Pete Dowson

Why would you think it might not be working okay? Do you think I release and document facilities in a non-working state? Has my software got such a bad reputation? :-( Please do read the section in the User Guide. For the default 737-400 it certainly works on the two functions it says it works on in that section -- the 737-400 is the example actually used, so why not follow it? They are the only ones I know on in that panel which don't have a normal FS control (and so don't need a Mouse Macro in any case) and which work in a way a mouse macro can use. None of the EFIS ND options will, they are all internal. In general the facility is not of a great deal of use on any default aircraft, though when I was developing it I had hoped otherwise. Most Microsoft-made panels use internals which aren't hookable. The main use is for add-on panels made using the Microsoft C/C++ panel-making toolkit, as those all follow a simple logical structure which the facility can trap and emulate. Pretty much all of the Level D and PMDG panels are amenable, for example. Regards Pete

Strange. The Toggle control should show it on one use, hide it on the next, so if you send it twice it should self-cancel. Are you sure you haven't got "Repeat" enabled? Maybe you are now sending it three times? Enable Button and Event logging (in the Logging tab), then use it once and check the Log, see what is happening. You must "OK" out of the FSUIPC options, not Cancel or press ESCape. Changes are written to the INI file at that time. Check the INI file. It sounds like you programmed it with "Aircraft Specific" set and the wrong aircraft loaded. You shouldn't need any of those ApChart macros programmed "aircraft specific" as if it used 10012 for one aircraft it probably used it for all (check another to be sure). What do you mean "both parameter boxes"? There is only one parameter entry field for each control -- there are separate places for control sent on "Press" and "Release". Each control can have ONE parameter. Where are you seeing more? See the pictures in the documentation? Don't they match? In any case, with this Macro the parameter for the Toggle Panel control is in the Macro itself -- you don't supply a parameter with the control you program on the button, so that can be left to the default (0). If you want a macro to take a parameter you have to omit it (and its comma) in the macro definition. Maybe if you are getting this confused you'd better let me see the [buttons...] sections in the INI file! Regards Pete

What is this "patch" you are talking about? I have never provided a "patch". You said you downloaded FSUIPC4 version 4.30. You never mentioned whether you installed it, but I assumed so. If you installed FSUIPC4 into FSX it must be in the Modules folder of FSX. Do you actually manage to run FSX from a memory stick? Anyway, if you delete it, then it is deleted. You cannot delete it and have it still present -- that means you did not delete it after all! Maybe you need to explain what you mean by "patch". It sounds like you are mixing my software up with something completely different. Pete

The window will only appear if you click on something which can be trapped as a gauge "hotspot", one which does something, and even then only if that hotspot is processed in a Gauge -- some are processed directly by the PANELS DLL of FS, and those cannot be used this way. Regards Pete

You didn't say that. Evidently you aren't actually assigning them in FSUIPC then. Are you assigning them to FS controls or using the "Direct to FSUIPC calibration" option? If you use the latter then you MUST calibrate in FSUIPC as well. In the former case that is optional. Never ever assign things in two places. You are asking for trouble. No idea, sorry. You'll have to tell me exactly what you are doing, step by step. I don't know anyone else who can't assign axes in FSUIPC. It is a much used facility, and documented with pictures as well! Sorry, but I produce the best documentation I know how. If I could do better don't you think I would have, rather than have to repeat something different here? Please tell me what you are doing. I really cannot imagine how you could do it wrongly. It is very very hard to do it wrongly! Pete

None of those are simulated by FS9 or before. For FSX there's a single hydraulic switch at offset 341E as listed. Why are you reading the entire list? Try using simple word searches. Pete

If you only downloaded it, just delete the ZIP you downloaded! If you installed it, then removing it is called "uninstalling", and is described in the User Guide. Just use Windows Explorer, find the Modules folder in your FSX installation, and delete "FSUIPC4.DLL". There's really no need to do anything else. You can put it (or a later version) back if you change your mind. Pete

