danbaz

Thanks a lot for your answers.

Yeah great feature to see all the available Sid's/Stars on the map. That already helps a great deal in selecting the right one.

Hello all,

This has probably been asked a zillion times, but somehow I can't find the answer: When we give LNM a departure airport and destination airport can we let it calculate a route that automatically starts where the most likely SID ends and ends where the most likely STAR starts given the conditions at that moment?

PS. Thanks for this great program!

Daniel

On 11/7/2023 at 6:43 PM, FS++ said:

dome light on   (sets it to bright)

dome light off (sets it off)

Sorry for late response. I have tested:

The dome light consists of two lights, one for captain and one for FO.

dome light on: says "lights on", does not flip switch, both lights do not go on.

Turned on the lights manually, then:

dome light off: says "lights off", does not flip switch, light for captain goes out. light for FO remains on.

Would be nice if FO could be trained to handle these.

Good afternoon.

Is there any news on those interior lights?

• Dome light
• Overhead integrated panel lights
• Flood lights 
• etc

It is quite unrealistic that he cannot set these lights.

Would be appreciated if he could manage those.

8 hours ago, FS++ said:

Will have to check whether the FlyBywire latest version has the Lvars used to adjust lighting.

That would be appreciated a lot. Thank you.

Hello Gerald,

Pls can you advise, from my table, for the ones where the voice command was not recognized an example of a working command for that action or let me know there is no command for that action?

For the ones where the command was accepted but there was no resulting action, pls can you help to get it working or pls let me know if that is not in scope for that action?

Pls note that I do not mind if something was not modeled. I assume there are many of those. I would like to get the ones working that should work.

Kind regards,

Daniel

Thanks for your response.

To create your own command you first need to know a command that does work. This is where my problem often is.

Your guidance on how to word asking for more light has helped, however as you can see in my table below nothing happened. 

I wish I would have a listing as the below for all switches with just a single example command that does work or a note it is not modelled. It would make my life with MCE a lot easier and fun. I do have this list with first three columns if you are willing to help.

Good evening,

I am back to FBW A32NX.
Trying to complile flows so that my first officer will follow the FBW provided SOP.

My question is about the interior lighting setup.
The SOP calls for him to set lighting but I wonder to what extend he can help here.

[I wanted to paste a snip of the section from the SOP here but don't know how to do that]

These are the things I have tested:

Right Instrument Panel but none of these are recognized by MCE. Does MCE suport this panel at all?
increase first officer n d brightness
decrease first officer n d brightness
increase first officer weather and terrain brightness
decrease first officer weather and terrain brightness
push the first officer p f d n d transfer button
increase first officer p f d brightness
decrease first officer p f d brightness
set first officer console and floor lighting to dim
set first officer console and floor lighting to bright
set first officer console and floor lighting to off

I have also tested the Dome light:

dome light dim    Saying he does but nothing happens
dome light bright    Command not accepted by MCE
dome light off    Turns off the light but does not move the switch

The A32NX was the plane that was loaded first when the sim was started and I have started MCE after the plane was fully loaded. All LVARS and HVARS were accounted for.

Hope you can help.

On 1/5/2022 at 10:07 PM, FS++ said:

There is a new patch

Replace/add files as per folder structure.

If only running MSFS, replace "mce.exe", "Simco64_Ldr.exe", files in <CandC> folder as well as "Available_Commands.dat" in ASobo A320Neo flows folder.

You can ignore the other files

EDIT: Forgot to mention, you can now disable the automatic call for the ramp on MCE startup in "mce.ini" by adding this

[RAMP]

AlwaysInitiateMsfsRampServices=0

Thanks Gerald,

Will look at this.

Thank you and will do.

Daniel

Hi Gerald and David,

Gerald,

Thanks for the updates. I hope you did not mind my question regarding the roadmap. I think MCE is a great program already, which is why I am spending time on it and am talking to you. Yes, I do also feel that there is room for improvement, besides supporting more planes, but of course it is fully up to you if that is what you want to do. By the way I would gladly renew my license at a certain price for MCE 2.0 if that would bring innovation to the table.

I will have less time now as the workling life begins again, but after the update, I will review and submit the remaining questions.

David,

MCE is very powerful indeed and I have flown the PMDG 737 too. Looking forward to have it in MSFS.

Regarding ATC, I have played a little with VOX ATC in past, but the fact that these progs do not also manage the AI planes is killing the immersion for me. I know MSFS is working on it (voice controlled I believe too) and hope it will be good (enough)..at some point. 

Such briefings are good as they happen in the real plane too. Good for the immersion!

Take care. Wish you both  all the best every day of the year.

Regards,

Daniel

Regarding this challenge/response request I will write up the exact wording I would like and will get back with specifics asks.

Regarding my other requests in the other thread, pls can you fix the broken links, e.g. yellow hydraulic pump etc.

