PMDG 737 estimated to be released in Q4, 2021

[JRBarrett 3,070]

Already answered…

Edited October 1, 2021 by JRBarrett

[JRBarrett 3,070]

4 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

Yes, weather radar can be done in MSFS with HTML & Javascript. Unfortunately, some people in this thread are not fully informed.  PMDG, if they want to, can do a weather radar for the 737 if they use HTML & Javascript.

Yes, both weather and terrain are currently available to displays written in JS/HTML. The terrain display (in particular) in the new WT G-1000 NXi is superb.

 But, the PMDG 737 will (AFAIK) be written in C++ under WASM.

There is not yet any API to inject weather or terrain into WASM-based displays, and it is not possible to have a mixture of JS/HTML and WASM displays and gauges in the same virtual cockpit at the same time. It has to be all one or all the other. I don’t think there is any chance that PMDG is going to re-write the entire 737 in JS/HTML - if they did, it would probably be years before they could bring a product to MSFS.

[abrams_tank 7,409]

42 minutes ago, JRBarrett said:

and it is not possible to have a mixture of JS/HTML and WASM displays and gauges in the same virtual cockpit at the same time. It has to be all one or all the other. .

I have not heard this before, that it has to be one or the other.  Are you a 3rd party developer or do you work for Working Title?

If you are not, perhaps you could provide a source for this.

When I read Aerosoft’s explanation on why they didn’t want to use HTML & JavaScript for the weather radar, they did not say the reason was it has to be one or the other, from my recollection (but I read that many months ago).

If you aren’t a 3rd party developer, you don’t work for Working Title, and you don’t have a source for this, then maybe a 3rd party developer or a Working Title developer reading this thread can confirm whether this is accurate or not.

Edited October 1, 2021 by abrams_tank

[rocketlaunch 614]

The lack of enthusiasm from some about this upcoming offering from PMDG is surprising. Maybe they shouldn't bother?

The way I read it the product will be as fully featured as possible. The A320 from FSlabs to this day does not have every feature of the aircraft simulated. Give them a chance and some time, they have delivered before multiple times. 

Also while on a rant: who asked anyone about Xplane or Zibo? If you love it so much maybe give this topic a miss and stop spamming us.

 

[rtodepart 761]

8 hours ago, Chapstick said:

Not to worry--it'll be cheaper because it'll be a watered down version of the NGXu with missing features.

Where did PMDG mentioned anything about watering down anything???? 

[captain420 3,099]

I presume the PMDG 737 NGXu is going to be based on the modern version. On that note, would you guys say it's on par with the A320 NEO in terms of automation and avionics? Which is easier to fly and operate?

[Jeff Nielsen 1,386]

7 minutes ago, captain420 said:

I presume the PMDG 737 NGXu is going to be based on the modern version. On that note, would you guys say it's on par with the A320 NEO in terms of automation and avionics? Which is easier to fly and operate?

The 37 doesn't auto-tune as far as I'm aware.  You also have to set the course on the MCP for the ILS.  LNAV/VNAV are separate versus one NAV mode.  Just to name a couple from the navigation side.

You can still fly the same approaches and what not, it's just a tad more manual than the bus.

One thing I do love that the 37 has; is the VSD.  I think that should be standard on every aircraft from Cessna's to transport category aircraft.

Edited October 1, 2021 by Jeff Nielsen

[JRBarrett 3,070]

2 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

I have not heard this before, that it has to be one or the other.  Are you a 3rd party developer or do you work for Working Title?

If you are not, perhaps you could provide a source for this.

When I read Aerosoft’s explanation on why they didn’t want to use HTML & JavaScript for the weather radar, they did not say the reason was it has to be one or the other, from my recollection (but I read that many months ago).

If you aren’t a 3rd party developer, you don’t work for Working Title, and you don’t have a source for this, then maybe a 3rd party developer or a Working Title developer reading this thread can confirm whether this is accurate or not.

No, I’m not a developer, but am part of the test team for the CRJ. It may be possible for there to be separate discrete gauges that use either WASM or JS/HTML - I would welcome clarification on that by WT, but they cannot be mixed in one display. In the case of the CRJ, the MFD, which normally displays the route and waypoints is coded entirely in C++ via WASM. All the logic of the MFD and all the display-drawing routines are C++ based. The MFD would overlay either radar returns or terrain, and the drawing routines for those elements would have to be compatible with C++. 

The WT version of the CJ-4 does use some WASM for non-display related functionality. There is a WASM source file in the package, and the aircraft compiles a WASM private DLL when run for the first time, but AFAIK, the WASM/C++ is used for some of the underlying logic of the systems which may be better suited to being coded in C++ for speed of execution.

I do know that the PMDG DC-6 for MSFS uses WASM as well - I assume that will also be the case for the upcoming 737, as it would allow them to re-purpose much of the underlying code developed for previous versions over the last 15+ years, rather than having to start from scratch.

[brucewtb 249]

I am another PMDG customer of nearly 20 years standing but until we have AI and GSX equivalent features in MSFS2020 so that major airports look the way they do in P3D I l will probably and reluctantly just pass which will be a real pity.

Bruce

Edited October 2, 2021 by brucewtb
typo

[Christopher Low 5,353]

Quote

Some folks have been asking about whether X function or Y function will be present and we are intentionally ignoring all such requests at this time. There are a number of things that we know don't work properly at this particular moment, but there were 10x as many things that didn't work properly back on 01JUN, and for us it is a matter of working through the task list one item at a time, and then taking any shortcomings to Asobo for guidance/input/adjustment. It is a long and slow process and I don't want to have to continually update the list of things that didn't work yesterday that work today- so we will talk through any functionality differences between the P3D and MSFS versions at a later date once we know for sure which items cannot be implemented.

