Comments on: Manipulators and VR Part 1: From Mouse to Mechanism

By: James Rooney

James Rooney — Sun, 07 Jan 2018 04:19:24 +0000

Agreed.
It is a wonderful experience.

Unfortunately though, I’ve got a lot of aircraft that have 2d manipulators which are now unusable. Even a laser-pointer or something in the cockpit would bring them back… it doesn’t need to be a mouse per se.

I’d love to ditch the mouse. I’d rather it didn’t come back. I do want to use my planes though.

By: Ben Supnik

Ben Supnik — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 22:49:29 +0000

In reply to ILIAS TSELIOS.

The manipulators are in the OBJ docs and 11.10; support is in the GIThub code base but not in 3.4rc1; we’ll start a 3.5 beta for VR I think.

(Ted has done the 2-way switch knobs and new rotate manipulator – detents on a linear axes is in process.

By: ILIAS TSELIOS

ILIAS TSELIOS — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 22:33:03 +0000

Are those manipulators already available? Using blender with X2B 3.4.0.rc1 I cannot find the ATTR_manip_drag_rotate anywhere. Here is the list:

https://i.imgur.com/rdxeq5D.png

By: Ben Supnik

Ben Supnik — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 19:02:03 +0000

In reply to Niall.

Hi,

This isn’t surprising, but it’s way too soon to look at this kind of thing. At this point we have ZERO support for plugins in VR. We DO expect to have plugin support for VR, but we have to make VR work “at all” before we can add third party interfaces.

In the long term, they will need to adopt the 3.0 SDK and then set a few extra flags to work in VR – that is, they’ll need to “opt in” to VR. The extra work for VR should be pretty trivial if they can run on the 3.0 SDK.

By: Niall

Niall — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 17:13:08 +0000

Hey Ben,
The ivap plugin for x-plane is basically useless in VR… it displays in the very bottom left of the headset view about two inches from your face, and cannot be interacted with. On the desktop, the plugin is drawn incorrectly, the text overlay is not aligned with the graphical background. It’s also very annoying to switch to the desktop, or lift the hmd to interact with the plugin. I mentioned this at the IVAO forums but they said to contact Laminar. It’s unclear by looking at the plugin or sourceforge to know who is behind it.

By: chris gard

chris gard — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 14:24:15 +0000

In reply to Ben Supnik.

i thought the object of flight sims was to be as realistic as possible
I have never seen a real pilot using touch controllers to fly an aircraft i would love to see him or Her try to handle a chopper with tose things strapped to his hands
btw, are you implementing these things in to you”commercial “release , i dont think it would be accredited
ps i need the mouse so i can get past the first screen

By: Dazzy

Dazzy — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 10:16:36 +0000

In reply to Ben Supnik.

“We’re also looking at the mouse, for users who don’t have any touch controllers, and at using the HMD and pointing, for users who have no free hands.”

That certainly puts my mind at rest, thank you! 🙂

Dazzy.

By: Peter Allen

Peter Allen — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 07:59:26 +0000

Great news on the release of native VR for XP11. I have a PFC C2 Professional Flight Console. I therefore am able to control a lot of what I need to via the console with little other interaction in the cockpit other than the radios and GPS. I have been using Flyinside XP for sometime now (I was a day one Kickstarter contributor to the original FSX release). I know where every switch and knob is on the console by feel. I therefore will never need the touch controllers if I can manipulate the radios and GPS by mouse. So mouse manipulation would be very much welcomed so that I can start using the native VR .

Lastly just a great big thank you to all of you at Laminar – the work you do and the way in which you do it with such enthusiasm, passion and fun is truly appreciated. The sim is just stunning now.

cheers and a Happy New Year
Peter

By: Ben Supnik

Ben Supnik — Tue, 02 Jan 2018 23:23:10 +0000

In reply to Nico R..

Right. We’re looking at allowing the laser pointer on controls. The idea is that you can directly manipulate most controls, then use the laser for controls that are either really far away (the gear handle for a 737 captain is a bit of a nightmare for my virtual passengers 🙂 or blocked by hardware (e.g. the landing light switch in the C172 if you have a CH yoke).

We’re also looking at the mouse, for users who don’t have any touch controllers, and at using the HMD and pointing, for users who have no free hands.

I don’t know how this will all fit together yet, but it’s been one of our main areas of active development since preview 1.

By: Nico R.

Nico R. — Tue, 02 Jan 2018 22:51:33 +0000

In reply to racer theta.

Yes…but not if you still want to use your hardware like yoke or throttle quadrant. It will always be in the way as it’s almost impossible to place it like in a real plane.
A laser pointer for the touch controller would be a good idea then! So you can manipulate the knobs you reach (the overhead panel, for example) and the others with the laser pointer.