Assigned presets turned into "Custom control: <0>" for unknown reasons

[aurel42]

Hey Dowson family! 😄

Recently, a lot of my assigned presets (which were working fine before) turned into this:

0=PB,134,C0,0     -{Custom control: <0>}-
1=PB,133,C0,0     -{Custom control: <0>}-
2=PB,136,C0,0     -{Custom control: <0>}-
3=PB,135,C0,0     -{Custom control: <0>}-
4=PB,138,C0,0     -{Custom control: <0>}-
5=PB,137,C0,0     -{Custom control: <0>}-
6=PB,140,C0,0     -{Custom control: <0>}-

I'm not sure what I could've done to cause this. Is this a known issue? Any idea what could've gone wrong and how to avoid it in the future?

Cheers,
Marc

[John Dowson]

This can happen if/when FSUIPC is started and cannot read the preset file(s) (events.txt and myevents,txt). As it cannot map the preset name to its control number, the control number reverts to 0 and this value is then used when the ini file is re-written.

I am not sure what happened in your case, i.e. why FSUIPC could not load the presets. Did you manually remove or rename the events.txt file at some point?

I am not sure if there is anything i can do about this but will take a look to see if I can prevent such assignments being re-written if the preset cannot be found. In the mean-time, just back-up your FSUIPC7.ini file occasionally, when you have added or changed any assignments.

Please also check that you are using the latest version of FSUIPC7, which is currently 7.3.21.

John

 

[aurel42]

Thanks for the explanation, John. I can confirm that I'm on 7.3.21. I did not move or remove "events.txt" or "myevents.txt".

But: I recently tried to troubleshoot a CTD caused by a 3rd-party airport scenery, so I launched MSFS a couple of times with an empty or almost empty Community folder.

Would you mind checking whether you can reproduce this behavior?

• have a FSUIPC7.ini using presets
• temporarily remove the "fsuipc-lvar-module" from the Community folder
• launch FSUIPC without MSFS running
• exit FSUIPC
• check FSUIPC7.ini

Before:

328=PD,31,CPKA_SPD_DEC,0 	-{Preset Control}-
329=PD,4,CPKA_ALT_FAST_INC,0 	-{Preset Control}-
330=PD,5,CPKA_ALT_FAST_DEC,0 	-{Preset Control}-
331=PD,7,CPKA_ALT_DEC,0 	-{Preset Control}-
332=PD,6,CPKA_ALT_INC,0 	-{Preset Control}-

After:

328=PD,31,C0,0 	-{Custom control: <0>}-
329=PD,4,C0,0 	-{Custom control: <0>}-
330=PD,5,C0,0 	-{Custom control: <0>}-
331=PD,7,C0,0 	-{Custom control: <0>}-
332=PD,6,C0,0 	-{Custom control: <0>}-

That doesn't seem to be working as intended.

9 hours ago, John Dowson said:

just back-up your FSUIPC7.ini file occasionally

Of course. My FSUIPC folder is in my daily Duplicati backup. Restoring the lost settings was just a matter of copypasting a bunch of lines.

[John Dowson]

33 minutes ago, aurel42 said:

temporarily remove the "fsuipc-lvar-module" from the Community folder

This will cause the same issue - when the FSUIPC detects that the WASM isn't available, it won't load the preset files and you will get the same problem.

I will look into rectifying this...

John

[aurel42]

If there's no easy fix, I would be happy with an option that causes FSUIPC to exit immediately if the WASM or event files are missing.

Something like "ExitIfEventsAreMissing=Yes" or "RefuseToLaunchWithoutWASM=Yes"?

Chances are that when the FSUIPC module isn't in Community, I don't need FSUIPC running (because I'm troubleshooting something or working on scenery).

 

[John Dowson]

I can easily update to load the presets even when the WASM isn't installed, but handling the missing events files is trickier. I will see if I can handle this better, otherwise I will add the 'ExitIfEventsAreMissing=Yes"  ini file option.

