Aircraft Manager Pro + Location Manager Pro now available

Discussion Hub Tools & Utilities
41

Done.

One relatively minor quality of life item with AM Pro after a couple of weeks use: when scrolling thru the list of planes, I look at the name moreso than the picture to find my target. I am forever clicking on the plane’s name rather than the picture to select it, which of course doesn’t do that but rather enables/disables the Favorites filter. Since clicking the header in the Fav column operates that filter, having the aircraft name do the same seems superfluous. I’d much prefer that clicking the picture or name selects the aircraft, while clicking the Favorites column header does the filtering.

1 Like
42

Thanks, working on it.

Favs

Well, the intent there is quick filtering, not having to even open a filter and type F, or even have to move your mouse to a button up the top. Just hit anywhere in a column, and bam, your favorites are there. It’s something I personally use a lot, to cut down what I’m looking and just want to jump into a plane I like without thinking about too much.

I could possibly swap the image and name triggers around though. Depends what others think too.

I’ll be sending out a UX survey at some point to gather feedback like this.

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I’ve put a hold on the aircraft control preset release for now, pending investigation into an initialisation conflict. Post updated.

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Is the pro version of aircraft manager been released, or is it still in alpha/beta stage ?

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It’s released and feature complete for now @ stable v1.0.1
See Aircraft Manager - Sonicviz for the version comparison.

46

Thank you.

Will it be available on the orbx platform ?

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Not at the moment, still working some things out. Maybe sometime.

48

Thank you. I’m going to wait the availability on orbx.

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Don’t hold your breath on that, just sayin’. By maybe I mean it might not.
I haven’t decided on marketplace distribution, and might just keep it simple.
As a niche addon it’s probably not worth the hassle.

I understand maintaining addons is also a hassle for users (I’m one myself, of MS MP, Orbx, Justfilght, Simmarket, flightsim++) but there’s also considerations from a developer side.
Trade off’s all round I’m afraid.

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I understand, but I had to reinstall the game, and it was a horror for the addons that were not on a centralized store. So that made me feel better about trying to centralize my purchases.

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@Sonicviz
Have you considered including the current Hobs times in Aircraft Manager, so it is easily seen how many hours you have in each plane.

Being able to sort on Hobs time might be nice,) but maybe an overkill.)

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It’s on the “nice to have” list somewhere. For now I think I’ll just keep it lean and mean, so you don’t have to horizontal scroll too much - though you could put least used data off screen as well I guess. Bloat balancing!

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Good news (I hope). Aircraft Control Presets aka auto control preset switching is back on the table.
I had to bump that up to Asobo as the issue resided in some inaccessable code, and they came through with a solution for me. Doing some final testing of it, hopefully release it soon.

2 Likes
54

Aircraft Manager for MSFS V1.0.2 released.

Aircraft Manager Pro Release Notes 1.0.2
Date: 02/03/2023
• NEW FEATURE: Auto Control Profile Switching (separate tab) see video explainer @ - YouTube
• Performance Improvements
• Fixed missing icons in filter popups
• Fixed horizontal scrollbar

Thanks for Asobo for the assistance in resolving the map button issue.

3 Likes
55

Heads up if you’re intending to use the SU12 beta.

I just updated to the SU 12 beta and it’s deleted Aircraft Manager data while Location Manager data is retained ok. That might put a cramp in your day, especially if you’ve got a huge plane collection.
It’s a beta though, so…

My advice for now is to not update to the SU12 beta.

I’ve raised this as an issue on the beta forum here and also on the dev forum, to see what they say:
https://forums.flightsimulator.com/t/su12-beta-deletes-stored-data/579090

I’m also looking into data export/import, but there’s no guarantees on that front at the moment due to some constraints imposed doing this integration.

Update:
On further investigation it seems the data is still there for Aircraft Manager, but what has happened is the plane names that are used as part of the storage key has changed in SU12 Beta, which renders the data inaccessible via the existing load function.

