ARINC 429 AND AUTOPILOT MODULES

[rhunt]

Have not found topic discussed.  Will the ARINC 429 module have a 25 pin d sub connector that will mirror the current HS34?  Does anyone know what the footprint of the auto pilot and the ARINC 429 modules will be?

 

[dynonsupport]

The ARINC module will have the same D25 as the HS34, with the ARINC-429 pins in the same place. The other pins on the D25 will be different, and mostly unused. We are not supporting analog connections.

It is about the size of a ADAHRS module, but the exact dimensions aren't available yet. It is not a panel mount module, it hides in the airplane.

At this point, we don't have autopilot modules planned, since the SkyView already has knobs and buttons, but we are investigating the possibility of doing this.

 

[jbeaver]

I'd originally thought that I'd like to see an external autopilot module, but I have a product suggestion that should be a small software change that I think could basically eliminate the need for one.

For a single screen SkyView system with the moving map visible (which I expect to be virtually always for most users), there is only a single knob to control BARO, HDG, ALT, VSPD, and ASPD since the one closest to the map is always RNG. Controllers frequently will give a new altimeter setting while issuing instructions to climb/descend to a new altitude and turn to a new heading; all within a matter of seconds. Having to bring up the joystick menu, visually find the correct mode, scroll to and select it before a value can be entered requires extra time and focus that can make entering multiple values too time consuming to do as the controller is specifying them.

Here is my suggestion. Currently, the joystick can be pressed in any of the four cardinal directions to bring up the joystick menu, and the currently highlighted item is the same regardless of the direction the joystick is pressed. What if the highlighted item depended on the direction? For example, I could leave BARO as the default and a new altimeter setting from ATC would just require a turn of the knob. If I received a new altitude, I could just click the joystick right, then left/right to select and then a twist of the knob would adjust the altitude bug. Left could be HDG, up could be VSPD, and down could be ASPD (for instance). Additional items could still be scrolled to as necessary once the joystick menu was up.

This would require a little bit of use before the meaning of the four directions would become automatic, but the big advantage is that this would become muscle memory after that and you could enter a certain mode in a fraction of a second without actually even having to look at the joystick menu.

btw, the directions I suggested weren't completely arbitrary. I specifically chose Left/Right to be HDG and ALT since those are the two most common bugs to adjust. This means two quick lefts would get you to HDG and two quick rights would get you to ALT.

Thoughts?

Jason Beaver

 

[dynonsupport]

Thanks for the feedback. The balance between "power user" features like this and making something that's discoverable and easily learned is tough, and we (like anyone inventing UI) struggle with UI design all the time. As always, we read everything here, but can't really promise any feature development. One thing that you should know is that you can skip one of the steps when changing the bug functions, that is, the left/right nudge to close the menu. So instead, just up/down until what you want is selected, then just start spinning. The menu will time out after a few seconds of inactivity.

 

[jbeaver]

Yeah, I noticed that I could skip a step after reading the manual more closely (I've received my 10" unit, but it isn't wired up yet so I have to just imagine what it will be like to use it).

I realize this is a power user feature, but it lets you skip a step that requires additional focus. You still have to look at the joystick menu, scan it to locate the item you're interested in and then nudge up/down to highlight it. Then you can change your focus to the value for that field and spin to set it. With this change, you could nudge in the direction for the field your want to change and immediately focus on the value for that field.

I understand UI design is a matter of compromise, and designing good UI is *really* hard. I work on the iPhone/iPad team at Apple, and this is something we spend a great deal of time trying to get right. When we were designing the interaction mechanisms for our UI, we always strove to make it easy to discover at least one way to do everything, but we put non-discoverable features in for power users. These are almost always hidden to avoid cluttering the UI, but they are there to help power users use the product more efficiently. This seems similar to me in that if I don't know that nudging in different directions highlights different fields, then it appears to behave the way it does now in that nudging in any direction will still bring up the joystick menu. A non power user could still use the UI, but power users would quickly discover this shortcut that makes these operations even more efficient.

Even without this, I'm really impressed with how intuitive and well thought out your product is. Too many companies today build products without any thought given to these things.

thanks,

jason

 

[dynonsupport]

This seems similar to me in that if I don't know that nudging in different directions highlights different fields, then it appears to behave the way it does now in that nudging in any direction will still bring up the joystick menu.  A non power user could still use the UI, but power users would quickly discover this shortcut that makes these operations even more efficient.

We actually started here (and we have competitors that do use this method), but there were a couple of problems that we didn't find complementary and elegant solutions to.

First, there are potentially more than 4 items in that list, depending on what bugs/settings are available. So we'd have to choose which ones are in the menu, possibly provide setup UI to assign them, etc. That menu is dynamic too (if you turn HDG bug off, it goes away). Finally, if you defaulted the option on by default, then people who don't figure it out (I'd estimate 30% of our particular sort of customer) would be popped to a (seemingly) random setting every time they popped the menu up.

So while definitely a (admittedly slim chance) possible future power-user feature, we think it needs to be selectable and customizable to really not aggravate a good portion of our customers.

We did something similar in the D10/D100 series products when we needed to expand the UI to accommodate some new features that we hadn't thought would ever exist when the EFIS-D10 first came out. Instead of all buttons pop up a menu (old way), buttons 1/6 now always take you page forewards/backwards through a customizable set of screen rotations. The other buttons dynamically pop the menu for the active page directly above it. So nominally, on a D180, buttons 2/3/4 bring up the EFIS menu, button 5 is the EMS menu. We even printed a special card that ships with every unit to brief this behavior, and we thought it was pretty discoverable even without that. Anyway, long story a touch shorter - the power users love it, but probably 50% of people get really confused until they're very explicitly taught how it works.

Also, you'll notice, once you fire things up, that we purposefully don't use the center push on the knob. It's just too easy to nudge it to a side accidentally in any sort of turbulence when you're meaning to center click. On the other hand, it's much easier to be purposeful with the four corners of nudging. So one of them had to go, and we chose to keep the nudges. That had implications across the entire UI, of course.

 

[Camillo]

Dynon, I saw that the expected release date for the ARINC converter module is changed from August to "summer/fall 2010".

Since I hope to fly in August and I need to close the airplane, are you able to give exact dimensions or at least exact hole distance in order to let me arrange platenuts behind the panel and bring cables there?

Thanks.

 

[dynonsupport]

Most likely final mechanical for the holes: 4.2"x1.888" center to center of the mounting holes. Holes are 0.2" diameter.

 

[Camillo]

Dynon, thank-you VERY MUCH. I can now make holes, install platenuts and proceed further!
Camillo

 

[Pilots8000]

I realize the ARINC converter module (for SV) is still a few months away, and appreciate the info provided so far (DB25(s?) with same ARINC pinouts as HS34, approximate size, and expected mounting hole dimentions).  My question is - can you say what the interface will be to the SV system?  Do you expect this to be via the DB25 (as in the HS34) or will there be a DB9 connector for a standard SV network connection?

Thanks.

 

[dynonsupport]

It will be a SkyView Network device, with a DB9 just like the ADAHRS and EMS modules.