How to make a popup gauge available in any aircraft?

[Guest zovirl]

I would like to make a popup gauge (I'm sure there is a better term) which is available in any aircraft. Examples would be FSFlightMax and FSBrowser. I've downloaded the panel SDK and compiled the samples. They have a flight map gauge which is a popup, but it is only available if you tweak the panel.cfg for every airplane. How do I make it available in all the airplanes?

[n4gix 4,947]

You can't. Every panel.cfg must be edited manually to enable your custom popup...

[Guest zovirl]

any idea how those other addons I mentioned do it then? How does FSBrowser make itself available in every plane?

[ddawson 35]

I think the examples you quote are FS modules. They are .dll's that are placed in the Modules folder and are loaded by FS when it loads. Gauges are very specific. While they are also, strictly speaking, .dll's, they are loaded through the FS panel routine and are thus only available when a panel containing them is loaded.Doug

[Guest zovirl]

Ah ok. So I guess my next question should be how do I make modules (as opposed to gauges)?There is no "modules" SDK, or did I just miss it?

[Rocky 128]

As far as I know (please correct me if I'm wrong), here is my point:As you said, there is no module SDK (unfortunately), and developing a module is much more complex than developing a gauge. In addition, the SDK provides all the necessary tools to access the FS variables, and it is not the same for the modules. Accessing FS variables from a module DLL is not that easy, except if you use FSUIPC.Eric

[Guest _ak]

Eric, it's possible without FSUIPC :)

[Guest zovirl]

>Eric, it's possible without FSUIPC :)But is it easy? :) I'm a software engineer, so perhaps you could just point me in the right direction?

[n4gix 4,947]

Download the FSUIPC SDK. All of the offsets are listed there, so it IS possible to access the sim without using FSUIPC itself.Search back in this forum about five months ago for a discussion and examples of how to fetch data from FS via the offsets.

[Guest _ak]

>>Eric, it's possible without FSUIPC :)>>But is it easy? :) I'm a software engineer, so perhaps you>could just point me in the right direction?Yes, it's easy.In Gauges.h you can see following structure:

/* This is the module's import table.	*/				GAUGESIMPORT	ImportTable =					{										{ 0x0000000F, (PPANELS)NULL },					{ 0x00000000, NULL }				};

When FS loads module (including gauge) and see{ 0x0000000F, (PPANELS)NULL } entry, it fills it with some addresses.You can insert such in your module and after this you will able use lookup_var and other FS routines.

[Rocky 128]

This is interesting, but it doesn't work for me. I am not an expert in Windows programming and DLL development, so I'm sure I missed something here...When I include "Gauges.h", it makes a conflict with my own code because of a redifinition of the "Linkage" variable. In my code, it is defined like this:extern DLLEXPORT MODULE_LINKAGE Linkage = { 0x00000000, module_init, module_deinit, 0, 0, 0x0900, NULL};and it is already defined in "Gauges.h" like this:typedef struct GAUGESLINKAGE{ FSLINKAGE PGAUGEHDR gauge_header_ptr[];} GAUGESLINKAGE, *PGAUGESLINKAGE, **PPGAUGESLINKAGE;EXTERN_C DECLSPEC_EXPORT GAUGESLINKAGE Linkage;How can I make it work?I am very interested in being able to use the "lookup_var" function in my module.Thanks for your help !!Eric

[ddawson 35]

Eric,This interested me quite a bit too. What I did...Pasted this block of code, from GAUGES.H, into my sourcecode.c file: /* This is the module's import table. */ GAUGESIMPORT ImportTable = { { 0x0000000F, (PPANELS)NULL }, { 0x00000000, NULL } }; /* This is the module's export table. */ GAUGESLINKAGE Linkage = { 0x000002d9, module_init, module_deinit, 0, 0, FS9LINK_VERSION, {0} };I then used GAUGES.H as the header file for the module.Seems to work OK! If you have other stuff in your header file, try just commenting out your definition of ImportTable and Linkage, rather than eliminating the file altogether.Doug

[Rocky 128]

I already tried this, but then FS9 pops up a windws on startup, saying a module can not be loaded and will be disabled. If I load it, FS9 simply crashes. This is why I think the Linkage definition I have in my code is important.Eric

[Guest _ak]

Then you did domething wrongActually there is no difference between gauge and module in FS.Both are dlls and have Linkage and ImportTable exports

[Rocky 128]

You're right, something was wrong. It now works fine...Thanks.Eric