RealFlight G4-Demo Forum

The G4-Demo version is a free download offered by Great Planes to allow R/C enthusiasts to evaluate the retail version. Overall, the Demo version works fairly well considering the G4 series increased demand for graphic resources compared to earlier versions. The application is unique from the retail versions in that it provides a keyboard to control simulated aircraft if an I-Controller is not recognized. This also offers testers and interested developers the opportunity to view program functionality without requiring the I-Controller. The application provides three different aircraft, one chopper and two airports.

Test Environment:
Phenom II 3.0, GTS 250 (nvidia driver 319.49), Fedora-19 x86_64, Crossover Linux 12.5.0, winXP bottle, Virual Desktop.

Installation and Running the Application:
Simply download the free demo verson from RealFlight and see Installation Tips to install. When the application is opened the Great Planes logo will appear then an error message "Error: E_FAIL File: .\DXControllerG2Interlink.cpp Line: 119". Dismiss each ocurrence of the error (3 times) with the ok button. The application will then open and present the default trainer for flight with a paved runway. The simulation runs quite well with a decent frame rate and no noticable graphic hesitation although it is somewhat tricky to control with the keyboard.

Problems:
None as far as using the application with a keyboard. If one has an I-Controller from a retail version, the application will recognize it in a Windows System for use in controlling the virtual aircraft but Linux with Crossover will not yet recognize the controller until usb/hid support is available in Wine.

Updated: 09/04/2013

Hello,

I installed RelFlight G4 Demo with Wine. When I start the game, there appear the three error messages you told about. But at the third messagebox, nothing happens and I don't can klick on "OK".
Do you know whats wrong?

My System:

• Linux 2.6.31-14-generic x_86 (Ubuntu 9.10 - GNOME 2.28.1)
• Wine 1.0.1
• Memory: 749,8 MiB
• CPU: Intel Pentium 4 1700MHz
• NVIDIA Driver Version: 96.43.13
• GPU: GeForce4 MX 440 with AGP8X

Sorry for my english.

I solved the problem.
I had to emulate a virtual screen with Wine.

I can choose different planes, too.

Hi Paul,

Glad you got the problem resolved. Good point on the virtual screen. I'll add that to the tips and tricks. BTW, you're English is fine. Thanks for the information.

Roger

I just updated "Tips and Tricks" to reflect installation of this application using Crossover Games 9.0. With this new release of Crossover, the application performance and functionality has improved as follows:

1) User selection of different aircraft types and airports is now fully functional.
2) Dynamic 360 degree preview of aircraft and airports now correctly presented during selection (will submit screen shots).
3) Graphic screen now properly updated to reflect new aircraft or airport being loaded when selected.

As for keyboard only operation of this application (as was intended when released by the manufacturer), it is fully functional in Linux under Crossover Games and works as well as when run in native Windows. As such, I have upgraded the application status to Gold. If one has an Inner-Connect Controller plugged in from a retail release version and if Wine had HID/USB support, the application would recognize the Inner-Connect Controller thereby making the Demo Version much easier and more realistic to play. HID/USB support on the horizon???? 😊.

Edit: Reworded a few sentences to make this easier to read.

Hi,

I believe there -is- USBHID support somewhere out there appearing
as a light at the end of the dark tunnel...a related thread about all
this was sewn in the advocate forums over recent times...see;

http://www.codeweavers.com/compatibility/advocate_center/forum/?t=1;msg=77502

Check the link there vis experimental wine - may help draw a picture for you?

Cheers!

Hi Don,

Thanks for the reply. I did see that forum thread earlier and meant to post since the emWave application and my simulator seem to require the same type of support. I am going to try the Alexander Morozov patches on Wine-1.2-rc1 and see if that helps. I have also tried sym links to /dev/input/js0 (which is functional in Linux but not to the app) and even modifying the wine registry to reflect all the hid keys in Windows to no avail. The simulator controller (essentially a mock up R/C transmitter) does not use a specialized driver so maybe.... There is also a libhid RPM package on the verge of release to be available for Fedora 12 and 13 which I may install as well. Will post on the thread you referenced when I get it tested.

Hi,

You know, that sounds a little different in a sense...if what you're  

saying here is that the controller works (as a joystick HID) in linux with
the symlink..?...let me know when you get a moment...

Cheers!

Hi,

I've actually been able to recreate an almost identical situation
(with a USB missile launcher) that's following the same sort of
behavior....so I'm in with a better shot at figuring this stuff out
now....

Cheers!

Hi Don,

Great news!! Please let us know if you discover a work around 😊.

Looking at my last post, I think it was somewhat ambiguous in that I should have used the I-Controller "may be avaialable" to native Linux apps rather than "functional". KDE Control Center joystick module shows the I-Controller active both sticks, pots and switches meaning it might work if a native Linux app required this specific device.

All efforts at using sym links have failed to get the G4 Demo app to recognize presence of the Controller plus I suspect the G4 app uses this controller "requirement to be present" as some form of DRM protection for their retail versions.

There is not a special controller driver supplied with the app as it appears to rely solely on the MS Windows driver set. I thought maybe manually adding the required registry keys for HID support to the Wine registry, then copying the MS native .dll and .sys support files to the appropriate Wine Windows dir and letting Wine know to use the Windows native versions might work but so far no luck (unless I made some errors or forgot something which is entirely possible).