Neither FSUIPC nor WideFS provide any weather, it isn't their job at all. If you want real world weather either use FS's own real weather downloads (World - Weather dialogues), or get a weather program such as ActiveSkyor FSMeteo. Regards Pete

Good! Well done. It's nice when someone understands my stuff a bit more! ;-) You can turn any button into a toggle switch like that. Regards Pete

Why not? You can assign all the axes and buttons in FSUIPC and disable all joysticks in FS. You most certainly should never have the same things assigned in both FS and in FSUIPC! As I said, assign them in FSUIPC (not in FS) and make them aircraft-specific. This is why axis assignments were added to FSUIPC -- not to duplicate FS but to replace its less-capable assignment system. You don't. You get FSUIPC to do it instead. That's the whole point. You seem to be wearing blinkers here -- please read the words: you can assign axes (and buttons) in FSUIPC instead of in FS! Pete

You'll need to look in the Window 16 definition in that CFG file, the ID is given there. For example, in my APchart installation for the default 737 (where is was Window07) the Window it has added looks like this: [Window07] size_mm=912,654 position=4 window_size=0.75 background_color=0,0,0 visible=0 ident=10000 zorder=4 update_rate=6 gauge00=apchart!APChart,0,0,912,654 The parameter 10000 I provided is from that ident=10000 line. I assumed it would be the same for each installation -- not sure how it can vary, unless the author changed it in the version you have, although I suppose it is possible his installer loooked at all the other Windows in al the aircraft panels and found 10000 already used, so reconfigured it. Seems less likely though. Just find the Ident number and change it in the Macro to suit. Regards Pete

to be performed seperately to the second half .The second half of the macro ( ) would need to be performed by the same joystick button some time after my flight has been completed, hence shutting the engine down. You most certainly don't want ANY of these solutions in that case. sorry, I thought you just wanted to return the starter switch to its normal "off" position. On the aircraft I fly the starter actually spring loads back to "off" in any case. If you want to use the one button to start and aircraft and also, at a time completely unrelated, to shut down, then you need to emulate a toggle switch -- i.e. one which stays in the position you set it until you change it again. To do that with an ordinary non-latching button you will have to use the Button Flag. Make the "start engine" control conditional on the flag being off, and set the flag at the same time, and make the "shut down" control conditional on the flag being on, and clear the flag at the same time. This effectively turns your button into a latching switch or toggle. You'll need to read up on the flags and conditionals after all. There are examples. Regards Pete

Yes, of course. There are 4 in fact: RADIO VOR1 IDENT DISABLE RADIO VOR1 IDENT ENABLE RADIO VOR1 IDENT SET RADIO VOR1 IDENT TOGGLE The "SET" one, like all "Set" controls, takes a parameter -- 1 for enable, 0 for disable. I publish a list of all FS controls -- for FSX see the list in the PDF installed in the Modules folder. For FS2004 and older versions, download the list from http://www.schiratti.com/dowson Regards Pete

Are you talking about the default FS radio stack? If you can read and change the digits, it IS powered up -- when the Avionics power is off, the whole radio stack (COM, NAV, ADF, Transponder) is dark and non-responsive. Maybe you are mixed up over the NAV ID button? All that does is select the SOUND from the NAV radio so you can hear the Morse coded ID it is transmitting. There are separate FS controls you can assign for the sound from COM1, COM2, NAV1, NAV2, ADF and Marker Beacons, i.e. the buttons on the sound select bar. None of those have anything to do with power. The Avionics power switch operates the whole radio stack. Regards Pete

You picture shows the Axis Assignments, not the calibration. There are rarely any axes which just happen to provide a zero when centred, that's why there is calibration -- the Windows drivers and Game Controllers provide calibration ,which is where you should start, and FSUIPC provides calibration too. Proper calibration allows you to make the centre where you like, within reason. How come you are assigning it in FSUIPC but not bothering to calibrate it? Just go to the Joystick calibrations tab and follow the steps detailed in the User Guide! Pete

