Helicopter Total Realism Release & question for Pete

[fred64]

Hello,

I wanted to announce the release of Helicopter Total Realism

http://www.hovercontrol.com/cgi-bin/ib3/ikonboard.cgi?s=bb2ddd7ded934cf873d8e6f54dbcd6d3;act=ST;f=1;t=17635;st=0

Helicopter Total Realism (HTR) is a free program that overrides FSX FS9 flight model with a more realistic model and was fully developed with the managed FSUIPC interface.

All the helicopter reactions are calculated using formulas taken from different aerodynamic books. Every helicopter can be configured using a .cfg file similar to the aircraft.cfg but with custom parameters used by the application to model the physics profile.

Thank you Peter for making my job so easy ! your fantastic software allowed me to concentrate on the physics part with an easy way to interface FSX and FS9

The software is becoming quite popular and already got over 1000 downloads in a few weeks.

I keep on improving the program and I have a question for the next release.

The way I read and write data to FSX is from a group of about 30 parameters i query at regular intervals. The query frequency can be adjusted by the user to match the FSX frame rate.

This leads to occasional stuttering problems when my velocities settings are highly different from what FSX thinks they should be. I wondered if there is a different way to time my requests to FSX, maybe through a listener approach or monitoring the time elapsed at offset 04A8, or counting the frames...

Thank you

Fred

[Pete Dowson]

The way I read and write data to FSX is from a group of about 30 parameters i query at regular intervals. The query frequency can be adjusted by the user to match the FSX frame rate.

I assume you do this all in one Process call per cycle, so only causing one process switch? If not you certainly should. Do the writes and reads at the same time.

This leads to occasional stuttering problems when my velocities settings are highly different from what FSX thinks they should be.

It is extremely difficult to escape from that entirely, even with the change going on as fast as possible from inside FS. I know, I've tried to do this. FSX is worse than FS9 because I'm going through the SimConnect interface. FS9 is better because many of the things have direct access into SIM1.DLL's variables.

Is your program an in-process DLL or GAUge file, or an external EXE? Internal actions can of course be repeated at a much higher frequency, which does help.

I wondered if there is a different way to time my requests to FSX, maybe through a listener approach or monitoring the time elapsed at offset 04A8, or counting the frames...

With FS9 the best approach is really do do it as fast as possible without actually causing any noticeable deterioration in frame rates etc. For FSX, as fast as possible helps but the asynchronous nature of the SimConnect server-client approach will never give ultimate satisfaction I'm afraid. All you can do, as with most things FSX-wise, is recommend the fastest hardware the user can afford!

You might want to consider using SimConnect directly for your FSX version as in this case FSUIPC is really only another layer -- though admittedly, SimConnect is a lot faster for internal clients like FSUIPC.

Regards

Pete

[fred64]

I assume you do this all in one Process call per cycle, so only causing one process switch? If not you certainly should. Do the writes and reads at the same time.

Yes it is one process call per cycle

Is your program an in-process DLL or GAUge file, or an external EXE? Internal actions can of course be repeated at a much higher frequency, which does help.

Sorry I did not mention it it is an external exe file.

With FS9 the best approach is really do do it as fast as possible without actually causing any noticeable deterioration in frame rates etc. For FSX, as fast as possible helps but the asynchronous nature of the SimConnect server-client approach will never give ultimate satisfaction I'm afraid. All you can do, as with most things FSX-wise, is recommend the fastest hardware the user can afford!

You might want to consider using SimConnect directly for your FSX version as in this case FSUIPC is really only another layer -- though admittedly, SimConnect is a lot faster for internal clients like FSUIPC.

I will try the as fast as possible approach, with a new hardware it should not affect frame rate that much, is it worth suggesting to keep FSX frame rate and my application frequency to similar values or does FSX program runs with a different cycle from the render frame rate ?

Also I'd like to stay with FSUIPC, I don't see a reason to move to simconnect, also now that you mention it is actually faster!

Thank you for your help

Fred

[Pete Dowson]

is it worth suggesting to keep FSX frame rate and my application frequency to similar values or does FSX program runs with a different cycle from the render frame rate ?

Ideally you'd think matching the render frame rate would be smoothest. However, you don't know when, within that time, the SIM engine is computing the next values, nor, in fact, when those values have their effect on the screen. Suppose you are spot on, sending values exactly at the frame rate, but meanwhile the SIM engine has just passed its latest computed values to the rendering engine? Your new values now take a whole frame to have any effect and by that time they should probably have been different. The only way around that is to try and get more updates done within each frame, so you have a better chance of being "right" on the mark.

Naturally you have to have a limit, but that will be dependent upon the performance of FS on this specific PC.

Regards

Pete

[wingclip]

Hello,

I wanted to announce the release of Helicopter Total Realism

http://www.hovercontrol.com/cgi-bin/ib3/ikonboard.cgi?;act=ST;f=1;t=17635;st=0

Helicopter Total Realism (HTR) is a free program that overrides FSX FS9 flight model with a more realistic model and was fully developed with the managed FSUIPC interface.

All the helicopter reactions are calculated using formulas taken from different aerodynamic books. Every helicopter can be configured using a .cfg file similar to the aircraft.cfg but with custom parameters used by the application to model the physics profile.

Thank you Peter for making my job so easy ! your fantastic software allowed me to concentrate on the physics part with an easy way to interface FSX and FS9

The software is becoming quite popular and already got over 1000 downloads in a few weeks.

I keep on improving the program and I have a question for the next release.

The way I read and write data to FSX is from a group of about 30 parameters i query at regular intervals. The query frequency can be adjusted by the user to match the FSX frame rate.

This leads to occasional stuttering problems when my velocities settings are highly different from what FSX thinks they should be. I wondered if there is a different way to time my requests to FSX, maybe through a listener approach or monitoring the time elapsed at offset 04A8, or counting the frames...

Thank you

Fred

 

Fred, can you tell me who is "Technically" responsible and credited for this program? I ask because I'm a tech writer, (FS aircraft manuals), and am doing a job in which the HTR program will be mentioned. I'd like to give a proper credit resource to that affect.

Thanks, Rich