[John Dowson]

Presets will be loaded even when the WASM module is not detected in the next release, and I have also added the ini parameter ExitIfEventsAreMissing.
I will probably release this version (7.3.22) tomorrow. The new version is attached below if you would like to try it.

John

FSUIPC7.exe

Edited September 3, 2023 by John Dowson
New version attached

[aurel42]

You're a legend, good Sir!

 

[aurel42]

John, the events.txt file included with 7.3.22 is missing a range of events that worked fine before. I heavily used the "generic" autopilot events ("KA_*", e.g. "KA_ALT_DEC") and it seems they're all gone now. Is that a change we inherited from upstream (Mobi) or did something go awry when you created the file?

If they're not coming back, I'll copy them to myevents.txt.

(edit: Oh, I just noticed the comment, they're not so much "generic" events as they are events meant for the Asobo King Air, but I still use them as defaults that I only override on a per-profile basis, because most of them they work in most planes.)

 

[John Dowson]

7 hours ago, aurel42 said:

the events.txt file included with 7.3.22 is missing a range of events that worked fine before. I heavily used the "generic" autopilot events ("KA_*", e.g. "KA_ALT_DEC") and it seems they're all gone now. Is that a change we inherited from upstream (Mobi) or did something go awry when you created the file?

The file is provided as-is from MobFlght. Comparing the new one to the old one,. it looks like many of the KA_* events (as well as others) have been renamed rather than removed. Not sure why MF did this as it is bound to create issues with folks using the older preset names. I will ask about this on the MF discord channel.
I have attached the previous events.txt file used for reference - you can diff this with the current one to see the changes (various free tools available for this): events.txt

7 hours ago, aurel42 said:

If they're not coming back, I'll copy them to myevents.txt.

Probably better to update to use the new names, if available...

7 hours ago, aurel42 said:

(edit: Oh, I just noticed the comment, they're not so much "generic" events as they are events meant for the Asobo King Air, but I still use them as defaults that I only override on a per-profile basis, because most of them they work in most planes.)

Yes, many of them are generic - not sure why they are listed under the King Air rather than as generic Asobo events.

John

[aurel42]

Not really consistent what they did there, or maybe the renaming is just not fully done yet. But I'm not complaining, I'm sure they have good reasons. I'll keep a copy of KA_* stuff in myevents.txt for the time being (hoping that FSUIPC will handle duplicates in a sensible way) and wait for the events.txt file to stabilize.

Thanks for looking into this!

 

[John Dowson]

19 hours ago, aurel42 said:

Thanks for looking into this!

No problem.

19 hours ago, aurel42 said:

(hoping that FSUIPC will handle duplicates in a sensible way)

There i no check on duplicate preset names, so they will be added. The problem is that only the preset name is stored in your FSUIPC7.ini, so when this is reloaded this will match the first preset it finds that matches the name and use the preset code for that, which may be different than the one initially selected.

You may want to check-out the latest beta version I have posted in this thread: 

This contains a Find Preset.. button, currently only for button assignments, that displays a tree-view of the presets available.
The tree is constructed using the comments, so you may also want to add comments to your myevents.txt in the same way as they are used in the events.txt file.

John

[aurel42]

That's a welcome surprise! Selecting Presets is much nicer this way, but of course it's a lot of clicking when you're trying to change several assignments, because the tree view doesn't remember which branches were visible/"unfolded". Is that something the toolkit can do?

 

[John Dowson]

19 hours ago, aurel42 said:

the tree view doesn't remember which branches were visible/"unfolded". Is that something the toolkit can do?

Once I have figured out how to show the current selection, I can show (and open) the previous parent node when there i no current selection. I am having difficulties with this at the moment but will persevere...

John

[John Dowson]

On 9/8/2023 at 2:52 PM, aurel42 said:

because the tree view doesn't remember which branches were visible/"unfolded". Is that something the toolkit can do?

Please try the attached version: FSUIPC7.exe

This should automatically select and show any current preset that is assigned, and also select the parent of the previous selection made if no current selection/assignment available. Note however that it does not remember the previous state if no selection is/was made.

John