No. I doubt that you have an aileron trim on the hardware, have you? As I already explained, it is probably the trim on the aircraft in FS. Load an aircraft with aileron and rudder trim gauges and centre them. Where is this, you mean the PFC one is working, or are you talking about FSUIPC? Regards Pete

Unfortunately, judging by the reports here and elsewhere, reinstalling FSX seems to be a cause of many SimConnect problems. I think one of the reasons is that SimConnect libraries are NOT uninstalled when you uninstall FSX, so don't get re-installed later. Ugh. Ah, you did a complete SYSTEM re-install. In that case ignore what I just said. Everything should work fine in that case. Is FSUIPC4 actually loaded at all? You can tell by whether it generates an FSUIPC4.LOG file -- if there's no loag file then it isn't being loaded by SimConnect. You provided loads of files, but no actual FSUIPC4 log, so I assume it isn't there? Your SimConnect logs don't extend far enough to see it loading any DLLs at all. Are there no other lines beyond the initialisation of the assorted Server ports? And did you do this AFTER getting all the Logs and so on above? Judging by the FSUIPC4 install log, there was nothing wrong with your SimConnect installation, so you've probably now messed it up completely. If you've deleted the folders and they don't come back on FSX reinstall followed by Acceleration, then you'll need to contact Microsoft support. It isn't a good idea to mess with these things unless it is really necessary. When you say "SimConnect works" you mean from a client PC, running ASX, not locally? Without those WinSxS folders intact no local SimConnect applications such as FSUIPC4 can run. Judging by the two [Trusted] entries for FSUIPC4 in your FSX.CFG file, you certainly have had FSUIPC4 loading since you formatted and reinstalled FSX, so it looks like this is now lost information. You need to get SimConnect working enough to actually run local SimConnect applications, including FSUIPC4, before we can then look and see why there's no Add-Ons menu being produced. Regards Pete

All DLLs are dated and timed the same, except the following That's okay then. The others aren't part of FSX as such. (Read what? A DLL? DLL's are binary library files in PE format. You can decode them with a PE disassembler or PE Explorer tools). Which proves the CONTROLS.DLL must be okay. It is labelled "Trim/shaker motors fitted", on the main consoles tab. Here's the documentation extract for it: Trim/shaker motors fitted: Only check this to enable the facilities in PFC.DLL which drive the stick shaker motor (on stall or overspeed warnings) and trim motor (to turn the trim wheels), if you have these fitted. Do not enable them otherwise, as there is a possibility that the version of firmware in your console might then cause odd things to happen, most noticeably flashing of the gear indicator LEDs when trim is adjusted. If you still bank when the calibration shows the aileron is centred, it is almost certainly the aileron trim out of whack, or just possibly rudder trim. Check both. I don't know how to fix that, as it certainly isn't happening here. Without forcing you to reinstall everything from scratch, I can only suggest working around it for now. You can assign any of your PFC switches and buttons to FS controls (or FSUIPC controls) in FSUIPC's Buttons tab. I think that option is more flexible than using the PFC driver's built-in option. I use it all the time. (You can even do the same for the PFC axes -- quadrant levers, yoke, etc -- i.e. assign them in FSUIPC's axis assignments. However, there is less point there, in general). Regards Pete

All the Show/Hide macro does is send a Panel Toggle with the parameter set to the ID of the APChart display. In the cases I looked at it always had that ID, but maybe it is different in the version you have. Look in any of the Panel.CFG files for aircraft into which you have APChart installed and find its ID, then edit the macro to put the correct ID in. Regards Pete

As it clearly states in the documentation, entries with zero ID are empty slots. the data in the other fields would have been relevant to the previous occupant. FSUIPC only sets the ID to zero when an aircraft disappears, it is inefficient for it to clear al the rest of the stuff, not just for it but for any WideFS clients it is being sent to. If they are active still they will be present in another slot. They may have temporarily disappeared, and got another slot when they reappeared. Please simply ignore all slots with a zero ID. That's the only indicator of an empty slot. Pete

