gospadin

hahaha, sorry

Quoting Wags on his first NTTR demo, "How'd that F-5 get there?" --gos

damn onions...

Oh, and one more quickie, I present: "Two Tomcats" =P

Community A-4E February 2017 Update February 2017 Update Before we get started on the content update (which made February by 55 minutes, pacific time), a quick announcement: We want to say congratulations to gyrovague, who has accepted a position working with one of DCS's official 3rd party developers on a module you'll all be super excited to fly. I won't reveal which developer or which module right now, as I don't want to steal any more thunder than I already have. As a result, to ensure no pollution of our codebase with SDK knowledge, he's stepping down from the Community A-4E project, effective immediately. The Community A-4E team has been honored to have his contributions for the last year, and he really stepped up with implementing a number of capabilities in the code we didn't think possible, like our positional audio, calibrated gunsight, three autopilot control systems, the profile mode for the APG-53/A radar, and our sidewinder lock tone support. He also helped invent and implement our radar display system, which helped turn our data feed into pixels on the screen. We'll miss him, but also use his creative contributions to push us to completion of the A-4E mod. With that said, we'd like to share a few changes from the team in February: Cold Start procedure We figured out how to catch certain DCS event callbacks in Lua, which i.a. made some more interaction with the ground crew possible, and this in turn allowed us to hone the cold start procedure: ySA-Nswwfmc Gunsight calibration By creating a mission file with ‘green gate’ waypoints, at 6000m horizontal distance, spaced 300m vertically apart (50 mil angle each) to give fixed visual references to aid in gunsight calibration, we've been able to accurately calibrate our gunsight. Here's a quick video of the tuning: 68HPB0Hu8as We also flipped the direction of the reflector glass w.r.t. the gunsight. Special thanks to https://www.youtube.com/user/iamslendermanQ517 for pointing out the error. While we now have an accurately modeled gunsight, we now have the (good) problem of needing to re-create all of the gunsight mil tables from scratch. The reason (we believe) that we get mismatches (all bombs are landing long) is because the real ejection racks have small explosive charges that apply a downward force to bombs being released which isn't modeled in our SFM/SSM aircraft. Without this initial velocity vector, our munitions seem to land long by 20-25% or so, compared to what is expected from available data online. We'll make sure we work in an accurate set of tables for standard munitions before release. 3D: On the 3D front, we have a number of simple quality of life improvements to share. After some discussion over ways to increase player customization, we implemented one of the simpler features. We placed a Photograph object into the bottom right corner of the cockpit, which is tied to a file that is easily edited in photoshop or any other image editing software. Just like in the movies, players can fly with their favorite image! Additionally, we added spec maps to all of our new weapons, along with updated textures in a few cases. We hope you like how they look in their now-final form: Each of these weapons is included with the A-4E mod: Mk-77 mod 0 napalm bomb: AN-M30 100lb GP HE bomb: AN-M57 250lb GP HE bomb: AN-M65 1000lb GP HE bomb: AN-M66 2000lb GP HE bomb: AN-M88 216lb fragmentation bomb: Mk-81 Snakeye 250lb high drag bomb: Thanks everyone for your support, and we can't wait to share what we have in store for the March update! --gos

Some A-4 and F-4 share a few instruments, but not the ones that are most iconic. Later A-4 shared the UHF radios, backup ADIs, and a few other parts. I don't think the F-14 had any parts in common with the A-4, but I could be mistaken. It is, after all, a 15-year newer design and for a completely different role. archimaede has a Skyraider in progress. His thread is here: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=167159 Besides our own work, I personally am looking forward to some fast attack birds. I also can't wait to see what happens with improved naval warfare support from ED and how they'll integrate the F-14. Having naval fleet versus naval fleet battles, complete with ASW, SAR, and maybe even CA integration of missile frigates would be awesome. --gos

Actually, this one's a business trip to California for 2 days. Work laptop won't let me access these forums, and I'm terribad posting from the phone, hence the delay. (Unless one of my teammates feels like putting the final touches on our update and posting it.) --gos

Haha. Thanks for asking, the delay is now "two more weeks." It actually takes a good hour or two to put them together, and a lot longer when you consider the video filming, editing, and captioning. We just have a few things that are on the very edge of making it into this update, so I didn't want to post early, just in case they finish. :music_whistling: --gos

Just to preempt the pitchforks, due to some last-minute travel, our monthly update will probably be out a few days late. Should have it by end of this week. Thanks! --gos

Grimes' comment in Post #4 in this thread: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=183415 appear to show a new atmosphere module that can be queried. That likely provides the info needed for that kind of gameplay.

Thank goodness! The functional and systems code is 100% lua. We also obviously have other types of files for the audio/images/gunsight/etc. , but nothing uses any custom DLLs or C/C++ code. --gos

Why does everyone keep naming planes that other people are working on?

just for the record, i hate you all --gos

clever :pilotfly: --gos

Wasn't someone else making that? Could have sworn I saw one...

Honestly, just to kick over a can of gasoline, I've been thinking (personally) really hard about making a <**redacted**>, but need to see how some other things pan out first.

More specifically, I'd say simply that we are releasing this as a free mod. Anything that may or may not come afterwards is just speculation, though admittedly it can be fun to read sometimes. =P --gos

TBD. I mean, I guess it would act as a showcase on its own, whether we wanted it to be or not. The specific pursuit of 3rd party status, however, is a separate topic with a number of complicating factors. --gos

Great idea. One small suggestion from our experience: Add to your spreadsheet the exact animation argument positions you intend for each knob state, and the expected type of knob/switch behavior you're implementing as well. We also kept notes of exact degrees of movement as well for things like our radar adjustment knobs. That way you can write the code in parallel with implementing the animations, plus it gives you a checklist of test criteria as well once the two come together. Good luck! --gos

awesome, thanks, though it's a bit intimidating to try to find the proper switch within 5 seconds sometimes =P --gos

This was my understanding too. Many weapons (most) are based on standard, parameterized templates. Anyone can create a variant of an existing weapon by following one of the existing formulas. These templates/formulas/hierarchies all live in ED's standard .lua files. For something like the Viggen's anti-ship missile, my belief (just guesses) is that the logic for that lives inside custom .dll files, essentially creating a new subtree of weapon logic and behavior. Whether the .dlls come with a plane or with the base package is really up to ED and the 3rd party. However, for AI, it probably needs to live somewhere in the base package (CoreMods) so everyone's simulation can access it, versus just those who bought the module. --gos

First argument is the material name. 2nd argument is the material layer it affects (0 = diffuse, 2 = spec, etc.) 3rd argument is the filename without the extension. I don't think < or > is a valid filename character. 4th argument: "true" indicates it's built into the default DCS paths, "false" means you get it from the local directory.

another great one, thanks Devrim!

I fly 80% Y saturation, 0% curves, and don't use an extension. (Mostly because helos aren't the only thing I fly) I do use center position trimmer mode, since I use a warthog. Stiction on mine isn't bad. If I only flew helos, I would simply remove the centering spring from my pedals. (I have Crosswinds)

A "realistic" feel depends 100% on your own hardware. In general: Reducing Y saturation on the X and Y axes is used if your joystick has a shorter throw than the real controls. Curves are used to decrease sensitivity around the center (or increase it) but I never use them, because I find the non-linearity very annoying.