PRO ATC SR is released - first impressions

[Fiorentoni 4,080]

2 hours ago, tup61 said:

MSA data isn't the same as mountain and terrain data. The ATC addons still won't have a clue where mountains are. But you are correct: with MSA the addon should at least know what alt to keep you above in order to keep you safe. Obviously this isn't a problem as long as you fly procedues: only when you get vectored this comes into play. I don't have any real experience yet with vectoring in FSHud: I look forward to hear how well PROATC does this. It's a shame I don't use speech and find the P2ATC interface way too much/busy/over the top. I like the simple 'one button' method that FSHud and PROATC are using. You don't even have to keep the UI on screen with those two. 

Yeah I understand, the UI for P2ATC is awful. Nowadays I fly only VATSIM or without ATC, all those ATC programs are too predictable in the end. E.g. on climb I could just set to the CRZ alt because I know the ATC will always give me the appropriate clearance at the right time. In real life or VATSIM it's can happen that further climb is delayed because of traffic, or I get some other restriction for separation etc. With an AI ATC I could just step off the computer at 10000 feet and let it fly alone for two hour. Not really immersive for me.

[Bobsk8 12,492]

2 minutes ago, Fiorentoni said:

Yeah I understand, the UI for P2ATC is awful. Nowadays I fly only VATSIM or without ATC, all those ATC programs are too predictable in the end. E.g. on climb I could just set to the CRZ alt because I know the ATC will always give me the appropriate clearance at the right time. In real life or VATSIM it's can happen that further climb is delayed because of traffic, or I get some other restriction for separation etc. With an AI ATC I could just step off the computer at 10000 feet and let it fly alone for two hour. Not really immersive for me.

With PF3 , the climb rate always changes, never the same. 

[RALF9636 1,897]

2 hours ago, psolk said:

PF3 and RC4 which are arguably two of the best available are a single person development shop and a very small group of individuals and turned out phenomenal ATC products.  I still use PF3 in MSFS thanks to Dave March and his ongoing support. 

 

Absolutely. I use PF3 as well and being part of their Beta Team I know how arduous it is to keep improving it. There are so many features lacking from PF3 I would like to have in an ATC app, still for me PF3 is the best available solution (and from what I've seen and read about ProATC, PF3 still is - at least for me). 

 

[Bobsk8 12,492]

27 minutes ago, RALF9636 said:

Absolutely. I use PF3 as well and being part of their Beta Team I know how arduous it is to keep improving it. There are so many features lacking from PF3 I would like to have in an ATC app, still for me PF3 is the best available solution (and from what I've seen and read about ProATC, PF3 still is - at least for me). 

 

Yeah I have used almost every ATC available, some of them for a long time, and PF3 is the most consistent in my opinion. Couple of hot keys assigned to buttons, no word not allowed headset to have to wear talking to the PC, and I am good to go. Every once in awhile over the years, I have had a question about PF3, post it on their forum and usually within hours the developer responds with an answer. Totally different experience than I had with Pro ATC X. 

[threexgreen 3,135]

21 hours ago, G550flyer said:

You are right, let me clear this up. You run it separately outside of MSFS. Once you enter MSFS, the UI stays in it's position at the top left. If you are clicking items within MSFS and the cockpit, the UI stays put and never goes out of view. When I use P2ATC, clicking within MSFS makes the ATC UI hide. In this case, I can can operate and the UI is right there for my clicking.

But is the PATCX interface a separate window from outside of the sim that is always on top or actually one of the MSFS windows you select from the toolbar? I'm asking to find out if it displays in VR.

[JasonPC 173]

13 minutes ago, threegreen said:

But is the PATCX interface a separate window from outside of the sim that is always on top or actually one of the MSFS windows you select from the toolbar? I'm asking to find out if it displays in VR.

It does not run inside of msfs it is an outside program that has a window always visible over msfs. I’m not crazy about that because with hdr it tends to occasionally cause some brightness fluctuations.

[Fiorentoni 4,080]

3 hours ago, Bobsk8 said:

With PF3 , the climb rate always changes, never the same. 

What do you mean by "climb rate"? Does ATC tell you to climb with e.g. 2000 FPM?

[threexgreen 3,135]

34 minutes ago, JasonPC said:

It does not run inside of msfs it is an outside program that has a window always visible over msfs. I’m not crazy about that because with hdr it tends to occasionally cause some brightness fluctuations.

That seems... to be a very weird solution. Apart from the fact it's not usable in VR, at least not in any convenient way, it has to be annoying to constantly have a window visible on top of MSFS at all times.