It's probably too fast to have any affect on the graphics. If you want to emulate normal actions, instead of doing this (in fact instead of doing any INI editing at all), all you needed to do was program the first action for the PRESS of the button, and the second action for the RELEASE of the button. You could do both of those in the Options screen.I didn't suggest that before because I assumed you realised you could do that and either didn't feel it was suitable, or you were using a toggle switch not a button. If you want to edit the button in the Options youd need to delete the second entry you now have for it in the INI. Just for info, you could make one Macro to do this, instead of actioning two from one button. From this: 4=eng1ON=RX5b00*Xa1cc,31 5=eng1OFF=RX5b40*Xa1cc,31 I can make this new macro, which does both: 6=eng1ON-OFF 6.1=RX5b00*Xa1cc,31 6.2=RX5b40*Xa1cc,31 This facility is described in the Advanced User's guide, in the Macro section, under "multiple actions in one macro control". Regards Pete

You don't need any conditionals, if that's what you mean. Just two lines for the same button instead of one. When a button is pressed, FSUIPC obeys ALL lines for that button press, in the order of the line numbers (the number before the '='). The easiest, if you don't understand anything at all, is to assign two buttons, one for each function, in the FSUIPC options, then edit the INI to renumber the 2nd button to be the same as first, so both functions act on that one button. All you need to remember from the Options screen is the Joystick and Button numbers. Note that once there are multiple assignments to the same button, you can no longer edit it in the FSUIPC Options dialogue. This is why it is now better to make a macro instead, or if you are already using a macro, to simply extend it to operate both functions. Regards Pete

FSUIPC doesn't perform any clicks at all. The Mouse Macros are NOT emulating a mouse, they are calling code to do what a mouse click would do. There's a fairly large section about Button programming in the FSUIPC Advanced User's guide. All buttons can have as many actions as you like, defined in the INI file, and these are executed in sequence. So one way of doing your "two clicks" (by which I assume you mean "two operations") is to simply edit the INI file to make that happen. The other way, specific only to the macro facility, is to have a Macro defined to do what you want. Any macro can have multiple actions defined for it. In fact when you are generating Mouse Macros, if you assign the same action to the same Named macro (i.e. enter the same name twice) both will be recorded for that Macro. But in general, any macro, be it a "mouse" one or simply a mixed list of actions, can be edited to do multiple operations. Please revieiw the documentation on all this, provided with FSUIPC. Regards Pete

Could you actually give version numbers, please? Folks mean all sorts of different things when they say "latest" -- it can mean simply "the latest one I know about". One chap was using a year old version of FSUIPC and was thinking that was the 'latest' simply because he'd not looked very far. Have you used the same facility before with these "latest" versions? PFCFSX gets the FS Controls List in the same way as FSUIPC4. Does FSUIPC4 crash when you try to drop down the Buttons or Keys assignment lists? (Do you have a Registered FSUIPC4, if not you won't be able to try that). FS's controls are all listed in its CONTROLS.DLL -- can you check that it bears the same date/time as the other FSX DLLs? That's due to having old firmware with recent versions of the PFC driver. Apparently when they added new functionality, for new devices, the older firmware misinterprets some of the new commands -- a bit of an oversight in the code which was always meant to be extensible. Often it is due to having the "Motor Trim" option enabled -- that will certainly do it -- but I have received reports of it occurring even with that off. If I knew which of the additional commands now used in PFC.DLL and PFCFSX.DLL were being so misinterpreted, I could make them optional. However, there has been an enormous amount of development for new bits and pieces and it isn't feasible to make it all optional. The only solution, therefore, is to get the firmware in the console upgraded -- it's a socketed chip change. Can't you simply re-calibrate to get a correct centre? The numbers provided can be interpreted in any way, so this is always possible. Of course you should also check your aileron trim. If there's no such dial on the console, check that the trim in FSX is centred -- it is quite easy to get it off-centred and saved in a Flight file, then propagated to other aircraft by loadingh those instead of loading fresh flights. Regards Pete

That's why I suggested glueing a [iece pf plastic or rubber on the axis slot to form a detente. The other way is of course to do it like in reality, with another lever assigned as the reverser. Regards Pete