MarkHargrove

It's a toggle from the FSX/P3D keyboard controls. Gear Up/Gear Down are discrete SimConnect events. There are equivalent discrete Gear Up/Gear Down custom controls from PMDG, and, as you said, "Gear Off" is yet another custom PMDG control.

I recently added a three-position landing gear lever to my sim and have run into a puzzling issue with getting the correct DOWN/UP/OFF states to work. I'm using SPAD.neXt as my primary control and panel handler and a USB-button controller to sense the button states on the landing gear lever. It has two switches -- one is engaged in the gear-UP position, one is engaged in the gear-DOWN position and neither are engaged in the OFF. I've got SPAD.neXt configured to treat the switches as 'simple' buttons (i.e., no "long" or "short" presses, just "button pressed" or "button released"). The gear DOWN position is detected as a 'button pressed' event and sends a PMDG737:EVT_GEAR_LEVER simulation event with a PMDG "Special Value" of Singleclick:Left Mouse Button (I'm going by memory on which mouse button it is; I may have it reversed from "gear up"). This event works correctly -- when the physical gear lever is moved to the 'gear down' position, PMDG responds correctly and the gear lowers (and the on-screen gear lever moves to the DOWN position as well). The 'gear up' switch as two events attached: 'on press' sends a PMDG737:EVT_GEAR_LEVER simulation event with a PMDG special value of 'Singleclick:Right Mouse Button', and 'on release' sends a PMDG737:EVT_GEAR_LEVER_OFF event with a 'pmdg special value' of 'Singleclick:Left Mouse Button'. The 'on press' event does not work correctly -- the on-screen animation rapidly cycles between gear-up and gear-off as long as the physical lever in in the 'gear up' position. When moved to the 'gear off' position, the simulator state correctly moves to 'gear off' as does the on-screen animation of the gear lever. My first thought was that I was inadvertently sending a repeated 'gear-up' event, but I've verified over and over that I'm sending only a single emulation event for the 'gear up' on-press event. Does anybody have any thoughts about what might be going on? (Since I truly don't know if this is a SPAD.neXt issue or a PMDG SDK-related issue I'm cross posting this to the SPAD.neXt support forum as well). Thanks! -M.

ChasePlane appears to interfere with Synergy (mouse-and-keyboard sharing software from Symless), in the sense that when the mouse cursor is on a client system, the client ignores mouse clicks (probably, because the host system is not sending them). If I close ChasePlane, the normal mouse behavior on the clients immediately restored; if I restart ChasePlane, I immediately lose remote mouse clicks. This behavior is 100% reproducible. A lot of simmers with multi-PC sims are using Synergy to reduce the number of keyboards and mice around the simulator -- is ChasePlane deliberately doing something with mouse events that might be causing this, or is it an unknown side-effect of something? -M.

After cloning my system disk last night on my simulator (I ran out of disk space on the old drive), my GNS 530 won't work, displaying only the message 'Navigation Data License is Invalid" (or something close to that). I have a current subscription for quarterly updates of RealNav data. Did I mess something up by cloning my old drive to a new one? -Mark Hargrove

I'm trying, for the first time, to assign a joystick button to select a camera view. In the camera definition, I click on the "Joystick Button" field. It turns red. I click on the joystick button I want, but OpusFSI doesn't see the button press. In fact, it doesn't see ANY button presses from any of my USB HID devices that have buttons (all Saitek gear). The button presses are visible to P3D itself if I map one, and they're visible to FSUIPC -- but OpusFSI (4.66.2) doesn't see them. What could be going on? -M.

You are 100% right. I don't know how or why, but my C: drive had lost its share. When I restored it, things started working again. There were a couple of recent Windows updates around the same time I updated both P3D and OpusFSI -- one of those updates obviously "helped" me to "fix" the security of my system (although it is a little weird that you need the entire C: drive shared as read/write for 'Everyone'). I do, btw, have OpusFSI installed in the standard place (C:\OpusFSI). -M.

After updating to P3D 3.3.5 and OpusFSI 4.66.2 this same problem has returned, only now, none of my clients will show the weather on the server (whether live or from a theme). Live View functions continue to work normally, but weather will not update. I have verified that sharing is working in both directions. In particular, I can manually access the \\flightsim1\OpusFSI\Weather\OpusWeather.WTB file (where 'flightsim1' is my server system) from each of my three clients. I can manually copy that file to each individual client (though I don't know exactly where the FSIClient.exe process wants to put it so I cannot absolutely verify that permissions to that destination are correct. In your message from a few months ago (shown above) you say that the client copies the WTB file from the server and writes it into your specified sim folder. I don't know for sure what you mean by the "specified sim" folder. The only two folders that make sense from any configuration I've done are C:\OpusFSI\Weather or into the P3D root installation folder (which the FSIClient has been told about -- it my case it's "C:\Prepar3D v3.3"). In any event, the OpusWeather.WTB file is not being copied ANYWHERE onto any of the client systems -- I've done a system-wide search and it's simply not there. The output from the 'spy' functions on the client: From the client spy window: GEN General process monitoring has been enabled ... SIM Operating in Prepar3D Version 3 Mode SIM Link 1 established with Simulator SIM Link 2 established with Simulator SIM Link 3 established with Simulator SIM Event: Air Folder = WidevieW_Dummy SIM Event: Sim Active APP Application Link 1 Established Connection with Server. APP Application Link 2 Established Connection with Server. FSU Link established with FSUIPC And from the client 'general' spy function after clicking 'Weather/Update' on the server: RX Length 20 Bytes LWE CONTROL DATA UPDATE 05 31 30 30 30 30 04 4B 4C 41 58 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 .10000.KLA X......... RX Length 1 Bytes LWA MONITOR STATUS 02 . RX Length 7 Bytes CLOCK UPDATE E0 07 B3 00 0F 14 12 à...... RX Length 0 Bytes WEATHER UPDATE RX Length 0 Bytes LWA DATA UPDATE RX Length 1 Bytes LWA MONITOR STATUS 00 . RX Length 1 Bytes LWA MONITOR STATUS 00 . ... and so on with the LWA monitor status I don't know what to look at next, and I would appreciate another steer. Thanks, -M.

