Graphic Dashboard Gauges

Hi, I have been playing around developing a trial dashboard gauge layout tool. The goal is to enable simtools users to create their own (windows) custom dashboards without programming. The layout is simply? defined by a text file. Example attached. I was planning on running this on a separate laptop rather than the game pc but I guess if the game pc is fast enough and you have a spare monitor that would work too.

I have the layout and display working reasonably at the moment (example video below), but I don't know how to interface to simtools dashboard output. Is it possible to get some example interface code or is this part of simtools not officially released yet?



It is written in FreeBasic
You can use any installed windows fonts for the texts and values displayed
You use your own BMPs for the gauge backgrounds and the needles are drawn on top
You can specify colours of needles/fonts etc
You can specify the size of the gauge window and background color (or image)
Currently includes text, formatted values, bmp/needle gauges, LED (text) bars, graphic bars/columns
Code can be made available for anyone who wants to take it further

The proposed app is not release as yet mate, new app is a bout 60% complete, Yobuddy needs to add a few more functions to it to make it easier for people who can not code. This looks good, I have a test app and might have to look into driving this from the app, but might require some extra code which I can test with the original code that is no good for people who cant code in VB.NET.
So whats the app, or if you like keep this private and contact me maybe we can do a quick sort out with existing app so we may give Yobuddy some info on what internal scripts maybe needed in the new app to drive a graphical dash,
Overall a real nice find mate.

Hi eaorobbie, the app is one I have started writing myself in FreeBasic (easy to get and setup). I have attached the code and a compiled version for anyone interested... Not much use yet until I sort out the simtools interface, but you can play with the layouts.ini file to change the display.

Just doing out of interest really so happy to wait until things are officially released - unless there is benefit in using it for some sort of alpha/beta testing?

I was assuming I would be able to write a connector that somehow connects to the simtools dashboard output directly (or over the network) and it would all be self contained? I don't really have much experience in this area.

oops... forgot to attach files.

At the moment the app can only send stuff to comports and to a net port as in a particular ip address on a port. So there is potential for this app of your to become a Tool for SimTools, very cool indeed.

Great, network ip port sounds like it would be useful. Thanks for the info. I'll progress it further when simtools is ready and info is available.

OK, I'll do some research and see what I can setup.

Thanks

I had a quick look the functions are avail in freebasic, found a better link but forgot to bookmark it, dummy i am. http://www.freebasic.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3268

Came across that one too

The send and receive examples at the bottom of this page seem to work and appear pretty easy to understand - will give them a go.
http://www.freebasic.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=18747 I assume I will only need to receive.

correct only needs to recieve the data from sim tools port

ok, this has my attention as I have a 17" monitor next to my 32" tv for the sim. A display like this would look nifty for sure.

@bsft are you already using the beta Gamedash for your shift light? If so you can try out the graphics dashboard - its in the beta section or I can post to you. I haven't had time to work on it lately but it is functional and customisable, I may need to add some extra game parameters.

By the way are you planning on using a second computer to drive the dash? I think the graphics implementation is a bit resource and cpu hungry at the moment.

@RufusDufus , yes I am using gamedash for the shift light. I am going to upgrade the shiftlight to an actual led segment display soon as well.
Yes please, I would be happy to try your graphics dashboard on my 17" display. I will look in beta section, but if you have a link (i am hopeless sometimes) , that would be good.
No I wasnt planning, at this stage to run a 2nd pc for dash info. My sim PC has 6 cores, so hopefully I can spare a core or two. AMDx6 3.5 gig per core.
I may at some stage though use by beaten up dual core laptop.
Cheers.

Refer attached zip file...

Some things to note:
1. It's early days but quite functional in its current form
2. The UDP port number is currently hard coded at 20017 (need to set this in Gamedash)
3. If you run the gauge program without the dash output it will just sit there "locked up" until the dash output is started/received - just close the console window (the black dos window that is also created) if you need to shut it down
4. You can edit the Layout.ini file to change your display - not much error checking at moment but not to hard if follow existing examples
5. No install required - just unzip to a folder and run from there (of course you need to setup the dash output)
6. I have been running with a packet delay of 20ms in SimDash seems OK (the gauges refresh whenever a new data packet is received)
7. SimDash config is just <Dash1>,<Dash2>,<Dash3> at the moment
8. I think that was speed, rpm and gear in that order? (need to check that)
9. Haven't setup other parameters yet but shouldn't need much work
10. In theory if you run something like Airdisplay? you should be able to output on iPhone or iPad but haven't tried that yet.

Let me know if you run into problems.

(Edit: Oh I don't think I included the ozone TTF which is used for the gear display in the example layout - either download and install free from web or it will just be replaced by default system font I believe - Arial?). Or let me know and I'll dig it out from my system)

Thanks, I will have a go during the week if time allows

Nice! Great job!

@donovan a 3 word reply to a 2.5 year old out of date thread, looks like coin spam to me, or am I paranoid??

Hello RufusDufus, great project congrats, hey your last post was on Nov 30, 2013 for this software and I was wondering if you have a new version out already?

Let me know?