News:

Precision Simulator update 10.173 (24 February 2024) is now available.
Navburo update 13 (23 November 2022) is now available.
NG FMC and More is released.

Main Menu

BACARS WX/AIS Problem

Started by torrence, Tue, 22 May 2018 23:46

torrence

Gary,

Strange problem cropped up the other day.  I was setting up a flight with PSX_NET_DISPATCH.  Setting up flight initial info in BACARS_4_0_5 was OK.  Then went to request some wxr info from WX/AIS page.  This worked ok but then I quickly sent a second airport request before the first printout came out.  First printout printed OK but then the printer seem to hang up.  The FMC 5R label remains locked at "sent" in lower case, no SEND> ever shows up and will not allow further requests.  Since then I've tried multiple other situ files, run BACARS and the WX/AIS is still locked in the "sent" mode.  All the other BACARS functions work and if I go back to basic native PSX ACARS in the central FMC the ATIS info comes out as printable message as it should.  I'll go back and RTFM but I don't see how I could have broken/jammed a virtual piece of machinery (and I tested all this stuff before  cocktail hour!!)

Perplexed,
Torrence
Cheers
Torrence

Sebastian

Gary, Torrence,

same thing here. I've actually had it for quite a while now, but I haven't been able to trace back what I have to cause this issue. I have even uninstalled/installed - no success.

Regards,
Sebastian

James H

Hey,

I also had this issue. The only way I solved it was by uninstalling BACARS, deleting the BACARS installation folder (as the uninstall process didn't seem to remove everything), then reinstalling BACARS. It worked fine after that. I'm now careful not to be too trigger happy with the SEND key.

James.

torrence

Thanks for the help, guys.  I was going to try re-install also but wanted to check first.  The problem cropped up right after install of latest 4_0_5 version and was wondering whether there was a glitch in that.  Will see if simple re-install works.  Sounds like it might be a delicate timing issue in the program send-receive-handshake-print loop somewhere.

Cheers,
Torrence
Cheers
Torrence

Gary Oliver

Ah!

Well spotted, if you send another request before one comes back it gets stuck....

You could delete the two xml files in the bacars folder as a workaround for now, but I'll try and fix it when I get a spare moment for some coding fun!

Hopefully in the next week or so.

Sorry about that.

Cheers
Gary

torrence

Thanks Gary

I think I'll live with it right now or maybe try the full reinstall suggested.  Cut and pasting in someone else's code that I don't understand always feels too close to doing brain surgery on myself  :).

Semi-serious suggestion, though - maybe you should consider making this failure a feature which could be cleared if you get too trigger happy with the SEND button.  After all the real thing must be prone to some types of failures - jams, running out of paper etc.  I don't think PSX currently has any printer-related failures modeled - I believe the relevant power CB is noted as being 'not on the flight deck'.  I went looking just to see if I had inadvertently tripped something and couldn't find anything.

EDIT - By the way what does the Alert/Reset button do in real life?  I don't think I've ever seen it referred to.

Cheers,
Torrence
Cheers
Torrence

torrence

Workaround Question

OK - I see 2 xml files in the Resources subfolder that were generated yesterday when I was running my tests.  Seem to have a bunch of status states set.  Are you suggesting that if I delete these, the next time I run BACARS it will generate a new set without the hang up - as long as I don't go jumping the gun on the SEND again?  Maybe that type of brain surgery I could do. 

Suggestion re a failure mode or 'clear' capability still stands.

Thanks
Torrence
Cheers
Torrence

Gary Oliver

Torrence,

Yep, these XML's basically store the BACARS states between reloads.

Deleting them should cause them to be recreated on startup the next time.

Cheers
Gary

torrence

Great - Deleting the xml files worked as advertised.  Out of curiosity, what does the real printer do if a second SEND request is made before the first printout is done?  I assume it has a small in/out message buffer that keeps messages from stepping on each other or something similar.  Or does the logic just refuse the SEND button action until the incoming msg is finished printing?

Again, thanks for response on this.

Cheers,
Torrence
Cheers
Torrence

Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers

I don't know for sure but the printer talks the same kind of protocol as the FMC to the CMU and the CMU to the SATCOM etc. so I make an educated guess.

This protocol is based on file transfer. Can you accept a new file? Yes? Ok, here it is. Got it? Thank you.

There is basically one failure mode and that is No, I cannot accept a new file, sorry.

If the printer would buffer files until it can print them, it would assume responsibility to do so, possibly including battery backup and other methods to assure that it won't accidentally lose important files for the flight deck. It is much simpler for it to just refuse a file until it is sure it can handle them.

My SATCOM logs contain CMU status messages and I often see out of paper, paper jam, etc. coming over the bus so I am pretty sure the printer just says nyet when it isn't capable.

This means that the unit responsible for receiving messages (the CMU) would simply not show the printer option unless the printer signals it is okay. This same unit keeps a log of received messages, so it is able to offer re-print at a later date.

Hoppie

Hardy Heinlin

There's a CDU scratchpad message "PRINTER BUSY". This is used in the ACARS of PSX, when the PRINT key is pushed while the printer is busy.

But this is not the same function as the downlink request by the SEND key. The send function is not the same as the print function, obviously.


|-|ardy