Boeing 777 - Holding Pattern - The Feature Code

[Walter York]

To All:

Sorry that it has taken me a while to get this completed but attached is the link to the code. I have provided 2 zips one with the whole 777 dir and one with the files I have changed and added. I also provided instructions. Please provide feedback good and bad


Link to the Feature
https://1drv.ms/f/s!AkimS6Rlt1GXg2uFh4rG2DPPTL8t

Thanks everyone that made comments on my original post and provided me help in getting it working.

Walter

[Isaak]

Hi Walter, I took a quick look at the documentation. It looks fantastic! Can't wait to test it. Thanks for your contribution, I'm really looking forward to implement it!

[Walter York]

Hi Isaak,

You are welcome. Now that I have v1 completed I am already starting on tweaks to make it better. I am looking into NSEW orientate based on wind patterns and having it predict which entry mode it the most appropriate and then defaulting the dialog to that when it is opened. At that point the core functions will be working and I can then work on CDU integration.. I will probably drop the circle pattern altogether since I am guessing no one will use it since it does race-track.

BTW I see that you put a lot of work into the new 777 version, I love the new pushback overhead view. I suppose that I need setup to be a contributor. I see that you are working on the refuel .now that is cool. I tried to add that a while back for the 787-8 code but got stuck at the model side. Looking forward to seeing that working.

Thanks,
Walter

[Isaak]

I think you're right regarding the circle pattern, it isn't used IRL, so I guess it won't be used in FG too. It would be very good to have the correct entry procedure selected and executed automatically, because even in real life pilots mess this up quite a lot, which could potentially lead to dangerous situations.

Regarding the pushback overhead view: I like it too, very much, but that isn't my job, I only committed the valuable work of merspieler et. al. on the autopush, the only thing I did was tweak a few settings to make it compatible with the 777. So I 'm grateful to them for providing this wonderful piece of software!

Regarding modelling/animating: I 'm learning as I go, only set my first steps in blender and modifying .ac files three months ago but I 'm learning fast. This weekend I 've built a completely new passenger boarding/baggage loading system that works quite well. It will be pushed to FGaddon later this week. Yesterday I did my first animation: a simple translation of the baggage truck and trolleys to compensate for the gear compression when the aircraft is getting heavier (otherwise they were sinking in the ground). These easy things enable me to learn to know how everything works. Looking at other people's code is very helpful to get around

I've still got to do some work on the code, and I 'm creating a long todo-list very fast, but I 'm feeling confident that if I keep learning at the current rate, I 'll be able to model/animate more complex systems like a moving baggage truck delivering cargo to the loading truck, transporting it over and visually loading it into the aircraft as long as the baggage loading system (already implemented) is running, and the same vice versa for unloading the aircraft. But now I 'm getting a little bit over enthusiastic, this will probably take a few months at least so please don't shoot me if it takes some time. The basic system should appear later this week though.

Long story short: FlightGear is a great tool to learn new things both in modelling and coding, learn from others and keep trying to get what you want If you'd like to contribute directly to FGaddon, you should ask commit access on the developers mailing list, I don't know if you're following that already, but it is very useful to keep you up to date with updates in the sim. If you'd like to commit to the 777 I would suggest that we set up a git repository of some kind, so we can coordinate our work and be sure we don't break things for each other. I didn't look very well at your code yet, but I saw you added some stuff (e.g. in 777-set-common) right at the top of the files, I would suggest to put it a bit lower in a suitable place, so that the general layout of the files keeps structured for other people. I 'm totally willing to assist you in that process if you have questions

Thanks again for all your work, this is a feature I 've desired for a long time and I 'm glad you're making it happen!

[Walter York]

Hi Isaak,

Hearing about your modeling experience gives me hope that I can grasp the Blender tool at some point . Sounds like you are picking it up at an exponential rate so you will be an expert in no time. I will just have to jump into the fire so I can do the modeling too. I really want to port the new CDU from the 787 along with the weather and maps displays. I quickly found that I would be knee deep in Blender to get that accomplished. I will take you up on the offer for help and would enjoy working together with you on the 777 model. In my experience this model is most mature and stable ones out there. Just like in real life, I see may fly by my house on approach to 27 at KMCI.

