09-Oct-2005 End of project. SB747 development halted due to a
chronical lack of time and enthusiasm. Alternative implementations are
available, PS1 is slowly fading away, and other projects are more
interesting. Time to wrap up and consider SB747 a very nice project, but
done and over.28-Mar-2005 Full implementation of ATIS and Autotuning for the IVAO network. I could now take the sim out for a ride in IVAO skies using protocol B. However we will need a few harsh tests to see whether the many features that SB747 has sported for years (actually before any other pilot client contained them!) actually work properly. So a nice beta program is being setup. For VATSIM, SB747 currenly is abandonware, but I'll maintain the code as it is (i.e. I won't make it break on VATSIM; VATSIM will make it break).
13-Mar-2005 Succesful splitup of the network code into a VATSIM and a IVAO part (and potentially more networks). The VATSIM part still is unchanged, but the IVAO part now has the protocol B authentication module aboard. SB747 will be a full-fledged IVAO client in a few weeks at most, while the first 2.0 beta can be expected in days. VATSIM-specific changes still wait for the NDA trouble to be solved.
25-Feb-2005 First peek at the old network connector code revealed that it wasn't nearly as ugly as I feared, after five years of maintenance. I had to only replace one (1) synchronous call with the FIFO method to bring it fully back to original design specs.
20-Feb-2005 Some bugs fixed, and ATIS requests added. Feature freeze while I hack in the new IVAO (and maybe VATSIM) protocol requests. This may take a long time, as I don't know what ugliness I will encounter while trying to support both networks as they diverge.
23-Jan-2005 New hosts.txt file with all current VATSIM and IVAO server hosts. Static Air Temperature at FL370 now limited to always fall between minus 70 and minus 30 degrees C. Traffic is now passed on to the Broker when within 80 nm, no matter at what altitude.
22-May-2004 V1.99j. Fixed a bug in the ACARS reply-to-message handler (thanks, Pierre!). Changed the URL of the ACARS Communication Station to my new web server. Added a line wrapper to the ACARS message print routine.
07-Feb-2004 V1.99i. The transponder mode is now also available via the latest GoFlight Bridge.
01-Feb-2004 V1.99h. Added mode switch to the transponder. .xpdr standby switches the transponder off. .xpdr auto makes the transponder follow the air/ground mode switch of the B747-400 and should be the default for all operations. .xpdr on switches the transponder on permanently and should be selected only on ATC request. The transponder mode is remembered in between SB747 sessions. You can still select the code with the normal PS1 selector or with .squawk, and 0000 still equals standby.
25-Jan-2004 Fixed bug in ATC scanner that would cause a hard lockup when no active ATC facilities were in range. Removed the ETA from the flight plan remarks (too many pilots fly on non-UTC time in PS1).
12-Jan-2004 V1.99g with the new ATC filter, plus a neat, distance-dependent polling delay per ATC facility to reduce the ATIS download burst just after logon.
11-Jan-2004 On request by the Belgian IVAO group, added a better filter for valid versus invalid controlling position names (*_DEL, *_GND versus *_OBS, *_INS) and also applied this filter to the ATIS lookups.
30-Nov-2003 V1.99f: more ETA time fixes.
19-Nov-2003 V1.99e: fixed a few remaining issues around ETAs which started with a zero. Replaced the small-font boxes on the ACARS INFLIGHT page in case of an unknown destination by invisible spaces.
17-Nov-2003 V1.99d: fixed problems with empty Broker keys and bug with the implementation of the ACARS POSITION REPORT page. Pressing a LSK that does not lead to a message on the RECEIVED MESSAGES page does not crash SB747 any more. Arriving ACARS messages that are not printed now cause a message on all MCDUs in any mode. Fixed bug that when not using Print Direct would crash SB747. Moved <RECEIVED MESSAGES prompt on all REQUEST pages to the left of the page to stay consistent with other pages. Added "now printing" message to the SB747 log window, so that you get a clue why the program appears to hang. Hint: put your printer ON LINE.
14-Nov-2003 V1.99c: the destination ETA is now copied straight from the PS1 FMC (thanks, Ivan!). Several small user interface snags, both in the GUI and in the ACARS system, have been weeded out. You need to install one extra key in the VMREAD.CFG file, but can take out two.
