How to build a FDM for DCS?

[Anatoli-Kagari9]

I would like to find out about the flight dynamics model used in DCS World. I can see that many of your are working on your own models, so, I believe there is some documentation available on this subject.

 

Is it public? Where can I get it from?

[Tango]

AFM/EFM development is primarily aimed at 3rd party developers. It seems one group has partially succeeded at creating an AFM/EFM but they ran into problems as ED only provide support to 3rd party developers.

 

All 3rd party developers (including myself) are under NDA regarding the internal workings of the sim, so we're unable to assist.

 

If you have a project that you think ED would be interested in, then get a group together and approach them with it. :)

 

Best regards,

Tango.

[Anatoli-Kagari9]

Thx for the prompt reply Tango! I look fwd for the ALRATROS!!!! ;-)

[SilentEagle]

I would like to find out about the flight dynamics model used in DCS World. I can see that many of your are working on your own models, so, I believe there is some documentation available on this subject.

 

Is it public? Where can I get it from?

 

There is no documentation, public or private, on the creation of flight models, so don't spend too much time looking for it. 3rd Party Developers often share tips with each other, but the majority of the work in developing a flight model is learning it yourself and trial and error. I do know that one group did release their source code for an EFM (the F-16 FM developed by CptSmiley), but it does not shy away from using more advanced C++ syntax, so if you feel you can follow it, take a look. My first flight model incarnation was written much more simply, but I have been improving it as I learn more aerodynamics and C++.

 

Sorry I can't be of more help due to NDA restrictions. Good luck!

[Anatoli-Kagari9]

There is no documentation, public or private, on the creation of flight models, so don't spend too much time looking for it. 3rd Party Developers often share tips with each other, but the majority of the work in developing a flight model is learning it yourself and trial and error. I do know that one group did release their source code for an EFM (the F-16 FM developed by CptSmiley), but it does not shy away from using more advanced C++ syntax, so if you feel you can follow it, take a look. My first flight model incarnation was written much more simply, but I have been improving it as I learn more aerodynamics and C++.

 

Sorry I can't be of more help due to NDA restrictions. Good luck!

 

Ok, thx for your additional info :-)

[SkateZilla]

It's complex, my eyes melt just trying to read Cpt.Smiley's notes.. lol...

 

not for the weekend gamer/joe, Aeronautical and programming background is highly recommended.

[ericoh]

It's complex, my eyes melt just trying to read Cpt.Smiley's notes.. lol...

 

not for the weekend gamer/joe, Aeronautical and programming background is highly recommended.

 

 

You would be suprised what talent is hidden in the world wide web, i think ED is slowing the process by keeping it locked.

[sobek]

You would be suprised what talent is hidden in the world wide web, i think ED is slowing the process by keeping it locked.

 

ED are entitled to use a business model that they see fit to keep the company alive.

 

If i've learned anything from sims that have very accessible SDKs for planes etc. then that such a move will result in a flood of low quality add ons. Medium quality is often hard enough to find even in paid add ons for these sims.

[ericoh]

ED are entitled to use a business model that they see fit to keep the company alive.

 

If i've learned anything from sims that have very accessible SDKs for planes etc. then that such a move will result in a flood of low quality add ons. Medium quality is often hard enough to find even in paid add ons for these sims.

 

Note that i said "i think".

 

WHat speaks against floods of low quality add-ons? You dont need to use them, what if 1 more high quality product is under it? Worth it in my opinion.

[Anatoli-Kagari9]

Hey jcomm, here is the link if you can't find it:

 

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=95985

 

Hopefully it'll help you out, but I'm ashamed it isn't organized/documented better. Also code is always uglier when you are learning to use the tool (DCS) as you go along so it isn't pretty at all and later iterations of other stuff I'm working on is much more organized.

 

It can be done much more simply, or with much more complexity, it's all up to you!

 

Good luck and feel free to PM me if you run into any roadblocks regarding the F-16 code.

 

Thx for your kind reply CpotSmiley, and for the Carl Sagan citation in your signature!!!

[aaron886]

not for the weekend gamer/joe, Aeronautical and programming background is highly recommended.

 

This is precisely right. ED hides nothing, but they will not give you answers. They know how difficult this is, and they do not have time to teach it... they are too busy making flight simulators. ;)

[159th_Falcon]

Note that i said "i think".

 

WHat speaks against floods of low quality add-ons? You dont need to use them, what if 1 more high quality product is under it? Worth it in my opinion.