Looking into why the plane names have changed, it seems as if a space has been removed from the end of the plane names.

That also explains why Location Manager data was fine, different key composition.

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@Sonicviz Hi Paul. Finally had free time to spend on getting AM Pro and setting it up.

It works very well and I’m happy I got it! Thanks for adding that good stuff!

I had one issue with one aircraft where it was not swapping ONE of the assigned profiles for one controller but it WAS changing another. I think I must have clicked the dropdown (or out of it) wrongly somehow first time I selected the profile and it saved wrongly even though the dropdown read correctly when I look again. Seems I fixed it by selecting a different profile then choosing another plane, back to the broken one, changing the profile back to what I wanted and seems to have set properly now.

Some questions though:

  1. At what point in the process are the controls actually toggled? As soon as you select a aircraft in either the main list or the controls list? I assume you ONLY need to use the controls view if you want to assign any new stuff / changes. Using only the main AM list is the normal method to change planes still?
  2. Are the FAVOURITES supposed to synch between the listing and the control profiles page? Seems weird that I need to add the same faves again to find / sort the controls page. If I move to the controls page from the list page with an aircraft selected, I also need to find it again which wouldn’t be as bad if the F column was shared I suppose.
  3. If I change a name of a created profile (in the MSFS black window), it doesn’t pick up the new name in the dropdown. Bit of an issue where I want to now tweak and set up specific profiles per plane but not a biggie.
  4. Seems the DEFAULT profile is not appearing in the list for my XPC yoke. I would need to copy it and give it my own name to use the default. Again not a biggie but weird as I thought I saw “default” available in the dropdowns for other controllers.
57

Thanks for the feedback.

I suspected there might still be some issues lurking with this, it’s a little tricky synching everything.

I had one issue with one aircraft where it was not swapping ONE of the assigned profiles for one controller but it WAS changing another. I

I’ll do a double check of those indexes. Do you remember what the controller numbers were?

  1. At what point in the process are the controls actually toggled? As soon as you select a aircraft in either the main list or the controls list? I assume you ONLY need to use the controls view if you want to assign any new stuff / changes. Using only the main AM list is the normal method to change planes still?

It will trigger a change whenever an aircraft is selected in either AM view as they’re linked under the hood. Only set presets are actively changed, blanks are bypassed and the current preset for that device will be used.

There’s a few different strategies for filling these in too.
You don’t need to fill them all if you don’t want.
So one way is to choose a Master aircraft for the type you have custom control presets (eg: Twin, glider, helo, turbo, piston, etc) and just switch those when you need to reset.

Or fill them all in as you go. I’m sure someone else will find another way.

  1. Are the FAVOURITES supposed to synch between the listing and the control profiles page? Seems weird that I need to add the same faves again to find / sort the controls page. If I move to the controls page from the list page with an aircraft selected, I also need to find it again which wouldn’t be as bad if the F column was shared I suppose.

Favorites should be synched, they are on mine. There is an issue with the SU12 Beta data, as noted above, but that data migration fix is on hold till SU12 release. They edited the plane names, so the keys in SU12 are different.

Are you on the SU 12 beta or live?

Due to the special initialisation needed to synch the control presets there’s an issue making the current active plane visible automatically on first entry into the ACP view. Just hit Reset all button to bring it up is the best workaround.

  1. If I change a name of a created profile (in the MSFS black window), it doesn’t pick up the new name in the dropdown. Bit of an issue where I want to now tweak and set up specific profiles per plane but not a biggie.

ah, renaming presets. I had some code to do this but ran into some issues due to the new aformentioned method for initialising the control presets (had to change due to the map button issue). So I removed it all, and for now I’m afraid it’s better to do your preset setups with names, then go back into ACP and set up there. Not ideal UX, but still scratching my head over that renamed preset detection. It’s a bit mindbending, not as simples as it looks. I’ll keep plugging away at that use case though.

