DSC is DirectX application so performance is degraded if user uses more than one screen: they cannot use full screen mode of the graphic adapter. There is another solution to this – SoftTH. This is a DirectX wrapper that creates a virtual video adapter space for 3D rendering that user can split later on the several 2D screens without performance impact.

Anyway I don’t use it and prefer a solution with transmissions of the displays over the network to another PC. DCS used to have this feature in early development of the Flaming Cliffs (exporting display textures as a block of memory) but they quit supporting it now days.

Falcon BMS

Since Falcon4 has been rebuilt by BMS team it had cockpit builder’s interfaces. They decided to use the concept of shared memory. They published C++ .h files with shared memory definitions so any external application could catch it. In the shared memory there were several sections:

1)      Binary data containing several information like status of the lights/annunciators, status of the systems, any other useful variables (of course we use datarefs for this purpose in X-plane, so no need to bother with it)

2)      Blocks of memory containing bitmaps of the displays. I bet they just do memory copy to the shared RAM section before writing it into the texture memory of the graphics adapter. Copying blocks of memory (even large ones) is almost resource free for CPU.

Using this API some people created different client/server applications capable of sending flight variables as well as instrument screens over the LAN specific to FalconBMS: (Lightning MFCDE, GiGurra GPT). I prefer GPT for open code, simplicity and performance.

Wrapper tricks

There was a very interesting thread by some time ago in DCS forum by the guy who experimented with the DirectX wrapper trying to locate the textures they used in A10 MFD’s. He succeeded but with one exception that ruined the approach – DCS A10 used shaders to post process MFD screens, so no “as is” texture extractions were possible.

Screen replicators

Some people tend to use screen replicators to display information on the other PC’s. There are many such applications available using different technology, but it makes no sense to use it since they read video adapter buffer memory to replicate it later on over the network. Memory controllers are optimized to write data from RAM to VRAM but no vice versa. So in case we need to export the instruments bitmaps we need to share the bitmap just BEFORE it went to VRAM. As far as I understand X-plane acf file concept – there are predefined blocks for any dynamic texture we want to see in 3D cockpit. What I don’t understand is why it cannot be shared the same way as DataRefs for plugins. Two years back I asked about such sharing option of the Xplane forum, but nobody cared.

So that’s pretty much were we are today…

P.S. Once more many thanks to IXEG team to make 737 classic possible. That’s my most beloved civil bird before the era of iPad-alike planes.

P.P.S. My best regards to Jan! Long time passed since the day he landed 737 with the jammed flaps 40 in Kiev. That was nice days! 

P.P.P.S. My pair of 737 yokes, pedals and seats are waiting for it’s time. Even though one of the seats temporary serving as ACESII

 

[Celis]

nice...

If my post has nothing to do with this one... please delete it..

This might help a few.

I run 2 computer, main pc with 1 monitor and MCP Pro (Goflight) and 2 pc with 3 monitors.

XHSI and airmanager for network pc.

http://xhsi.sourceforge.net/

https://goo.gl/7oZB2T

Running both software in 2 monitors. this is "wip". I dont know coding. 

this second one its a complete set from airmanager... I use aircraft detection so when aircraft change, also the displays.

Edited April 17, 2016 by Celis

[Ben Russell]

While AirManager is a very good product it would not be a full reproduction of the systems that IXEG have created.

It would require much more work essentially duplicating systems functionality to work within AirManager.

The technology proposed earlier in the thread should allow me to just export some pictures of what IXEG have already created, these are then displayed remotely as per user setup.

 

...close, but different.

 

[frumpy]

Replicating the EHSI with Air Manager won't be possible. However, I've got the strong hope that all

datarefs will be published. E.g. if there is a dataref for each AP mode and speeds, the EADI could be

fully replicated, along with all other instruments.

[vitabutch]

In theory its possible to replicate most of EFIS and EHSI logic using the datarefs. I started this project while in 2009 and had a working prototype (screen is on the picture). But I quit this development when IXEG 737 was announced. EADI replication via datarefs is not so complicated, but EHSI is an issue, since flightpath, navdata and weather radar replication will be very challenging.