 

The problem is that all these's, by us considered as low quality add -ons, will actually be advertised as being ultra realistic.

 

Meaning you will never be able to tell the difference until its to late, being you already bought the product only to find out its crap.

 

So i'd rather have ED keep things as they are and have 3rd party developers prove there worth before getting to know the ins and outs of our precious simulation engine.

[Mode1961]

This is precisely right. ED hides nothing, but they will not give you answers. They know how difficult this is, and they do not have time to teach it... they are too busy making flight simulators. ;)

 

Actually Aaron, they don't have to teach it, all they would have to do is release the source code for one of their AFMs.

 

Lets not kid ourselves, ED is not doing this to prevent low quality models from being released, they are doing it to prevent ULTRA high quality models from being released unless they get a piece of the pie, nothing wrong with that, that is their business model and they have every right to it but lets not try and pretend that there aren't some extremely talented people in this and other communities that could program circles around the guys at ED.

[Mode1961]

The problem is that all these's, by us considered as low quality add -ons, will actually be advertised as being ultra realistic.

 

Meaning you will never be able to tell the difference until its to late, being you already bought the product only to find out its crap.

 

So i'd rather have ED keep things as they are and have 3rd party developers prove there worth before getting to know the ins and outs of our precious simulation engine.

 

Really people can't read reviews. Please. And who says that most of the releases will be payware, most would be freeware like most other FS communities.

[sobek]

lets not try and pretend that there aren't some extremely talented people in this and other communities that could program circles around the guys at ED.

 

And yet ED manage to be one among a handful of studios in the World that is at this very moment in time actively churning out high fidelity combat flight sims for the civil market. Me, i think you have no idea how capable the people at ED are in their respective field and how harsh this market is.

 

I don't buy this argument of "extremely talented people being kept out of the market by ED". If someone wants to do this, they are free to put their money where their mouth is and apply for 3rd party status as many have done already. If someone is passionate and has the experience to churn out a HQ module, they can do just that, it's not like you don't get your moneys worth for the royalties you pay to ED.

Edited May 30, 2013 by sobek

[ericoh]

I still say open up documetations about it. Give the collective mind a chance. We're missing out on alot of luxury regarding mods. + more free mods draw more customers that potentialy buy payware.

 

@Sobek: I doubt Acer ment that ED is not capable.... You people allways feel attacked lol

[Silver_Dragon]

You have into DCS:W a "EFM API" here:

...\Eagle Dynamics\DCS World\API

 

And an F-16 EFM example make by CptSmiley (with sources) here:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1633288&postcount=202

 

only need investigate them and follow CptSmiley work road. only Need some technical data and deep into them.

[Tango]

And yet ED manage to be one among a handful of studios in the World that is at this very moment in time actively churning out high fidelity combat flight sims for the civil market. Me, i think you have no idea how capable the people at ED are in their respective field and how harsh this market is.

 

I don't buy this argument of "extremely talented people being kept out of the market by ED". If someone wants to do this, they are free to put their money where their mouth is and apply for 3rd party status as many have done already. If someone is passionate and has the experience to churn out a HQ module, they can do just that, it's not like you don't get your moneys worth for the royalties you pay to ED.

+1

 

If it was that easy, why are other flight sims so simple? Sure, they model normal systems behavior (e.g. you click this button and that lights up) but most entertainment flight sims, even the most "hard core" barely touch the reality of physics at all! Some flight sims are "our way or the highway" when it comes to systems development.

 

With DCS however, it's totally open. You can write anything you want, as you want, and there are no limits, beyond processing power and capability of the developer. This is in stark contrast to just about every other sim out there, where the framework is too rigid. A lot of developers struggle with that idea alone - the fact that there is no framework beyond the simple yet very powerful interface between our code and the sim!

 

The interface for the flight model in DCS is arranged such that you can go from a simple flight model that responds to control inputs, to fully-fledged real-time CFD if you have the processing power to handle it. No other commercial sim allows this. Even multi-million dollar sims are simpler than you'd think when it comes to flight models. They just hit the key areas that they need to for specific scenarios, and the rest is fiction. With DCS we actually have the ability to do flight models that are mind-blowingly accurate in areas of the flight envelope you wouldn't think possible.

 

Show me an existing commercial flight sim (excluding DCS) that models all the nuances of gyros and their behaviors, effects of aircraft attitude on radios, models maneuvering precession, not to mention all the other systems such as air data and all the effects on that, etc...?