13-Nov-2003 V1.99b: loads of new goodies, most of which were inspired by Matthew Sheils simulator setup. However they are compatible with everybody else's! Release request, reliable printing, direct print option, extensive POS REPORT page (requires 747IPC and new variables added to VMREAD.CFG, see other announcement), autoprinting of OOOI report at the gate, SELCAL capability following VATPAC rules, listens to V744 offsets, can inject weather at the ground without winds aloft, fixed "dot bug" in traffic call signs, get ETA at destination out of PS1 FMC when able.
30-Oct-2003 V1.96: fixed stupid Windows printer problem, added Direct Print option (will print all incoming messages from your company or requested by you directly), added Release Request. Not uploaded yet.
26-Jul-2003 V1.95: Small modifications to follow the new Advanced Voice Client, which requires specific callsign assignments for security reasons.
09-Jun-2003 Correct Flight Level calculation in all known cases including the new transponder protocol, trapping of bad position data from other pilots, compatibility with upcoming Advanced Voice Client assured.
19-Apr-2003 Fixed small things in the ACARS position reporting. The correct flight level is now relayed to home base, not the true altitude. Full test flight confirmed all systems still operational.
28-Mar-2003
Broker timeouts have been increased, to reduce nuisance messages when
your Broker is not online yet. In all cases, SB747 will eventually
pick up your Broker, but it can take a few seconds.
If ATC stations transmit on more than one frequency (which is possible
with ASRC), SB747 will correctly pick them up.
If you have the external MCDU connected, the internal PS1 CDU does not in
any way show incoming messages any more.
PS1-style winds aloft interpolation (which makes a distinction between
Northern and Southern hemispheres) has been replaced by a smallest-arc
interpolation. Winds aloft should now be reasonable. I would like to
get reports of SB747's native online winds versus SimWX. Note that at
the moment, networks such as VATSIM and IVAO do not provide real-world
winds aloft at all, but they should not be totally crazy either.
22-Feb-2003 Fixed bug in line wrap routine that screwed up ACARS message formatting in general. Added printing of received ACARS messages to any Windows printer (in plain ASCII). Fixed bug in the flight level report command calculation. New hosts.txt file.
08-Feb-2003 Finally the manual has been completely updated.
07-Feb-2003 Release 1.91 with a revamped route request, plus load sheet request, plus arrival info request.
02-Feb-2003 Release 1.90 with loads of new ACARS features and some usability improvements as always. Now includes live route downloads over ACARS and all the infrastructure to support extensive VA operations.
26-Dec-2002 Release 1.86 with the 22-Dec fix plus some other minor things.
22-Dec-2002 The RogerWilco ATIS Autotuner now will only listen to the first match of the ATIS, so that it should become less sensitive to spurious matches of the RW host/channel pattern, e.g., to METARs.
08-Dec-2002 V1.85. Small bug fix: when a METAR reported e.g. FEW020, the clouds were sent to PS1 at 2000 ft MSL, not at 2000 ft above airfield elevation.
10-Nov-2002 V1.84. When more than one ATC facility is present on the same frequency, SB747 now selects the nearest one. Helps for example in Australia, with Sydney and Melbourne sharing 121.50. Might also do something useful with shared NATO tower frequencies in Europe.
21-Sep-2002 V1.83. SquawkBox now listens for commands on the sb.cmd Broker key. The GoFlight Bridge uses two commands to reset the transponder and radio frequency from hardware. Also there now is an "off" option in the Broker Host field. When "off", SB747 does not try to connect to the Broker. Useful for testing.
18-Aug-2002 V1.82 fixes some bugs that did bother people. It
also adds a new MCDU mode, ATC, to control online ATC tuning. You can now
select from a list of ATC stations in range if you wish (which is considered
cheating!), and have good, direct access to the internal RogerWilco tuning
facilities for when ATC f*cks up again. This should not be required after
the new ASRC/SB3 protocol gets introduced.
Also this release contains more ACARS functions, mostly around flight
planning and flight progress tracking. You can now leave the MCDU alone in
ACARS mode and it will transition through pages itself as required.