It’s actually not possible to automatically pick up a the new name anyway, as it could literally be anything, due to the (again) previously mentioned initialisation code that actually loads the control presets when you load the aircraft panels. Feature of how the UI works I’m afraid, and I can only integrate with what’s there atm.

It might be possible to modify the actual Control Options code to cater for renaming presets, but that would be complex too, and not sure what I can hook into there. I’ll have to look into it more.

So, for now, some pre-thought and manual preset planning is necessary.

  1. Seems the DEFAULT profile is not appearing in the list for my XPC yoke. I would need to copy it and give it my own name to use the default. Again not a biggie but weird as I thought I saw “default” available in the dropdowns for other controllers.

That might be an issue with a device and MSFS setup I suspect. I noticed some of them are named differently. What is it called in the Control Options. Screenshot?
I always recommend copying the default anyway to a custom, even if you’re not going to change anything for now.

Can I ask how many devices you are using? I maxed it out at 12 based on feedback from a number of people, but if it’s possible I’d like to cut that back if they’re not being used for performance sake.

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Sneak preview of a WIP update to Location Manager: teleport to ground or water as a start location from a saved LM location. Unfortunately it’s not possible to do this from the main map (I tried, but no cigar there), but we can make it happen in fly mode, so you can enter in a cold n’ dark state, then teleport to where you want to start.

Teleporting is intensive if you’re switching locations due to having to load a whole new set of streaming mesh/textures++ so it takes a little time, but opens up flexible starts to anwhere in world.

More details later as I work it out a little more.

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Not at all, sorry! Had to scroll right so maybe 6 :smiley:

Don’t really understand the first sentence but don’t worry - I got a method that works fine :slight_smile:

Definitely NOT here for some reason then.

Live. Never installed (or ever intend to install) their Betas!

I can’t get onto my gaming rig for a couple of days now but will do. From memory It’s “4 axis, 8 button controller with hat switch” (it’s actually my Sidewinder FFB2 but that is how Windows detects it for some reason - even though I have seen other people with same controller where Windows names it properly).

I sent you my list before. It’s not using all 12 columns in your grid though.

Well, I didn’t want to say before as I felt I was doing your head in, but I had to stop using that feature of your tool. It needs to FREEZE the plane until terrain is ready (like Flow Portal does whilst it’s loading assets) because without that, your plane drops down below the world and into oblivion. I wrecked one of my “state saving coz you own it” planes using that and had to replace the engine, so technically you owe me around 90,000 USD for that repair of my Sting S4! :smiley:

Only kidding - but good idea to add this for water starts as you hinted in the Lake Skipper thread! Just need to make sure it doesn’t kill your plane I guess :slight_smile:

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Rename presets

Recommend duplicate preset with new name, change in ACP, then delete original if needed.
Not optimal, but works with the constraints of integration i’m under atm.

It needs to FREEZE the plane until terrain is ready (like Flow Portal does whilst it’s loading assets)

Active pause, which is what I’m doing now in the WIP.

Not sure how your sting died though, it’s currently set to teleport to 1000’ AGL @ 80 knots (iirc) straight and level, so shouldn’t pancake. But sure, I’ve added that to the current air teleport already in the WIP.

Any teleport could potentially “damage” a state saving plane though, you’re essentially putting it through an extremely unnatural experience. Wouldn’t take much to cause some state saving to flip out, even dropping it a small distance could technically “damage” a plane. Milviz has ~230+ different variables on the 310 being saved, for example.

I like Flows adjustment widget, but I’m not going that far with it.
I might be able to add some custom fields into the grid to tune.

[quote=“Sonicviz, post:57, topic:575628”]
Favorites should be synched, they are on mine.
[/quote] Definitely NOT here for some reason then.

No idea. Send me some more details when you get access again and I’ll see if I can spot anything.
I don’t have any other reports about it atm.

Fyi support questions should also go through the website form, as these forums are just for general discussion, according to forum tos.

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