 

Anyone tried doing any astronomy at night in DCS? You should. ;)

 

Best regards,

Tango.

Edited May 30, 2013 by Tango

[Tango]

ED are entitled to use a business model that they see fit to keep the company alive.

 

If i've learned anything from sims that have very accessible SDKs for planes etc. then that such a move will result in a flood of low quality add ons. Medium quality is often hard enough to find even in paid add ons for these sims.

SDKs are over-rated IMHO. First of all they immediately limit options (never a good thing) as the programmers who write them are generally incapable of thinking outside the box, so they guess at how their product might/should be used, and write complex SDKs to do that (often poorly). As a direct consequence, anyone developing for that platform is stuck with a poor interface, and limited options for doing things, and anything you might want to access is locked away and hard to access, if you can access it at all (there are two very well-known flight sims that fall into this category).

 

Sure - all software has some kind of SDK - it must in order to interact with it. The problem is most SDK developers are far too limiting with them, and/or do a very poor job of designing them.

 

In at least one case, some data is plain unavailable, which is fatal to the accurate simulation of anything requiring a time reference. This instantly destroys the word "simulator" in the product title; it becomes "imitation". This might not matter if you write "games", but for those who are looking to do a proper systems simulation, it makes it impossible (and I mean that literally) to do.

 

Modern computers are mini supercomputers these days, and there is no reason why we can not have highly complex, highly accurate simulations of systems/flight models. If that means you require a strong engineering or aeronautics background to accomplish it - so be it!

 

Best regards,

Tango.

Edited May 30, 2013 by Tango

[sobek]

That's sort of my argument, Tango. SDKs make it accessible for people that aren't already in the software development business. I doubt that any seasoned capable programmer would choose an SDK over a mere interface that he can plug his own custom tailored code into.

 

The thing is, with the API as it is now, you are sort of forced to use specialists for the result to be even remotely resembling something useful. You can't just go ahead and throw the 3d artist that did the geometry at the SDK and have him tune the FM template until it flies like what he thinks could be a cessna. You need someone who has, as you said, a background in engineering. To me that sounds like a win, but then i understand that i'm extremely biased.

 

I came to DCS so i would never have to fly a GA plane again where the pitch of the prop and engine noise was tied to the throttle setting instead of RPM, because i swear to Aisha, that day i will rip my hair out one by one. To this day i consider myself fortunate because there is no such plane in DCS and i'd like to keep it that way.

[ericoh]

The DCS community strikes again, backwards oriented as allways. :)

[sobek]

backwards oriented as allways. :)

 

If not having to sieve through a bucketload of abysmally bad add ons to find one that is at least decent is backwards oriented, then fine, call me backwards oriented. Obvious stereotype thinker is obvious, though. ;)

 

I'm starting to suspect that you don't have any grasp of how open DCS really is, so from a more objective standpoint, not backwards oriented at all. Just a tad steeper in the learning curve department. I thought people here would appreciate a challenge if the reward is an immensely powerful interface to the sim.

Edited May 30, 2013 by sobek

[ericoh]

If not having to sieve through a bucketload of abysmally bad add ons to find one that is at least decent is backwards oriented, then fine, call me backwards oriented. Obvious stereotype thinker is obvious, though. ;)

 

I'm starting to suspect that you don't have any grasp of how open DCS really is, so from a more objective standpoint, not backwards oriented at all. Just a tad steeper in the learning curve department. I thought people here would appreciate a challenge if the reward is an immensely powerful interface to the sim.

 

 

Right, whatever floats your boat.

 

P.S.: That was far from related.

Edited May 30, 2013 by ericoh

[Anatoli-Kagari9]

Hi again :-)

 

As the OP for this Thread, I would just like to add that while I would really be interested in having a glimpse at the internals of DCS's flight dynamics core / sdk, far away are the days when I spent countless hours trying to do the impossible with MSFS. I also have tried the same with Flight Gear and lately with X-Plane10.

 

Main aim of my post was to obtain feedback for a 3pd that designs excellent add-ons for X-Plane 9 and 10 (russian aircraft mostly). He is certainly a very tallented programer, 3d artist, but also an engineer, and someone I would gladly see joining the DCS World and bringing some os his best X-Plane add-ons to this platform.

[sobek]

I think CptSmiley's FM is a very good point to start.