11-Aug-2002 V1.81 fixes a minor bug that probably won't bother anybody.
11-Aug-2002 V1.80 introduces a connection to the new programmable MCDU. If you want to use the ACARS functionality, you need to install this MCDU. As a bonus, you will get nice new position reporting facilities, look at the ACARS log!
22-Jun-2002 Release 1.71: TCAS distance and altitude filters installed. This is only of interest to external TCAS-like systems.
10-Jun-2002 Release 1.70 adds support for pressure altitude reporting to (radar) clients that are aware of this. ProController is not and never will be. Also the distance to other planes in range can be read now.
04-May-2002 Re-installed TclPro 1.4 (available for free) and produced a new executable, release 1.68.
03-May-2002 The ATC list bug has been fixed for real now. However I now suffer from the repercussions of a disk crash, and I am not totally back up to speed with the development environment yet. Give me a few more days.
30-Apr-2002 Fixed a bug in the ATC list. An error would pop up if no controller was in range. This is release 1.67. In the mean time I still have received reports that the bug is not fixed, so I'm looking into it again.
20-Apr-2002 New documentation! New pictures!
Removed several RW Autotuner commands from SB747 since they were getting
totally outdated after the ATIS Autotuner had been introduced.
16-Apr-2002 Added origin and destination to the shortlist of weather
stations to be polled below FL200. Reduced the shortlist from 100 to 20.
Added distance in nautical miles to the Controllers in Range list.
Added continuous display of incoming bytes per second when online.
06-Apr-2002 Added the required functionality to support remote RogerWilco tuning. Release 1.65.
03-Apr-2002 Cleaned up the SB747 exit code (should not really mean anything to anyone) and moved the code that updates the "To" field in the Direct Communication Dialog Box, so that incoming ATIS messages do not update this field. Chat sessions should now be smoother while the ATIS poller works in the background. I keep the messages scrolling through though, because they are a wonderful source of debugging info.
29-Mar-2002 Several people reported that PS1 once in a while went underground if looked at from a Microsoft simulator. This appeared to happen because PS1 (truthfully) reports the pressure altitude via the Mode Charlie transponder, while the normal way of doing this in the Microsoft world is by true altitude. The code got simplified and PS1 now always reports true altitude MSL, regardless of the actual local pressure. As soon as the protocol gets adapted (which is already being proposed), the pressure altitude reporting will be back.
06-Mar-2002 Various improvements and additions. Timing of ATIS listeners got extended to counteract ATIS spams, .rw p command got added to force a (re)poll of the ATC facility for RogerWilco address, the Controllers in Range list can be sorted on distance to facility, and all distance calculations got improved.
03-Mar-2002 Release 1.60 for general abuse. Please give me feedback about the behaviour of the new Autotuner. The documentation is not adapted yet.
02-Mar-2002 The RogerWilco Autotuner has been revamped. It now
actively pre-fetches RW addresses from the controller's ATIS, so you do not
need to wait for the ATIS to trickle in after a frequency switch. SB747
knows right away whether it has voice contact, or text only, and will say
so.
You can switch network disconnect notifications via ACARS off.
VHF messages in the log window are now underlined instead of bold.
Better internal handling of several ATIS-related functions.
ACARS MCDU has working Link Status page.
02-Dec-2001 If you want to plan for the online winds ahead, you now have the .probe function that warps probes to all the waypoints in your flight plan (but only if you imported it from a PS1 ROUTE file). The result is listed in the log window and copied to the etc\winds.txt file for further processing. Wind direction and speed is given at FL180 and FL370 only.
18-Nov-2001 Added the .scan on/off function to scan for all radio transmissions on all frequencies. This is only useful in case of debugging; don't use this while flying normally because it will be far too crowded online! Take care that the network server will only send any messages to you that come from a station that is in range. You will never hear New York while overhead London.
03-Nov-2001 Some bug fixes/robustness improvements that depended on timing issues, especially at SB747 startup or connection initiation. PosReqs now reply (automatically) to the requester, not to Flight Dispatch. ACARS uplink announcements now get through properly. Position reports now appear in the downlink log. Bug fix in the flight plan (route) importer.
