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Advice about postmi afterburner gauge


il88pp

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I made a gauge. (A while back, but gettin back to it, and get to posting state, would take a long time.)

 

it turns on lighteffects at high thrust. Creates the afterburner effect at specific conditions.

 

As in, turns on light.5 and light.6 at that time.

 

Works fine.

 

Problem is with posting.

This gauge turns on specific effect numbers. (for example 5 and 6.).

Not every plane has same number of effects.

Saying "add the followng effect 5 and 6" won't work in every plane.

 

For some it would work. If there is already 5 and 6 (for example beacon and nav light) you can increase the number for those lights without consequence.

 

But in some fighters, 5 and 6 may be causing a wing vortex effect, because of a gauge.

Moving those effects is out of the question, as then the original gauge would not work.

Wing vortex would not show after installing my gauge. Instead the original panel wing-tip-vortex-gauge would turn on the afterburner effects in those planes.

 

How can I best get around this? Ideas welcome!

 

I'm thinking i could post it with instructions on how to edit the gauge to the users needs. Themselves.

 

As in: check the aircraft.cfg file lights section. Find the last number. Add these as next number. Then edit gauge thusly and install.

 

But seems like recipy for disaster. And for loads of "please make it do 8 and 9 for me, i'm inept" requests.

 

Other option would be to make 20 versions. From 1-2 to 19-20.

 

Other ideas? What would you do? Feel a bit stuck. Unfortunate, as I'm pleased with gauge itself.

 

il88pp.

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Sorry, I must have been half asleep when I posted.

 

I meant smokes!

 

My gauge switches on "smoke.01 and smoke.02"

My gauge could easily be installed in the default 737. The 737 does not have any smokes installed just yet.

 

But you could not install it in, lets say some addon fighter. That may already have a smoke.01 and smoke.02

 

I can't just tell the user to move those smokes to a different number. THe order of the original smokes matter. They could be wing vortexes or something, that get turned on by a gauge in the original aircraft.

 

I can't tell the user: :move those vortex effects to a different number. Because with a different number the original gauge won't turn them on.

And if I tell them to then install my afterburner effects as smoke.01 ad smoke.02 there will be an issue. Yes, my gauge will turn the afterburner effects on. But so will the original wingtip vortes gauge.

SO whe there should be a vortex showing, the afterburner will show instead.

 

 

I'm a bit stuck.

Telling users to move original smokes is not really an option.

 

I could choose very high nubers. "Install as smoke.30 and smoke.31"

But that also has issues. That number may be too high. Or may be too high for some of the planes.

I think the maximum number is limited. Just like it is with number of lights.

(And when you skip smoke.numbers, you get a different result then when you don't.)

 

Telling people how to manually edit the gauge so it turns on different numbers seems problematic too. You may get many versions doing the rounds. These could then conflict with each other if installed twice in one plane.

 

Besides. I think each separate gauge, should have it's own file name, internal name, and separate folder/.cab name. To prevent conflicts. But telling there is no way to guarantee that new names will be used if you let people create their own versions.

Or you get two people, both creating a gauge that turns on smoke.05 and smoke.06 but with a different Gauge Name.

 

Last time I thought about posting this, I thought of most of this stuff also, and decided not to publish. Deciding: "this may do more harm then good."

 

I don't see a way to make this a "One shoe fits all" gauge.

But I would like to find a way.

 

(btw, I have made and use several of these "turns on a smoke effect gauges", that I use for various things. not only afterburner. That's what made me think of finding a good numbering scheme to begin with.)

 

Thanks for thinking along.

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The only thing I've seen similar to what you want to do is the FSX BA F/A-18C, or whatever version number.

They use an xml to trigger a [smoke] section effect for AB flames. No light switches or anything needed.

Having said that, the effects in the [smoke] section do need to be in the right order. Same problem you're facing, different effects section used.

 

HOWEVER, could you utilize an instruction in the Readme file that instructs the recipient to place the effect(s) you want to use at the beginning of the effects section utilized? Tell them to make it entry 0 and 1, for example, and renumber the rest of the existent entries to make up for it? That way, whatever plane it is, however many entries there are in the chosen section already, your gauge will always select the correct entries. Numbers 0 & 1.

You may need to get a bit more detailed about renumbering the already existing section entries, but it shouldn't be all that difficult. Just give a good example or two, and you're in good shape :)

 

Not super helpful, I fear...

Pat☺

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Had a thought...then there was the smell of something burning, and sparks, and then a big fire, and then the lights went out! I guess I better not do that again!

Sgt, USMC, 10 years proud service, Inactive reserve now :D

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Hi Pat

That seems like a good idea, however...

Some planes already have a gauge.

That gauge triggers a vortex effect at high G for example.

The vortex effect is, lets say, smoke.1

SO orig gauge--->turns on smoke.1 when vortex is needed.

 

Now if I tell user to install mine as smoke.0 and smoke.1 (flame effects in tail)

the orig smoke.0 and smoke.1 will become 2 and 3

causing:

my gauge turns on the flames in the tail at the right time,

but high G also produses the flames now, because of the original gauge.

 

(and the vortexes will no longer appear.)

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