SkyView customization/plugin question

[rdamazio]

Hi Dynon.

I'm an RV10 builder who's coming to the point where I need to decide which avionics system to use, and SkyView is up high in my list of possibilities (great system, congrats on the good work!).

I see that SkyView already allows some customization (e.g. in the engine monitoring page), but I'm wondering if there's any way to interface it to other custom components, either by talking to it over its network/serial port, by writing add-on software components that can be loaded alongside the main software, or by customizing its main source code. I'm specifically looking to:
- Get data out of it (position, navigation, attitude, all engine parameters, traffic information, current radio and xpdr numbers, etc.)
- Send commands in (to change display options, flight plan, autopilot, radios, etc.)
- Display alerts in a similar way that built-in alerts are displayed
- Render custom 2D or 3D widgets on the screen, e.g. by uploading a displaylist or similar (I understand this is a harder one given the realtime constraints of the system, but it's also one that would allow the coolest mods )

If the answer is yes then you'll likely get an order from me plus a bunch of contributed customizations

Thanks
Rodrigo

 

[Dynon]

We try to "liberate data" and provide the ability to customize SkyView in ways that make sense for the most customers. This includes the ability to stream serial data streams that contain most of the primary flight display, engine monitor, and other functions that SkyView provides. See Appendix E of the SkyView System installation manual (downloadable from http://docs.dynonavionics.com) for full documentation on that. SkyView also datalogs internally for later USB retrieval at a rate that you can specify.

While we'd love to offer outright programability in some form, but offering that kind of toolkit competes with end user features at a small companies like ours. However, there are a few areas that you can hack around at. The map presentation colors are one of those areas that are exosed in a setting file. Also, you can customize the EMS outside of the options that you get from SkyView's UI, again by cracking open the configuration files. Poster mmarien has done some slick-looking things here.