20-Oct-2001 Small improvements in general, such as a realistic mode Charlie always-standard pressure altitude readout. ACARS now also features automatic position reports. I think I will now rewrite the manual, and not add a lot of features for a while. But I have said this before. In order for the position reports to work, you must import a PS1 .rou file as your flight plan, otherwise the SB747 waypoint sequencer does not have enough data. Also, position reports can be accessed from the ACARS INFLIGHT page. Reports are sent to the flight dispatch ground station on pilot request or on ground station request, but not automatically when you pass a waypoint.
24-Sep-2001 If an imported route file contains a SID, it is now correctly included. You can now update the ETA directly in the MCDU on the ACARS CURRENT FLIGHT page (equivalent to the .eta command). Silly lat/long values are now filtered out of the Pilots In Range list. Speed on that same list can now be four figures. Switch altitude for ICAO weather fetcher is now 20,000 ft (above this, all ICAOs are tested, below, only the previously nearest 100). TCAS traffic data is now more rigorously checked for sanity before passing it on to the Broker. This should prevent TWY/TF crashes.
09-Sep-2001 Release 1.51 fixes a few problems: ACARS time now always is PS1 time and the "Check your clock" callout is configurable; the OOOI report now goes to the same address as the Flight Dispatch telexes; the CDU CRT is a bit brighter; and "in" reporting is delayed two minutes to cover for stops during taxi-in.
08-Sep-2001 Release 1.50. Lots of changes: the METAR temperature at an airport is now correct at all elevations, totally new "extra" MCDU implemented (mainly for ACARS operations), quite full-fledged ACARS based loosely on the Qantas model, SB747 complains if PS1 time is too far off actual Zulu time, and less up-front network error handling. If you switch Network ACARS on in the Setup, you can exchange messages with your headquarters. This uses a Web site that is part of FlightLine, and not the VATSIM/IVAO networks at all. Not all ACARS functionality is implemented yet, just telex up/downlink and progress (OOOI) reports. The rest will follow as soon as proper ideas have been formed. In order to let ACARS know your ETA, you need to manually put in the ETA from the PROG page, using the .eta hhmm command. As soon as I can get at the PS1 ETA, I will use it, of course. Consider this mainly a user feedback release.
04-Aug-2001 Release 1.41 includes a better METAR search algorithm that is more robust and adds boldface messages in the log window to signal which messages have been sent to PS1.
29-Jul-2001 Release 1.40. New weather updater that automatically scans where you are and fetches the correct METAR. Added .sa Say Again command. Overhaul of the HOSTS.TXT file, now includes VATSIM servers and allows for inclusion of you pilot CID and password, handy if you fly on more than one network. Oh, and a new logo, thanks to Hardy!
08-May-2001 Release 1.35. More interface sugar, more robust Roger Wilco autotuning on ATIS, and a new PS1 flight plan import function in the Flight Plan dialog.
08-Apr-2001 Release 1.34, shows which of the controllers in range is the nearest. May be useful when you are in doubt who to contact first.
23-Mar-2001 New manual, now with screen shots. First effort to replace all occurrences of "SATCO" by "network".
18-Mar-2001 Release 1.33 with a small bug fix in the callsign display routine and some cosmetic changes. The SATCO.TXT file is now called HOSTS.TXT and contains more servers, including the IVAO network. The .fp command now accepts a parameter to send remarks to ATC, useful for e.g. ETA updates.
03-Mar-2001 Release 1.32. Traffic can now be cut off, leading to a significant decrease in CPU load when it is busy out there. I also made a change in the included libraries, which cuts the file size down a lot. And I updated the SATCO hosts file.
02-Jan-2001 Release 1.31 includes support for the AutoATIS servers that proliferate throughout the SATCO landscape these days. Just type .atis when tuned to the correct frequency.
24-Dec-2000 New RogerWilco autotuner mode: on ATIS. Small bug fixes and feature changes all over. Release 1.3 should stay unchanged for quite a while, as no new additions are foreseen in the near future.
05-Oct-2000 Bug fix release. All known bugs are now gone. Just wait for new species to be discovered.
