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The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Discussion about creating 2d and 3d cockpits.

Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby stuart » Sun Dec 12, 2010 10:28 pm

Hi Horacio,

I've merged what I can from your c172p into the current git code. This took more than 2 hours.

As I had feared, there have been various changes to the model since the last release, which has meant that I was not able to merge all your changes. Sorry. In particular I could not apply some of the interior textures as the main model (c172p) has changed since the last release.

For these final changes to be applied, you will have to either
a) Re-do your changes to the next version of the C172p immediately after the next release, and hope that nothing significant has changed.
b) start using git and make your changes to that.

To avoid further wasted effort on both our parts, I would suggest option b).

I've also not applied some of your changes :
- Moving the flaps and magneto switch from Aircraft/Instruments-3D to Aircraft/c172p/Models. In both these cases, the changes enhanced these models without making them any less generic. Therefore they should remain in Aircraft/Instruments-3D.
- Addition of co-pilot and passenger views. I don't think these add anything to simulation - the C172 is a single-pilot aircraft, and the extra views simply add more views to be cycled around.
- Vanity message printed to screen (action-sim.nas). We generally don't do these.

-Stuart
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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby horacio » Mon Dec 13, 2010 5:15 pm

stuart wrote:I've merged what I can from your c172p into the current git code. This took more than 2 hours.


Thanks a lot, stuart, by your time and disposition, and I accept the way you have merged my work. I understand it's not possible to add every point, and you have your own ones, so I respect this.

Some comments:

1.- I'll check the next release, specially when I'm still not finished with all changes have previously thought to do. So, I can do everything together over the next C172 version.

2.- About using GIT, I'm afraid I won't. I will not give now detailed explanations, but after look a little bit from inside developing FG, I've already done some decisions, and I will start my own path.

3.- About instruments folder: I think will be necessary anyway to move all instruments to C172 own folder. I will resize almost each one of them, due to they are smaller than needed, and they appear too embedded within the panel. So, I need to make them larger, and move them a little backward. If I do this resizing over default instruments in "Aircraft/Instruments-3D", I will affect the position and appereance in every other aircraft that use them.

4.- About views: many other aircrafts offers many other interesting views (specially comercials and jets ones) as co-pilot, passenger1, passenger2, (belly-view in BO-105) etc., and of course any passenger pilots the plane, isn't it? But they are interesting points of view on a flight where to look out. And precisely, C172 is widely used for pleasure flights and tourism offered to other passengers than exclusively the pilot.

5.- What you mean with "vanity message"? Can you explain please? I don't understand.

I really appreciate the disposition and effort to accept a recently work done by a user whom don't use GIT, but I really think the favor is not for me, is for FG. The same as any improvement done by every single user in other planes. I really don't need my work on GIT to feel better.

I'm sorry for this, but the same as I have clearly expressed my points of view about FG development and use of GIT, I will stay outside them. For the same reason, and due to examples like the last points in C172 case, for this and any other further work I could do, I will offer my own version, on my own hangar.

Thanks to everyone and good comments on my work.

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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby Gijs » Mon Dec 13, 2010 5:34 pm

horacio wrote:If I do this resizing over default instruments in "Aircraft/Instruments-3D", I will affect the position and appereance in every other aircraft that use them.

You could use the scale animation in the C172P's xml to scale them on a per-aircraft base (even per-instrument-per-aircraft).
About views: many other aircrafts offers many other interesting views

I would like to see the views included as well. If you don´t want to cycle through those additional views, you can disable them through the View > menu.

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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby stuart » Mon Dec 13, 2010 7:21 pm

horacio wrote:1.- I'll check the next release, specially when I'm still not finished with all changes have previously thought to do. So, I can do everything together over the next C172 version.

That would be great. If you make your changes immediately after the release, I should be able to merge them in without any problems. I look forward to seeing them :)

horacio wrote:3.- About instruments folder: I think will be necessary anyway to move all instruments to C172 own folder. I will resize almost each one of them, due to they are smaller than needed, and they appear too embedded within the panel. So, I need to make them larger, and move them a little backward. If I do this resizing over default instruments in "Aircraft/Instruments-3D", I will affect the position and appereance in every other aircraft that use them.