Probably the most significant section of the update.

[Tom_L 533]

11 hours ago, JRBarrett said:

15 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

Yes, weather radar can be done in MSFS with HTML & Javascript. Unfortunately, some people in this thread are not fully informed.  PMDG, if they want to, can do a weather radar for the 737 if they use HTML & Javascript.

Yes, both weather and terrain are currently available to displays written in JS/HTML

There is a "Wishlist" posting over at the official forums, initiated by the Fly-by-wire guys, that says: "Currently, the only way to obtain weather and terrain radar is through the BingMap JS interface, which only renders a static image that can barely be customized at all (and only cosmetic customizations). Therefore, this means that high fidelity third party aircraft are severely limited by the lack of a native SDK API for retrieving weather, terrain, wind, and METAR data"

I guess that's what you are referring to. Unfortunately, although having by far the largest vote count, the devs showed no awareness for the motivation of said request in the latest Q&A as they were ranting about an API to WRITE weather data to the sim, and then the complications of conflicts with the Meteoblue weather model. However, they claimed to be open to provide an API to access data that are present in the RAM. Not sure if that would be sufficient, and it didn't sound like it will happen anytime soon. In any case it is fair to assume that the 737 will release without weather radar, as will the Fenix A320 afaik.

 

[abrams_tank 7,409]

9 hours ago, JRBarrett said:

No, I’m not a developer, but am part of the test team for the CRJ. It may be possible for there to be separate discrete gauges that use either WASM or JS/HTML - I would welcome clarification on that by WT, but they cannot be mixed in one display. In the case of the CRJ, the MFD, which normally displays the route and waypoints is coded entirely in C++ via WASM. All the logic of the MFD and all the display-drawing routines are C++ based. The MFD would overlay either radar returns or terrain, and the drawing routines for those elements would have to be compatible with C++. 

So I'm not exactly sure how HTML & Javascript work in the cockpit in MSFS.  But I can say that for HTML & Javascript for web pages, you can set the z-index and also position a specific "div" element on top of other elements.  If the same functionality for HTML & Javascript were supported in MSFS that is possible on web pages, that means that a weather radar, on its own layer, could be positioned on top of a C++ based gauge. 

There could be other workarounds too that allow the mixing of a C++ gauge and an HTML & Javascript gauge.  

In any case, I think it's better if a Working Title developer or a 3rd party developer that is more familiar with the capabilities of MSFS answers as neither of us are experts in this area.  

[Fiorentoni 4,224]

15 hours ago, rocketlaunch said:

The lack of enthusiasm from some about this upcoming offering from PMDG is surprising. Maybe they shouldn't bother?

The way I read it the product will be as fully featured as possible. The A320 from FSlabs to this day does not have every feature of the aircraft simulated. Give them a chance and some time, they have delivered before multiple times. 

Also while on a rant: who asked anyone about Xplane or Zibo? If you love it so much maybe give this topic a miss and stop spamming us.

 

I suppose the enthusiasm-lacking part is not "as fully featured" but rather "as possible". People are afraid that MSFS is still so limited that PMDG has to (for now) leave out a lot of those beloved features from P3D. But sure, if they had the choice they would rather have a limited PMDG 737 than none at all; but you can still be happy about having something AND unhappy about it not being as you would like it to be. Happiness is not a binary value.

[Fiorentoni 4,224]

3 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

So I'm not exactly sure how HTML & Javascript work in the cockpit in MSFS.  But I can say that for HTML & Javascript for web pages, you can set the z-index and also position a specific "div" element on top of other elements.  If the same functionality for HTML & Javascript were supported in MSFS that is possible on web pages, that means that a weather radar, on its own layer, could be positioned on top of a C++ based gauge. 

There could be other workarounds too that allow the mixing of a C++ gauge and an HTML & Javascript gauge.  

In any case, I think it's better if a Working Title developer or a 3rd party developer that is more familiar with the capabilities of MSFS answers as neither of us are experts in this area.  

I just started a programming course and one of the first things I learned was that HTML & Javascript offer only 1/10 of the possibilities of C++ or even Java itself.
Also I don't think you can natively mix two languages; you could probably inject one into the other externally, but that is far beyond my comprehension.

[MegaRiceBall 99]

5 hours ago, Tom_L said:

There is a "Wishlist" posting over at the official forums, initiated by the Fly-by-wire guys, that says: "Currently, the only way to obtain weather and terrain radar is through the BingMap JS interface, which only renders a static image that can barely be customized at all (and only cosmetic customizations). Therefore, this means that high fidelity third party aircraft are severely limited by the lack of a native SDK API for retrieving weather, terrain, wind, and METAR data"

I guess that's what you are referring to. Unfortunately, although having by far the largest vote count, the devs showed no awareness for the motivation of said request in the latest Q&A as they were ranting about an API to WRITE weather data to the sim, and then the complications of conflicts with the Meteoblue weather model. However, they claimed to be open to provide an API to access data that are present in the RAM. Not sure if that would be sufficient, and it didn't sound like it will happen anytime soon. In any case it is fair to assume that the 737 will release without weather radar, as will the Fenix A320 afaik.

 

What I learned in Q&A

• Read API:
  • The weather data in RAM may not be at the same resolution at different proximity so they need to find a way to homogenize the data for weather radar usage
  • They want to prevent rogue scanning/crawling the raw data streamed from MB due to licensing constraint and data constraint (I think setting a weather data stream quota per account per day may work)
• Write API:
  • They need to expose weather variables injected to the core weather engine. The list may be huge and hard to prepare but also potentially expose their engine IP