Ideal Flight Accessibility phase 3

[Steve Waite]

Question regarding H S I (Horizontal Situation Indicator) during I L S landing:

Lets say the aircraft is below the glideslope and to the left of the runway course.

The callout for C D I (Course Direction Indicator) says "right 30 percent C D I" when the course indicator is 30 percent to the right, meaning the aircraft is on the left of the runway, depicting where the indicator is.

The callout for glideslope says, "below 30 percent G S I" when the glideslope indicator is 30 percent above the line, meaning the aircraft is below the glideslope, depicting where the aircraft is.

I am thinking to keep the logic of callout for both either to the location of the aircraft or both to the positions of the indicators.

Since the glideslope callout says where the aircraft is below the glideslope, would it be better for the course indication to say where the aircraft is to the left of the course when the indicator is on the right? So that both callouts depict the aircraft location with respect to the indicator?

Or the other way is to say the glideslope indicator is above with the course indicator on the right.

I am in two minds here, but I wonder if it would be better for both to refer to the indicator positions or both to refer to the aircraft location.

So should the glideslope callout be changed to saying the glideslope indicator is above the glideslope and the course indicator staying with runway course to the right. Or should the course callout be changed to say the aircraft is on the left of the runway and keeping the glideslope callout saying the aircraft is below the glideslope? Or should they remain as they are?

[obert01]

Hello Steve,

My vote is for both callouts to refer to the aircraft location, which would be more straightforward to interpret in a potentially stressful situation.

The idea behind that is that a sighted person immediately understands the situation of the aircraft when looking at the HSI or the GSI. With only ears, and with the many callouts and other spoken messages we have, "translating" right to left and vice-versa could be confusing.

In addition, if I remember well, TFM already reports the information as the aircraft position (not the indicator). I would accept this level of abstraction as auditory feedback is concerned.

Anyway, the essential point here is to have the same logic for both callouts. Let's the majority decide, I will accomodate.

[Steve Waite]

My vote is for both callouts to refer to the aircraft location

Good call, that's what I will vote.

[Steve Waite]

PMDG 737, so learning that has kept me busy in the meantime. I wish the climb assist could work in that, but it has its own custom AP so it can't

I will install my PMDGs and test this because I remember the simconnect sequence at startup installs most of, if not all of the calls for the aircraft systems and attitude. Ideal Flight merely signals those simconnect values. so I will be very surprised if the simple A P on/off, V S and altitude hold are not supported.

[Orinks]

I vote for aircraft location.

[Steve Waite]

The PMDGs come with an SDK whereby one can build a module that makes it compatible with the sim so that it responds to the standard simconnect calls to set things like V S and Altitude hold and so on. In other words, these aircraft are not compatible with simconnect out of the box.

[Steve Waite]

Ideal Flight works OK with the PMDGs and always has done. But as has been realised, the Ideal Flight Assist functions won't work because the PMDGs basically don't respond to simple SimConnect calls such as for example, auto-pilot altitude hold. Let's not forget that SimConnect is a core simulator function left out of the PMDGs, and that Ideal Flight employs SimConnect throughout the Assist features to maintain compatibility.

To enable the Ideal Flight Assist features to work on the PMDGs would be an endeavour extra to Ideal Flight programming. I can enable Ideal Flight to operate those PMDG auto-pilot features by constructing a module to sit between Ideal Flight and the PMDG to interpret Assist functionality. This would be bespoke software for supply in addition to Ideal Flight and therefore would attract a sales value.

[Orinks]

Well, one step at a time, I suppose. TFM has switches and ability to program FMC, there are apps like First Officer Pro to control it currently by voice, and the auto-throttle/vNav/lNav performs much better in those planes to the point where when AP goes on, I don't have to touch it until approach for the most part.

[Steve Waite]

Yes, it is all doable, no problems really. Thanks for the feedback. For the time being Ideal Flight first has to work the same on all the regular aircraft. I can think about supporting individual specialist aircraft at a later date.

[Steve Waite]

I've been using the PMDG 737 in P3D v4 all day and the Ideal Flight auto-throttle and runway steering fixed, which works very well for takeoff and landing, and on the climb it follows the IAS restricted speed all the way up nicely. I'm using the Ideal Flight hotkeys for that. So the PMDGs will work with the taxi control as well. None of that requires the auto-pilot SimConnect features.