Thank you for providing directions on how to get into the repos, I will do as you suggest and move forward to get commit access. I like your suggestion to create a shared repo since I will continue to work through the holding code (and other items) to make it as realistic as possible. Since you have more experience with the community and it practices at this time can you set the repo up? I am good with git so I am guessing it will be on gitlabs?

The items at the top of 777-set-common are my global settings and I was not sure where else they can go. I can move then down to the bottom, but if you have a suggestion on a better place to put them let me know and i will move them. Also, I need to look back but I do not think I changed AFDS.nas. I needed to get bank angle 30 deg to work but AFDS kept overriding it back to a max of 25, even when I set the min/max globals. I tried once to hardcode 30 but removed it. I will look at that this week and remove it from the docs and zips if that is true. Josh provided an update to autopilot.xml for the holding pattern so I ended up changing the filter to get to 30 degrees. I hear you on the todos for every one thing I get working I find 2 more that would be cool or need fixing .... a vicious cycle indeed .

Thanks for the feedback on the circle feature. Now that I have done the research on the flying and ATC around holding I see the futility of that efforts. But I relearned Trig and a deeper understanding of NAS so it was valuable in that regard. Now I am working on 3 items: completing the Holding (entry stuff), doing final testing of SpokenATC rewrite, and pondering the SID/STARS/APPROACH to make holding better. I have some NAS classes I wrote for Sids/Stars/App that I may integrate into SpokenATC and for the short-term have it provide the Holding info and maybe even update the Flight plan with Sid/Star info. I have never been able to get Route Manager to work and the comments against enhancing it were clearly against, so I am looking at a different path, I think I have the correct XML files but never see them getting picked up in RM's UI. Please let me know your thoughts on this.

Thanks again for all your comments and I look forward to working with you,
Walter

[legoboyvdlp]

I think you're right regarding the circle pattern, it isn't used IRL, so I guess it won't be used in FG too.

I've seen it multiple times in real life - but not too sure of the exact circumstances when it is used as opposed to a race-track.

[Octal450]

Are you sure that was a holding pattern? Sometimes ATC's will ask pilots to make a left or right hand 360 to increase spacing. Circles are much less efficient than racetracks.

Kind Regards,
Josh

[Isaak]

Thank you for providing directions on how to get into the repos, I will do as you suggest and move forward to get commit access. I like your suggestion to create a shared repo since I will continue to work through the holding code (and other items) to make it as realistic as possible. Since you have more experience with the community and it practices at this time can you set the repo up? I am good with git so I am guessing it will be on gitlabs?

Git is ok for me, I 'll try to set something up tomorrow on Gitlab. I 'll try and implement your v1.0 from the start, because I 've been modifying quite some files locally in the last few days to prepare the ground services and I 'm not sure I didn't touch something you did too. I don't have experience yet with the git-svn connection, but I saw some documentation on the wiki last week and I 'm sure I 'll make this work out. For the time being this means you won't really need commit access to FGaddon yet, as I can commit to FGaddon via git-svn from our repo.

If anyone else would like to contribute directly to this new git repo, just ask, I do think there are others who can play a very important role here and as I 've said before, I don't claim the sole right to develop the 777, as long as we all have the ambition to centralise our efforts so we avoid ending up with incompatible forks.

Thanks for the feedback on the circle feature. Now that I have done the research on the flying and ATC around holding I see the futility of that efforts.

I don't see it as a futile effort, it has enabled you to get to learn the systems and make some wonderful piece of software. All your work comes with a learning curve and I 'm sure the circle feature helped you a lot

Now I am working on 3 items: completing the Holding (entry stuff), doing final testing of SpokenATC rewrite, and pondering the SID/STARS/APPROACH to make holding better. I have some NAS classes I wrote for Sids/Stars/App that I may integrate into SpokenATC and for the short-term have it provide the Holding info and maybe even update the Flight plan with Sid/Star info. I have never been able to get Route Manager to work and the comments against enhancing it were clearly against, so I am looking at a different path, I think I have the correct XML files but never see them getting picked up in RM's UI. Please let me know your thoughts on this.

