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How to: Audio for Vatsim (AFV) with PSX+XP11 (with xView)

Started by Hammerstan, Sun, 29 Sep 2019 14:48

Hammerstan

For the benefit of others the below is a setup guide for Audio for Vatsim (AFV) for PSX+XP11 using xView.

This setup uses xSquawkBox and the AFV Standalone Client.

A known issue with xView is that ATC cannot read groundspeed when connecting to Vatsim (via XSquawkBox) or PilotEdge.

Steps:

1.  Refer to the AFV website (https://audio.vatsim.net)

2. Download and install the AFV Standalone Client available on the AFV website on the XSquawkBox client download page

3. Activate the AFV Standalone Client's PSX mode by changing the following lines in the \AudioForVATSIM\ClientConfig.xml file (replacing <SimulatorIpAddress> with the IP address of the PSX Server and <SimulatorPort> with the PSX server port):

<Simulator>psx</Simulator>
  <SimulatorIpAddress>192.168.0.1</SimulatorIpAddress>
  <SimulatorPort>10747</SimulatorPort>
  <DisableAudioEffects>false</DisableAudioEffects>
  <psxACP>0</psxACP>
  <psxComRadio>1</psxComRadio>

4. Set up the AFV Standalone Client for first time Vatsim use (enter vatsim credentials, set up audio, etc)

5. In XP11 connect to the Vatsim network using xSquawkBox as usual

6. Run and "Connect" the AFV Standalone Client

7. Use PSX's PTT key for transmissions (the PTT key is no longer XSquawkbox dependent)


To install the above I had to use a clean install of XP11, reinstalling xView & PSX Plane.

Note the xPilot client also worked however in the version I tested, ATC could not read PSX's altitude.

Many thanks to Gary Oliver who is both a major driver of AFV and also assisted me with the above setup.

My sim setup: https://www.twitch.tv/hammerstan/videos

John Golin

Great info Hammerstan!

Additional info for Prepar3d crowd...

Do the same but with vPilot and ExternalSim. :)

Important additional information - because this now uses the PTT in PSX to trigger the voice client, to transmit you must have the correct radio selected for transmission on the ACP in PSX (e.g. MIC on VHFL).  To hear transmissions you must either have the MIC selected on the relevant radio ( per above, VHFL), OR if you are not transmitting and only listening, at least the radio selected for listening (for example if you switch MIC to another radio).

Here's hoping we see multiple frequencies and HF integration in the near future :)
John Golin.
www.simulatorsolutions.com.au

Jeroen Hoppenbrouwers


Gary Oliver

All,

Sorry we should probably have got round to posting something here about Audio For VATSIM, after all it started as a Cabin Intercom system for PSX.  One thing led to another so before we knew it Mark and I spent a year writing a whole new Audio system for VATSIM.

Before world flight we hope to have the ability to have all 3 VHF and 2 HF radios via different (or the same) soundcards...

For now HF is achieved using a VHF Alias which internally tunes HF and brings with it all the fun audio simulation, but will be tuned via the PSX HF Radio.

Its exciting to be writing the first PS1/PSX VATSIM clients for a VERY long time.  How many years Hoppie?  Not an NDA in sight :-)

PS: V1.6.23 just released to fix a few PSX bugs.

Oh and if you have not seen anything about AFV yet check out this video.

https://youtu.be/J3mzyKC24cg

and visit http://audio.vatsim.net


Cheers
G

John Golin


I had a SATCOM / Skype extension in beta in Adapt, but MS deprecated proper Skype integration API's and there really wasn't a good substitute.  On my list is to one day integrate with SIP for real telephony...

But Rod has me doing a lot of other things before I get to play with cool stuff again :)





John Golin.
www.simulatorsolutions.com.au

John Golin

John Golin.
www.simulatorsolutions.com.au

farrokh747


Markus Vitzethum

Hi Gary,

> Sorry we should probably have got round to posting something here about Audio For VATSIM

all of this sounds totally amazing. This will be good ... looking forward to how this sounds under World Flight conditions.  :)

> Its exciting to be writing the first PS1/PSX VATSIM clients for a VERY long time. ...

Now that is something ... impressive. Quick question ... will there be any model matching (like vPilot does) when you are injecting Vatsim traffic into P3D (or XP11)? Not sure how that will work with a native PSX client... (but I'm sure you're taking good care of it)

Just another question, since I hate typing the flight plan into vPilot ... can you extract the FMC route out of PSX with a single button pressed in the flight plan window of the client?  :) Departure, Destination, Route, Flight Level, ...

Markus

G-CIVA

Quote from: Markus Vitzethum on Fri,  4 Oct 2019 08:14I hate typing the flight plan into vPilot ... can you extract the FMC route out of PSX with a single button pressed in the flight plan window of the client?

A couple of ideas for you ....

I guess if you are using Simbrief it created some kind of document?

Copy the ATS Flight Plan from the document & paste it into  notepad file .... from here you can remove all the line breaks & then paste the relevant info into the vPilot flight plan file window as necessary.

If you flight plan with PFPX it will create the correct file for you at completion of the dispatch/release process if you tell it too which you can access/upload directly into vPilot.