Yes, if you are having to change the physical size of the instruments, that is reasonable. However, most GA instruments are supposed to be a standard size, so they can be replaced. Please check that the problem is that the instruments are too small, and not that the panel holes are too large!

horacio wrote:4.- About views: many other aircrafts offers many other interesting views (specially comercials and jets ones) as co-pilot, passenger1, passenger2, (belly-view in BO-105) etc., and of course any passenger pilots the plane, isn't it? But they are interesting points of view on a flight where to look out. And precisely, C172 is widely used for pleasure flights and tourism offered to other passengers than exclusively the pilot.

I may have another look, but I don't think they add anything to the simulation experience, and just mean you've got to disable them or shift through them.

horacio wrote:5.- What you mean with "vanity message"? Can you explain please? I don't understand.

You added a textual message to be printed to the console with "C172" in ASCII art, and "By David Megginson, Horacio Conteras (cockpit textures)". In general we don't add these to the aircraft.

horacio wrote:I really appreciate the disposition and effort to accept a recently work done by a user whom don't use GIT, but I really think the favor is not for me, is for FG. The same as any improvement done by every single user in other planes. I really don't need my work on GIT to feel better.

I'm sorry for this, but the same as I have clearly expressed my points of view about FG development and use of GIT, I will stay outside them. For the same reason, and due to examples like the last points in C172 case, for this and any other further work I could do, I will offer my own version, on my own hangar.


No problem. Your work was very good, and has improved the c172p, which is always great to see. The benefit is for FG, for which I am grateful. However, by working separately from the main FG repository, you will have to continue to maintain your version with each new release. At present these are every year, but we're hoping to make them more regular.

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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby Tuxklok » Mon Dec 13, 2010 7:39 pm

I too would like to have the views, I rather like having different views in an aircraft. I also think it would be great if the views were made selectable by number, ie 1 = pilot, 2 = copilot, 3 = pax1, 4 = pax4, etc. Yurik has done this in his aircraft and I absolutely love it, makes it so easy and intuitive to go to the view you want. He also has created 'sub views', which is keyboard shortcut that allows you to zoom in/out to the important parts of the current view. These are great features and I'd love to see in more aircraft.

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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby HHS » Tue Dec 14, 2010 9:36 pm

stuart wrote:Yes, if you are having to change the physical size of the instruments, that is reasonable. However, most GA instruments are supposed to be a standard size, so they can be replaced. Please check that the problem is that the instruments are too small, and not that the panel holes are too large!

When making the panel, I checked first the size of the instruments. I also take a look on pages of the companies producing these for the dimensions to be sure that my panel is right in dimensions. So I found out that our instruments are o.k. in size, so I used them as measurement tool. Looking at an image of the whole panel in an original flightmanual I'm not sure if the holes aren't a bit too large- I hadn't a manual when making the panel. If I had more time, I would recreate the panel according to this image...

So I wonder why the size of the instruments has to be changed? Or are just the textures meant, which are still in 128x128?

I may have another look, but I don't think they add anything to the simulation experience, and just mean you've got to disable them or shift through them.

I have to disagree here! The different seat positions can be quite interesting, and aren't just a gaming factor. And the aircraft can be flown from the right seat as well.


You added a textual message to be printed to the console with "C172" in ASCII art, and "By David Megginson, Horacio Conteras (cockpit textures)". In general we don't add these to the aircraft.

Why I understand, that adding the authors isn't needed, I don't understand why adding "c172" is so bad? Btw. adding "FlightGear" as ASCII-art can help us a bit against FPS- it doesn't hurt much, or?
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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby HHS » Tue Dec 14, 2010 10:08 pm

horacio wrote:....Well, the truth is I'm starting to feel quite frustrated, because have tried to explain in several ways, and with many examples my vision (a personal impression), and all what I receive is explanations and explanations, which I need don't.

I see what I see, and the only thing I did was say it. I'm sorry if this bothers anyone. It has been not my intention.