30-Sep-2000 Release 1.25 should fix all bugs and on top add some features. You can now call up the ATIS of the currently tuned facility with just ".atis" (no callsign) and the incoming VHF messages are broken up in manageable pieces if they are too long.
26-Sep-2000 Still more bug fixes. This was really a sloppy release... the next one will be stable and working, I promise.
24-Sep-2000 Bug fixes and polish. Added the .ident command, added user name to the RW call sign, improved weather handling. SELCAL is postponed because I need to change the Broker for this, too.
23-Sep-2000 Release 1.20 makes the live weather updates available. No SELCAL yet, sorry...
07-Sep-2000 Added continuous weather updates. Still need to add some usability improvements like SELCAL and such. Should be finished in time for the Olympic fly-in to Sydney.
13-aug-2000 A new release of the graphical library I use finally makes the "Browse" buttons work like they should. It will be in the next release of SquawkBox747.
19-jun-2000 I forgot to package the AIRCRAFT.CFG file in the sb747111.zip file. It is included now, but you can also download the file separately and manually put it in the sb747\etc directory. If you don't, you have only the Boeing standard factory livery. Note: MSFS98/2k users need to install the Common Shape Library (784 Kb) in order to be able to see most planes on SATCO correctly.
18-jun-2000 Release 1.11 adds CSL-compliant livery selection. You can now look like a company 744 instead of like a standard Boeing 744. Some little usability things got changed, too, like double-clicking on a callsign in any of the "in range" boxes.
18-jun-2000 Release 1.10 introduces bug fixes for weather problems, a priority switch for performance tuning, and full TCAS exports to the Broker that can be used by the Scenery Injector for traffic generation. Also, PS1 now appears correctly on all displays of people running that other simulator.
07-may-2000 Finally the documentation is here, too.
01-may-2000 Included Dusan's priority hack so that even a very busy PS1 cannot steal CPU cycles from SquawkBox. This should especially help on busy SATCO evenings with lots of traffic buzzing around.
29-apr-2000 Release 1.06 brings you RogerWilco near-autotuning plus a more convenient replacement character for the underscore in callsigns.
23-apr-2000 IMPORTANT FIX RELEASE 1.05 fixes lots of dots in VHF receiver when your callsign is mentioned in the radio message.
23-apr-2000 Release 1.04. Fixed .freq command, improved callsign handling, added etc/bin checking to counter faulty installations, fixed ident bug, fixed SATCO error passthrough, fixed 65534 knots speed while pushing back, increased priority of incoming VHF messages including your callsign, flushed buffers after frequency change, improved fast SATCO startup sequence. Oh, and fully integrated Roger Wilco support.
21-apr-2000 Release 1.03. SATCO winds aloft are now set by the .wxr command. The implementation is rough but works. Of course, SATCO might send rubbish winds, which I cannot really help.
10-apr-2000 The Windows problem is solved and RogerWilco is now fully integrated. You still need to tune it separately, but you don't need to leave the flight deck any more. Some bug fixes for the rest. This is SB747 release 1.02. Still to do: fetching the SATNET winds aloft and injecting them into PS1, and properly work with the new Australian ATIS server.
04-apr-2000 More finetuning of the program, almost complete RogerWilco integration (tuning RW from the flight deck). Not downloadable yet, I need to fix a nagging Windows problem first.
29-mar-2000 PS1.2c support now officially stopped. Only PS1.3 is supported from now on. The old programs will stay available though, but I do not give any promise for how long.
26-mar-2000 More rugged network problem handler that should prevent SB747 locking out when the SATNET server goes berzerk, fixed incoming VHF text length overrun, fixed nonworking .r command after incoming chat message, flushed VHF buffer after frequency change.
22-mar-2000 Rollout! SquawkBox 747 version 1.0 is available for download! Now for the manual...
21-mar-2000 Lots of test flights later, SB747 is ready for release. Just one more flight and it will be packaged and put up for download here. If no more "real" work crops up, probably during the evening of Thursday, March 23. I then need to write the manual.
06-feb-2000 First release, version 0.90. No manual yet and you are on your own...