Minimal typing needed. Notepad is your friend.
Steve Bell
aka The CC

Markus Vitzethum

Hi Steve,

PFPX and Simbrief ... I know about Ctrl C/Ctrl V and use it a lot.  :) But with so many programs (*) in the sim wanting flight plans (the same!), I'm trying to get lazy.  :D

My own xACARS software for PSX has a button "connect to PSX" to make the TCP/IP connection and when the connection is established, it reads the flt no., departure and destination ICAO and planned level directly from PSX (FMC route: to do)


(*) Programs with f/p
Vatsim client
Weather Program (Active Sky)
Navigraph
xAcars client
PFPX / Simbrief

Gary Oliver

Markus,

Unfortunately the first PSX client is a smaller step than we originally planned and only handles the audio subsystem, for the rest you still use vpilot, xPilot (the new x-plane client that came out of AFV work) or XSB, swift etc.

Just in regard to your software stack.

Using simfest dispatch should simplify things alot for you if you wanted to go that route (happy to make changes for this to be viable for you if needed).

My preflight is as follows :-

-Plan in Dispatch.simfest.co.uk
-Click the VATSIM prefile link on there (which sorts out VATSIM for us without copying into vPilot)
-Enter cockpit and enter flight number into ACARS and hit INIT DATA REQ
-Use the ipads with the PSX EFB on them to access FlightPlan, Loadsheet, charts already synced from the flight plan
-Route uplink will then be available, with all the weights and balance set in PSX as per the dispatch briefs.
-Weather comes from PSX.NET which doesn't need a flightplan*
-My airline BAVirtual has an endpoint which allows their acars to work with BACARS natively without a second client.

*however when Hardy releases his integrated Winds update I am ready to insert this when he provides us with a Q var to do so, having seen the format he was suggesting in previous forum posts this should be available very quickly following launch.   We can then remove this last bodge from the sim :-)

Cheers
Gary

Martin Baker

Hi Gary. Are you planning to release the PSX EFB to the community? Thanks, Martin

Markus Vitzethum

Hi Gary,

> Unfortunately the first PSX client is a smaller step than we originally planned and only
> handles the audio subsystem, for the rest you still use vpilot, xPilot (the new x-plane
> client that came out of AFV work) or XSB, swift etc.

checked ... sounds like a good approach to do things. Just tried to submit want I thought to be a good idea (disregard  ;) ), no worries...

>Plan in Dispatch.simfest.co.uk

Will do... just doing my next flight with it.
If you can just possibly add STV - Stevens - as selectable airline?  ;) I understand there will be a PSX setup in Berlin for World Flight, the Stevens guys will surely appreciate it. Cheers.

Markus


John Golin

@Gary;

We were setting up Matt with the integrated AFV last night, and discovered he has the same transponder issue as myself - the transponder mode (STBY / TA / RA etc) don't seem to make it to vPilot. 

I'm  assuming the transponder code doesn't make it to vPilot either based on what a controller was telling me.

Matt has the config spread across 2 PC's;

vPilot Host / Prepar3d -> vPilot Client / AFV

and is using ExternalSim....

I posted an observation on my setup re ExternalSim and the transponder;

http://aerowinx.com/board/index.php?topic=3629.msg58707#msg58707




John Golin.
www.simulatorsolutions.com.au

RogerH

Hi Gary, another keen soul waiting to see if you're going to release PSX EFB to the community - hoping if you do it'll run on an iPad 2 :-)

John Golin

Just an update - Gary advised that the Transponder information comes from Prepar3d to vPilot- only the comm radio states come from PSX and go to vPilot directly.

We are tracing this in Matt's (old) sim to see what is going on with the spaghetti of apps running :)
John Golin.
www.simulatorsolutions.com.au

ScudRunner

John, FWIW I am running vPilot, P3D and PSX on the one box - xponder and comms freqs all being passed through successfully from PSX -> ExternalSim -> P3D -> vPilot and out into VATSIM on that configuration.

Sean

J D ADAM

Hi Guys
Thank you for the new program. Audio for Voice.
Set up:-   PSX/P3D/External Sim Router/VPilot.

Have set up AFV but when I try to connect, I get the message "Couldn't find active Vatsim connection,please connect to Vatsim first".

I have host and remote VPilot connecting and working perfectly with sound.

After 4 hours of struggling any advice would be appreciated

Cheers
Derek

John Golin

@SR - Thanks we are using the AFV client so we can get the PTT out of PSX directly because...  reasons... :)

ie NOT using PTT in vPilot but via AFV... :)


@JD - If don't need to use the AFV client then just use vPilot... no change from what you used to do and no real advantage.

If you still need to use it, Make sure vPilot is connected to VATSIM.  Wait a few seconds, then connect AFV to the network.  vPilot MUST be connected first.

Note that if you have voice set up on vPilot, it will get kicked out when AFV connects to voice.  AFV may also disconnect voice again a few seconds later and require you to reconnect AFV. TO avoid this you need to disabe voice in vPilot

See how that goes...
John Golin.
www.simulatorsolutions.com.au

Hammerstan

As a post-script, in a PSX+XP11+XView setup with AFV standalone client (in PSX mode)+XsquawkBox, some client's still read ground speed as nil (incl Vatscope), but some clients are confirmed as reporting ground speed.

Reason for this remains unknown at this time.  I initially thought that may be because ground speed is being taken from XP11 which is nulled by XView (The reason for this is that xView merely slews the XP11 aircraft visuals by injecting x, y & z co-ordinates, therefore the XP11 linear velocity data refs local_vx, local_vy & local_vz are zero as are the dependent velocity datarefs).