If you have some SID/STAR Level-D 767 files, you have to place them in one of your scenery folders (best not the Terrasync folder as that one gets overwritten by Terrasync). For EHAM for example you 'd have an EHAM.xml file. Rename it to EHAM.procedures.xml and place it in Scenery/Airports/E/H/A/. It doesn't matter how far up or down your priority list that scenery folder is in the addons tab, as long as there is no procedures file for the respective airport in a folder higher up the priority list, your procedures file will be picked up. I have a Navigraph subscription myself which enables me to get new data files with every new AIRAC cycle. I think it's really worth it's money, especially with the charts app that comes with it, but that's fully up to you. The renaming process can be automated with a shell script, there's some info on that on the wiki.

Thanks again for all your comments and I look forward to working with you,
Walter

I 'm looking forward to it too. I 'm glad there 's something moving on the 777 in the last couple of months

[Walter York]

Hi Isaak,

A quick update: I subscribed to the dev newsgroup and requested dev access to FGAddon, so I have an account now on SourceForge (weyork56). I verified that I made NO changes to AFDS,nas. I moved the Holding properties to the bottom of the 777-set-common file as you suggested. I am old school and use git bash but if you are move comfortable with SVN I have that working too. I found that I needed to control the speed when making altitude changes (NAS) so I am testing that today. Once it is verified I will provide everyone a link (same as the original one) to get to it. I also removed the circle pattern code.

Thanks for verifying that the Sid/Star files I have been using must not be the correct format. I will go the subscription route too.

Kindest regards,
Walter

[Walter York]

Hi Isaak,

If you have some SID/STAR Level-D 767 files, you have to place them in one of your scenery folders (best not the Terrasync folder as that one gets overwritten by Terrasync). For EHAM for example you 'd have an EHAM.xml file. Rename it to EHAM.procedures.xml and place it in Scenery/Airports/E/H/A/.

I went back and verified that the files I have seem to be Level-D (see below) Maybe I am missing some other setting. In 777 R/M I only see (for SIDs) (none) and Default. I see the same for STARs and Approaches too. I have Terrasync on but it is mapped to a different folder (F:\FlightGear\downloads). Unless they are too old (2015) and maybe not really in Level-D-767 format.

Since this is working for you do you see something I am doing wrong here? I want to be sure if I buy a subscription, that the files will work.


Dir --> F:\FlightGear\2018.3.2\data\Scenery\Airports\K\M\C
File Name --> KMCI.procedures.xml
XML File -->> <ProceduresDB version="AIRAC 1507 Rev.1 by Navigraph/Navdata" build="07/13/2015 09:31 UTC" xsi:schemaLocation="http://tempuri.org/XMLSchema.xsd FMC.xsd" xmlns="http://tempuri.org/XMLSchema.xsd" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
<Airport ICAOcode="KMCI">
<Sid Name="CHIEF5.01L" Runways="01L" JetsOnly="false" PropsOnly="false" Enabled="true" StartTime="00:00" EndTime="00:00" Comments="">
<Sid_Waypoint ID="1">
<Name>(1430)</Name>
<Type>ConstHdgtoAlt</Type>
<Latitude>0.000000</Latitude>
<Longitude>0.000000</Longitude>
<Speed>0</Speed>
<Altitude>1430</Altitude>
<AltitudeCons>0</AltitudeCons>
<AltitudeRestriction>above</AltitudeRestriction>
<Hdg_Crs>1</Hdg_Crs>
<Hdg_Crs_value>011</Hdg_Crs_value>
<Flytype>Fly-by</Flytype>
<BankLimit>25</BankLimit>
<Sp_Turn>Auto</Sp_Turn>
</Sid_Waypoint>
....

Thanks,
Walter

[Isaak]

Hi Walter, did you set your fgdata/Scenery folder in the addon list? It isn't picked up by FG anymore when you define other folders there. I sent you a PM too