Yes I have FSUIPC running. I have no key-press events being handled by FSUIPC -- only buttons and axes. FSUIPC is actually issuing keystrokes in response to button pushes -- but those keystrokes are never seen by PMDG. I have a bit of further information -- some keystrokes are getting through to PMDG and are working -- default FSX/P3D assignments such as the F1, F2, F3, F4 keys for controlling the throttle are working. Later today I'll try disabling FSUIPC and trying again. -M.

Using Prepar3D v3.3.5 Professional Plus, I cannot get PMDG keyboard shortcuts to work. Specifically, I'm trying to get the Engine 1/2 'Idle' and 'Cutoff' commands to work so I can map them to buttons on my Saitek throttle quads using FSUIPC. I've got the mapping done -- that's pretty trivial -- but neither button worked. I then tried the direct keyboard shortcuts (CTL-SHIFT-F1, F2, F3, F4). They don't work either. I made sure that any conflicting keyboard commands in the P3D 'Standard.xml' config file have been deleted (they have been). Digging in a little more, it appears that NONE of the PMDG-specific assignments are working, and I cannot program new sequences via the FMC. When I press a LSK to select any particular command I see a new screen that says "Press key sequence" (or something like that), but as soon as I press ANY key (including the CTL or SHIFT keys that are supposed to be key MODIFIERS) the display immediately switches to 'New combination' -- and that's it. The only active option at that point is LSK6 - Return and the keyboard shortcut is unaffected. Similarly, I cannot assign a new key-combo to an 'unassigned' command. I'm a bit of a loss here - what else can I check? -M.

After a bit of a hiatus with my sim, I've recently rebuilt it on Windows 10 with P3D v3.1. I re-purchased the Mindstar GNS 430/530 package today (because I lost the email with the original invoice number in, sometimes I'm an idiot). Installation seemed to proceed normally (from the GNS_Setup_1.08.0014.exe installer), and I installed the 530 into my Carenado Cessna Skymaster that I'd had it installed and working in many moons ago -- that was back around P3D v2 (or maybe 2.5). When I start P3D v3.1 (as administrator, per the docs) I see a dialogue box that says: Mindstar Gauge 'MPI GAUGE': Failed to load SimConnect Interface DLL: C:\Mindstar\iSimConnect_P3Dv22.dll Error Code 126 I added SIMCONNECT=NONE to the [GNS] section of the GNS.ini file (in C:\Mindstar, which is where I installed the package), but that didn't seem to do anything. The GNS 530 *does* appear in my Skymaster and seems to work (though I've not given it a thorough checkout yet). Any suggestions? -M.

It was, after all, just a sharing problem. I'd shared both C:\OpusFSI and C:\Prepar3D v3 on both systems as read/write by 'Everyone', but that apparently doesn't do the trick. When I shared the entire C: drive on both system as r/w by 'everyone' the weather started working again. I'm a little surprised that just sharing the OpusFSI folder isn't enough, since that's where the WTB files lives, but these PCs are all dedicated to my sim environment and I'm perfectly happy to just share the whole C: drive. Again, thanks for the steer -- all is good now. -M.

I believe I have sharing permissions set up correctly (I suspected that from the beginning), but since this is a reinstall I'll go back and double check everything. Thanks for giving me a direction Stephen!

After a reinstall of P3D and OpusFSI onto new server and client hardware (2 separate PCs), I'm not getting weather on my client. Live view works fine, and I see weather updates appear in the 'spy' window on the client (when I force a weather refresh on the server, for example) -- but I'm not getting the weather on the server replicated on the client. I've been through the 'getting started' guide pretty thoroughly (well, so I believe), but I just cannot see what is wrong. Running P3D v3.1 and OpusFSI 4.65.3. Can anybody give me a steer? -M.

Don't know if this is related to Dean's issue or not, but I had to re-install AIRAC Cycle 1410 twice to get the GNS 530 in my panel to "see" it. I was on the previous cycle (140something), then used the RealNav Data Update tool to install 1410. When I restarted P3D, I'd reverted to cycle 0801. Running the update again and selecting 'reinstall cycle 1410' did the trick -- next time I restarted P3D it showed the current cycle in the GNS 530. -M.

This is almost certainly not an OpusFSX issue, but I'm asking here because folks here are knowledgeable about (and care about) weather effects. When flying an autopilot-coupled ILS Rwy 19R approach into KSNA (John Wayne Airport, in Southern California, which is sort of my "home" airport when I fly on the PilotEdge network), I hit a pocket of heavy turbulence at almost exactly the same place every single time I fly the approach, irrespective of what weather is current. The characteristics of the turbulence are identical every time -- a severe updraft of about 2000 FPM at 3-4 DME from the airport, followed by a severe downdraft of about the same magnitude at about 1-1.5 DME. It's sometimes bad enough to cause the autopilot to decouple. Even when it stays coupled, the GS deviation is almost two full "dots" on the CDI. What's really strange to me is that is happens in both FSX and P3Dv2 at the same place. Doesn't matter what aircraft I'm flying, doesn't matter whether OpusFSX weather is enabled or not, and doesn't matter which simulator I'm flying. Does anybody have even the slightest thought about what might be going on? I'd also love to hear if anybody else sees the same issue -- just fly the ILS Rwy 19R approach from, say, SNAKE intersection, capture the GS at LEMON, and see what happens. -M.