 

 

[frumpy]

Vitabutch, thats lovely!

[Tinamus]

This is my home too....I'm a cockpit builder and till now I used my external monitors to show nd,pfd and eicass of x737 by using wonderfull piece of software named xhsi.

but now I feel in love of ixeg plane and I wish I want to see on my external monitor nod,pfd and eicass of thi bird.

the force be with you ixeg team !

[vitabutch]

I have to say that in the world of VR my proposal of this feature is getting obsolete. As well as X-Plane in general. I reverted back to prepar3d because of fantastic Flyinside VR support. If you have seen recent "VR review" from Austin you will realize that Xplane will fall behind. Instead of catching the modern tech he puts his criticism all over to protect the his baby from development. And he started to loose his followers and I am among the first ones. Even a beautiful IXEG will not keep me on the ancient flatscreen when I can go VR with prepared/FSX.

[Litjan]

1 hour ago, vitabutch said:

I have to say that in the world of VR my proposal of this feature is getting obsolete. As well as X-Plane in general. I reverted back to prepar3d because of fantastic Flyinside VR support. If you have seen recent "VR review" from Austin you will realize that Xplane will fall behind. Instead of catching the modern tech he puts his criticism all over to protect the his baby from development. And he started to loose his followers and I am among the first ones. Even a beautiful IXEG will not keep me on the ancient flatscreen when I can go VR with prepared/FSX.

Hi Vitaly,

I am afraid you are right. VR is the future, with some obstacles to overcome, of course.

Austin loves to be the guy that goes against the flow - which can create great opportunities if everyone is running just because everyone else is running. But it can also lead to disaster if everyone else is running because there is a lion on the edge of the forest...

He has some good guys on his team, though, and I believe as VR becomes more mainstream and initial problems are overcome, that X-Plane will go that way as well.

Here is thinking of that lovely afternoon with beer and a great view on the Kreshatik ,

Jan

 

[lanmancz]

Actually I think I've seen a recent video interview with Austin where he said that they made VR work internally and that it looks great but the issue is that as VR is still being developed and the libraries change all the time and new versions usually brake compatibility with old code so their idea is to wait until it's stabilized and then write in the VR support. As far as I understand him the VR support is planned and might not be that far away, seems to me like a feature XP11 might have.

edit: Ah yes, here's the interview (few months old), OR question starts at 3:05

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnYz9LpTTus

 

Edited October 2, 2016 by lanmancz

[Litjan]

Good find, lanmancz!

[vitabutch]

Nice memories, Jan! Was it 8 years back already or more?

As for the interview, the link above its not the one I have mentioned. I will try to find the proper link. Its where Austin is flying chopper on FSX or Prepared with Oculus and almost literally saying that its unusable crap  You have to see this, especially the owners of the helmets who have tried FlyInside

[Ben Russell]

"well the res is about half what it needs to be to make all the instruments in the cockpit usable." -Austin Meyer.

 

[vitabutch]

FlyInside for X-plane is out. What I can say - IXEG in VR IS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!!! No more words. Huge thanks to the team!!!

[Litjan]

2 hours ago, vitabutch said:

FlyInside for X-plane is out. What I can say - IXEG in VR IS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!!! No more words. Huge thanks to the team!!!

Need to try that! But will wait until they support HDR... Thanks for letting us know, Vitaly!

Spaciba, Jan

 

[meshboy]

Hi 

is there any update to this? Understand if Ben and the other Ixeg people have been busy.

having the Ixeg export the NAV display would be a wet dream for us cockpitbuilders.

 

i Am building a 737-800 with OEM panels from the 737-300 and some from FDS (-800 panels)

i will use IXEG even if its not a 800.

i think i can use the XHSI to display the PFD with 90% accuracy, but the NAV with the magenta route is another task.

 

are you still thinking of some sort of export for us cockpitbuilders?