Also in that thread were some requests regarding actions that FO should do stuff based on things he knows our can be told earlier. Would like to hear what is possible.

Lastly and unrelated to anything asked so far, I am very curious to hear what the roadmap is for MCE for 2022. Any development plans? 😊

Have a great day

Daniel

Thanks for your comments David,

20 hours ago, charlie130 said:

IF...ELSE..OR...AND...GOTO...? Seen this before?

I have as I have done a tiny bit of programming (VBA). Just enough to be dangerous probably!

My goal is to capture bits and pieces of the dialogue that would happen between a Cap and his FO, outside of the checklists. I used the altimeter, but perhaps better would have used the constraints setting as it is not directly part of a checklist.

20 hours ago, charlie130 said:

verbal response from PILOT CHECKING that the parameter is correct?

No, as that would be proper check list handling. I am trying to capture the cockpit preparation phase which in A320 they aparently do together for the most part (except overhead and MCDU). We can program a lot of dialogue with many little vox scripts, but that gets tedious and he cannot speak variables as he does not know them, hence the ask for some challenge/response functionality, but outside running the checklist. Inside vox script would be great. With the _ functionality I even would not have to remember an exact phrase

20 hours ago, charlie130 said:

I dont think everything can be read by MCE from MSFS.

Gerald would have to tell us. I believe a whole lot of the FBW can be read. They probably do break some stuff sometimes too.

What I am asking for is perhaps MCE 2.0 🙂

I agree, when everything is working, MCE is the best you can get now except from having somebody sitting next to you.

Regards,

Daniel

Hi David,

Always welcome to join in with your views and experience!

The biggest I have flown is a Metroliner - 20 years ago. Not in aviation anymore, but an enthusiast.

What I am trying to do is to get as close as possible to real world operations. Flows and Checklists are the cornerstone of what happens in the cockpit, but there is also dialogue with variables spoken back by the FO.

In my studying of the A320 flows I have seen that a big part of the cokcpit preparation scan the PF does is done when both pilots are seated, they then do the glareshield scan together and set it up, so later when doing the checklist they can confirm 'completed'. This is not silent, they talk to each other (I assume, so correct me if this is wrong). This part is not what MCE is designed for, but when able I would like to include a lot of it if possible. One way to be able to do this is to  be able to add some challenge response type of dialogue in a voxscript and the PF should be the one that speaks the challenges.

To program this you could add - above requested - options that can be set per checklist (like we have for voxscript) or add some functionality in voxscript itself. We have Notify/Pause/Sound commands, so a challenge/respond command should perhaps be doable too. (?)

Just thinking out loud here! Example for when they discuss the altimeter setting, the voxscript item could be:

[PF]=_ setting left -- _ setting right

[PF]= indicates challenge response type where PF speaks the challenge

_ setting left --> per regular checklist functionality

_ setting right --> per regular checklist functionality, but FO will speak "right"

This means the voxscript is halted until the PF has spoken "setting left"

The next item in the flow could be the voxkey item where FO presses B to set his altimeter (I know currently both alitimeters are linked, but asume at some point this will be fixed)

I hope the above makes a bit more clear what I am looking for. 🙂

Kind regards,

Daniel

one more... I know request the request for a non voice initiated flow has been made before, but please allow me to try again.

As you know the after start flow starts when the captain sets the mode selector to normal. We do not want the flow to start mid air, so perhaps when combined with the FMGC in preflight phase this could work?

Good evening,

FO has a silent before start flow. Part of the flow is to close his window. Part of his default action for this is to counter and tell me to close my window too. I tried several variants, all with the same result. Is there a similar command that will allow him to silently close his window without telling me what to do? Talks a lot, Enable nagging and Can hear minor insults have been deselected.

Part of his after start flow is to set flaps for takeoff. Can he read the correct setting from the MCDU? or can I tell him - as part of the briefing - what the flap setting will be, so that he knows what to set them to?

And as we are on it, he also needs to set the trim to the takeoff position. Same questions apply as for the flaps. He accepts "reset elevator trim", but he says he will set them to neutral and will not do anything. Either way, I need him to set them to the takeoff position.

Kind regards,

Daniel

Thank you Gerald,

Another thing that I have learned by crawling the forum is that with the "_ set" combined with the "//3" instruction, the FO will repeat the whole thing as if he was checking it himself. So if I say "three zero zero zero set", he will repeat "three zero zero zero set". Very cool!

Is there an option to run a checklist, but prevent that FO starts with saying e.g. "Glareshield checklist" and that he does not end the checklist with saying "Glareshield checklist completed"?

I triggered this checklist from a silent flow. Is there also an option that at the end of the checklist he continues where he was in that flow? I know that I could put a Pause=x statement in the flow, which would probably work, but better would be if he could go back to the flow at the end or if I could add a go to x flow statement (thus breaking the flow in multipe parts).