Edited August 13, 2022 by threegreen

[Virtual-Chris 682]

2 hours ago, Bobsk8 said:

Yeah I have used almost every ATC available, some of them for a long time, and PF3 is the most consistent in my opinion. Couple of hot keys assigned to buttons, no word not allowed headset to have to wear talking to the PC, and I am good to go. Every once in awhile over the years, I have had a question about PF3, post it on their forum and usually within hours the developer responds with an answer. Totally different experience than I had with Pro ATC X. 

How are the voices and phraseology in PF3? Will it assign a runway and approach on arrival? Does it interact with AI traffic at all?

[ha5mvo 237]

1 hour ago, threegreen said:

That seems... to be a very weird solution. Apart from the fact it's not usable in VR, at least not in any convenient way, it has to be annoying to constantly have a window visible on top of MSFS at all times.

That seems to be a shortcoming of MSFS. You cant just create a transparent window like you would in p3d. A possible workaround could be minimizing the window to a dot and vica versa. (I believe fs2crew does it like that.

You can of course ask the developer for something like that, or better still ask Asobo to allow hooks into the floating menu system. Good luck on both accounts.

[JasonPC 173]

2 hours ago, threegreen said:

That seems... to be a very weird solution. Apart from the fact it's not usable in VR, at least not in any convenient way, it has to be annoying to constantly have a window visible on top of MSFS at all times.

Only workaround seems to move it to another screen and/or use the speech recognition so that you don't have to interface with the menu. However the SR is less than stellar. I did manage to get it to work-somewhat. It's very hit and miss.

[threexgreen 3,135]

14 hours ago, ha5mvo said:

That seems to be a shortcoming of MSFS. You cant just create a transparent window like you would in p3d. A possible workaround could be minimizing the window to a dot and vica versa. (I believe fs2crew does it like that.

You can of course ask the developer for something like that, or better still ask Asobo to allow hooks into the floating menu system. Good luck on both accounts.

I'm wondering why the MSFS toolbar windows aren't/can't be used, which can be hidden as you like and also be easily displayed in VR. I have a couple of addons like Navigraph Charts and a PDF viewer that use these windows and I believe FSHud uses them too. If something as complex as the entire Navigraph Charts application can be displayed and interacted with perfectly fine in the MSFS windows and a hobby dev can use them to display PDFs with a custom navigation menu within the window, why wouldn't ProATC-SR be able to use the windows for the interface?

13 hours ago, JasonPC said:

Only workaround seems to move it to another screen and/or use the speech recognition so that you don't have to interface with the menu. However the SR is less than stellar. I did manage to get it to work-somewhat. It's very hit and miss.

Is it possible to interact with the ProATC-SR menu via hotkeys or do you have to click on the options in the window?

[Ray Proudfoot 8,919]

21 hours ago, psolk said:

PF3 and RC4 which are arguably two of the best available are a single person development shop and a very small group of individuals and turned out phenomenal ATC products. 

Yes, it's a massive task but some of the best offerings in the history of FS are developed by a single individual or a very small group of less than 4 people. 

I can’t speak for PF3 but the RC4 team comprised a code writer, 2 ATC experts, 1 mathematician, Pete Dowson and someone who helped with the voice recording software. Six plus the beta team and around 20 volunteers who recorded several thousand separate voice files for Pilots and/or Controllers.

I cannot think of any other element of flight sim development that is as complex except the simulator itself.

[psolk 3,037]

3 hours ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

I can’t speak for PF3 but the RC4 team comprised a code writer, 2 ATC experts, 1 mathematician, Pete Dowson and someone who helped with the voice recording software. Six plus the beta team and around 20 volunteers who recorded several thousand separate voice files for Pilots and/or Controllers.

I cannot think of any other element of flight sim development that is as complex except the simulator itself.

Yes, as you said, one code writer....  Same as PF3. 

Exactly what I said, single person development shop with a small group of key individuals. 

PF3 also has 120 different voice sets regionalized by geography but the core programs, both PF3 and RC4 had one "coder" as I said. If RC4 had 2 ATC experts +1 mathematician it had a core team of 4 people.  Voice recording and voice acting aren't specialized skills required for an ATC add-on, ATC controllers and a mathematician on the other hand are pretty core to an ATC add-on. 

The rest, voice actors, beta team are all tertiary, I was talking about "developing" the program which has always been a very small core team as you reinforced.  

 

Edited August 14, 2022 by psolk

[rob0203 686]

The only thing is that with PF3 you need to choose the SID and STAR before the filght which is a big immersion breaker for me!