Stated such arguments myself at my beginning use of FGFS I had to learn a lot of things since then.
One things is, that it is good to criticize - but how good critism works? Not with just saying what going on wrong- this won't help the developers. That was exactly the issue why I stopped developement on the c172p- I wanted to hear how to make things right and better, not what is all bad and wrong....

So tell me, how you imagine the future way of developement in FGFS exactly?

I'm not happy with comparing MSFS with FlightGear. The image you showed maybe looks good, but I know large parts of their default sceneries which looks more wrong than ours. Though MSFS isn't really dead (There is still a growing amount of Addons) I would rather compare FGFS with X-Plane.
Both uses Open-GL, both are competing with MSFS and both as a rather small group of developers. And yes, sorry to say that, the next version of X-Plane will set new boundaries what is possible with CG like Global Illumination etc. But we also did: the transition effect is something which is currently in development for X-Plane... 8)

FlightSimulators developed to a goldmine since our project started- at the beginning it was easy to compete and come up with new, exciting ideas. Now it has changed- it is up to us how we go on and how we behave.
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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby stuart » Thu Dec 16, 2010 9:13 am

The development methodology parts of this topic have been split to a new topic: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=10439

Back on topic:

On the subject of views - as I can see that that is quite a lot of interest in adding these, I will do so. I may choose to disable some of the views by default. I haven't decided yet.

On the subject of vanity messages/ASCII art on the console/command-line:-
1) The console is primarily a logging tool containing useful status and debugging messages. Adding some ASCII art just adds clutter, and which will quickly scroll off the screen as more logs are made. An updated welcome screen would be a far more appropriate place for this information - it is easily visible to the user and allows the artist more flexibility in displaying their message.
2) Horacio's console message gave credit to David Megginson (the original author), and himself as providing the cockpit textures. Being blunt, a number of people have made more significant contributions to the c172p, including Heiko (HHS). Given that I cannot identify all the people who have helped improve the c172p, I don't think it is appropriate to single out Horacio's contribution for special mention.

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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby Torsten » Thu Dec 16, 2010 11:48 am

I just found time to measure some standard ga-instruments:
Outer diameter (diameter of the hole in the dashboard): 80mm
Diameter of the face: 71mm (visible 70mm, hiding 0.5mm behind the "ring"
Width of the "ring": 5mm
Distance of the mounting screws: 62mm

FWIW, here is a scan of the face of an old Cessna P172D airspeed indicator:
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(click on the image for the full size 1200dpi scan)
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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby stuart » Thu Dec 16, 2010 10:11 pm

Worth knowing Torsten - thanks!

As it happens I spent some time last night creating a new texture for the c172p ASI, using the always great svginstr script.

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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby HHS » Thu Dec 16, 2010 11:13 pm

horacio wrote:... you'll find that instruments appears wider, nearer, almost touching each one to other, and filling almost the whole hole than here:


The panel isn't right in measurements, not the instruments. if you look closer, my work is quite abstract and simple. I didn't modeled the lighting as well.
As I said, I didn't had access to the real board for making pictures and taking measurements. :(
Together with the image of the panel in the manual and Torstens measurements, it should be possible to create it new. Myself hasn't the time to make it, but I would provide happily the image.
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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby DavidZhu » Fri Dec 31, 2010 7:44 pm

I just got the latest git version, and it seems like the updates on the cabin (everything but the panel) has not been included yet? The panel and controls look great, but i dont think the rest of the updated plane is included in Git ... am I correct?
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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby stuart » Sat Jan 01, 2011 1:25 pm

That's correct.

Horacio's changes were against a v2.0.0 version of the c172p. The git version has been improved since, and not all Horacio's changes were compatible.

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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby tk_jkg » Thu May 31, 2012 5:56 pm

So are we going to see any of the nice instrument/cockpit improvement in the next version? Just wondring and if not i have done some work on differets instruments that i can share with me.
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Re: The always great C172p cockpit improvement!!

Postby stuart » Thu Jun 07, 2012 9:10 am

I'm not aware of anyone submitting merge requests for new instruments for the c172p for some time, but you should ensure that you're working with git rather than 2.6.0 to ensure your changes are compatible.

I'm happy to receive merge requests, but note that major changes must be submitted by 17th June.

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