Basically what I am trying to do is to setup a whole procedure where flow items and unofficial checklist items follow one another in one big event. When watched on Youtube the viewer would not notice breaks between flow items and such checklist items, but see it as one big conversation where certain items are checked by both. I hope with this you know what I am trying to do.

Kind regards,

Daniel

Hi Gerald, All,

Regarding checklist options. As documents are not including all the advanced options and searching/finding on AVSIM is difficult, pls can you summarize these for me?

I have done my homework and found the //1 - //7 to determine who responds. <-- (documented in How to create custom checklist.rtf)

Also found the single underscore "_ set"  -> speak what you want --> "2992 set"

I think I have found that all text within () is omitted --> is that correct?

What about if you use double underscore or even tripple ( as found in TFDi_B717_Check.txt)?

We do not know what we do not know.. What other gold pieces you have to add to the list?

Looking forward to hear from you (all).

On 12/18/2021 at 12:19 AM, 737Andi said:

AUTO. He does not understand the word "Auto" from me.

I have had issue with this too in past. Try to say "oto" instead of "auwto" (like I am used to in Dutch).

Thank you Gerald,

1. Telling him is easier than doing the simbrief .pln export + MCE import (which seems to work partially).

2. OK

3. Opinions can vary, but I would opt to allow MCE to handle ground services, but only on request. This allows for flexibility. I could ask for the ramp through the Toolbar Pushback app, but could ask FO to call for the fuel truck. This way having best of both worlds.

PS. Have you been able to check FO ability to switch off/on the yellow electrical pump (and dome light) yet? FBW always starts up with this being below the green band, hence FO task to engage the pump for a few seconds to fix.

FBW will be adding chocks soon, so then he can also do the first flight of day alternate braking system check. Well I tried, but he will not touch the brakes, so guess that one is out of scope for now.

Good afternoon,

1. The FBW mod can take the flightplan directly from the MCDU, bypassing MSFS flightplanning, but still providing MSFS ATC services (IFR Clearance). Of course MCE does not know this and states so in the gui ATC tab.

How important is it for MCE to have the flightplan loaded?

From Simbrief I have downloaded the MSFS plan and have imported in MCE. Is this the recommended way now?

2. In the MCE gui, ATC tab, there is an option: Use <DEL> or <END>key for transn

I cannot deselect this option. Problem: I use the END key a lot as it is the default for switching from inside the cockpit to outside the airplane.

Why does it not accept to clear the check box?

3. While spawning at EHRD Gate 2C and loading MCE, the FO is asking ATC to send the ramp. How can I turn this off? The reason is that I am using another add-on to have the ramp in place and through that one it will stay in place until I ask for it to be removed.

Looking forward to hear from you.

Daniel

22 hours ago, danbaz said:

FO should check engine master 1 and 2 are both off. Which command to use for that? 'shutdown engine one' could work, but he ask me if I am feeling well and does not switch off the master switch. Looking for something like "check engine master switch one is off"

Pls forget about this one. Commands 'start master one off' and 'start master two off' do the job. Perhaps nice to add to Availlable_Commands.dat file.

Good day!

Holiday has finally arrived, so back to flightsimming.

Few questions re power up flow:

The Available_Commands.dat file: Pls can you sort it? I have done it for myself, but next time when I install a new version it will overwrite (probably)..

'weather radar gcs set to auto'  and 'weather radar gcs switch off' both have verbal confirmation, but do not actually do anything.

'weather radar to turbulence' is setting the mode selector to wx + t (FO response is "weather radar weather and air"). The FO also switches on the weather radar. Which command shall I use to only have him switch the mode selector to a certain option, but the leave the system on/off as it is?

ignition mode set to nomal: Pls can you add the r in normal in the Available_Commands.dat file?

FO should check engine master 1 and 2 are both off. Which command to use for that? 'shutdown engine one' could work, but he ask me if I am feeling well and does not switch off the master switch. Looking for something like "check engine master switch one is off"

I know the FO cannot do the lights yet. Does this include the Dome light switch or should that one work? When on bright/dim and I ask him to switch it off he says it is off already. When I ask him to switch to dim, he says he will, but he does not do anything. When I ask him to switch to bright, he does not know what I am asking.

The below has been added a bit later..

'hydraulic electrical pump yellow on' Command is accepted but the pump is not switched. He also does not switch it off when asked.

Kind regards,

Daniel

Thanks Bryan!

Thanks Bryan,

So if I do not use the pre flight events 30 minute scenario, but wish to take some more time and as the manual flow selector is for testing/emergency, then I think I have missed something somewhere on how to get the FO to start the Preliminary Cockpit Flow. What is the intended process for this? Sorry for ignorance.