Here are some queries regarding the I-Controller on my system summaried below:
$ uname -ri
2.6.18-164.11.1.el5 x86_64

$ cat /proc/modules
joydev 43969 0 - Live 0xffffffff89313000
vfat 46529 0 - Live 0xffffffff89306000

$ lsusb
Bus 007 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 006 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 002 Device 011: ID 061c:0008 Act Labs, Ltd <<----------(I-Controller)
Bus 002 Device 008: ID 0d49:7110 Maxtor
Bus 002 Device 004: ID 07cc:0301 Carry Computer Eng., Co., Ltd 6-in-1 Card Reader
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 05e3:0608 Genesys Logic, Inc. USB-2.0 4-Port HUB
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

$ dmesg | tail
SELinux: initialized (dev sdf1, type vfat), uses genfs_contexts
usb 2-6.2: USB disconnect, address 10
usb 2-6.2: new low speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 11
usb 2-6.2: New USB device found, idVendor=061c, idProduct=0008
usb 2-6.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=3, Product=1, SerialNumber=0
usb 2-6.2: Product: I-Controller
usb 2-6.2: Manufacturer: GREAT PLANES
usb 2-6.2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
input: GREAT PLANES I-Controller as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:13.2/usb2/2-6/2-6.2/2-6.2:1.0/input/input6
generic-usb 0003:061C:0008.0001: input,hidraw0: USB HID v1.10 Joystick [GREAT PLANES I-Controller] on usb-0000:00:13.2-6.2/input0

/dev/js0

KDE Info Center:
OHCI Host Controller (2)
USB2.0 Hub
I-Controller

Manufacturer: GREAT PLANES

Class 0 ((Defined at Interface level))
Subclass 0
Protocol 0

USB Version 1.10
Vendor ID 0x61c (Act Labs, Ltd)
Product ID 0x8
Revision 61.00

Speed 1.5 Mbit/s
Channels 0
Max Packet Size 0

Hey there Roger,

Thanks for the extra info -- all 'good stuff' as we say. It also helps to
remove the ambiguity wrt just how and what linux is up to handling the
controller as is. You have effectively thrown in another angle here, wrt
the fact the software might be checking for a specific hardware identifier
as being used analogous to a hardware based DRM mechanism. To that end,
could you provide me with a better view of the device...ie; issue the
following command in a shell...

bash-3.2$ cat /proc/bus/usb/devices

Pick through the output and cut&paste the section relevant to the
I-Controller back here please...it may help...

As I previous hunched at, this case is somewhat different from that of
the emWave device mentioned in the advocate's forum - to thicken the
stew even further here, the device I'm using really isn't a HID as
such -- it more fits into the 'gadget' category. That said, the USB
based communications between the app running in crossover/wine, and the
actual device attached to the host machine are still likely to need
travel the very same paths, so I think it's useful ground to travel.

This will take me a little time however -- I have to muck with the
wine-git tree and have a look at what the related USB patches are
actually doing etc...but be assured I'm looking into it ; there seems
to be a very real need for this kind of USB support in crossover/wine,
if for no other reason than crossover/wine becoming mature enough to
actually run more programs requiring such... 8)

Cheers!

Hi Don,

Here is the output you requested:

$ cat /proc/bus/usb/devices
T: Bus=02 Lev=01 Prnt=01 Port=05 Cnt=02 Dev#= 3 Spd=1.5 MxCh= 0
D: Ver= 1.10 Cls=00(>ifc ) Sub=00 Prot=00 MxPS= 8 #Cfgs= 1
P: Vendor=061c ProdID=0008 Rev=61.00
S: Manufacturer=GREAT PLANES
S: Product=I-Controller
C:* #Ifs= 1 Cfg#= 1 Atr=80 MxPwr= 20mA
I: If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 2 Cls=03(HID ) Sub=00 Prot=00 Driver=usbhid
E: Ad=81(I) Atr=03(Int.) MxPS= 8 Ivl=10ms
E: Ad=02(O) Atr=03(Int.) MxPS= 8 Ivl=100ms

I fully agree in that if this usb/hid type support were available, many more games would just start magically working. It would be interesting to conduct a poll for all advocates as to how many apps they advocate they think require these features.

I did try the Alexander Morozov patches but they errored out with wine-1.2-rc1 during application. I do know that Alexander Julliard committed 4 of his 9 patches submitted to the wine tree in Oct 2008. The remaining 5 were rejected since Mr Julliard felt they were incompatible with the existing wine infrastructure. Probably need to diff the patches to the latest wine and see why they error during application.

The G4 demo is quite limited in terms of obtaining system device information through the app itself but I can get more data for both Windows and Wine for comparison using the retail G2/G3 versions I am advocating. Will post that info shortly. Thanks for the help and time.

..just fyi...

I actually got to mucking about with this today -- I'm going to
need rework the patches for all of this ; I'm working with the
current wine-git tree. This will take some time...

edit: hours later....ok, I initially had two questions when I
started to look at this .... why are to git patches so damn big,
and why does...say...a USBHID (ie; a normal joystick) have virtually
no trouble (games + crossover/wine)? I've just unraveled this lot...
...it's ugly....and I also know why any attempt to copy the windows
drivers across won't work/help either...and why symlinking device
nodes to other (host_dev) locations many times won't work as well...

Hi Roger,

Could you tell me exactly which windows registry keys the controller appears
in when used on a windows installation? Best way to find them all is to search
the registry for the VID ( 061c ) ...get back to me when you have a chance...

Cheers!

Hi Don,

That took a little time but here is what I came up with. Checking the "real" Windows 2K partition registry (the same system I test CX and Wine on in the Linux partition) revealed VID_061c shows up quit a few times. It appears the same keys and values in the same hieracy are replicated identically 3 times within these parent keys as follows:

HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001
HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet002
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet

Each of these keys have 2 sub keys were this device is populated: ..\Control and ..\Enum.

I exported the ControlSet001 key, edited it to only show VID 061c information. Unfortunately, this is a fairly large file (about 46KB but lots of room on CodeWeavers forum so I thought maybe I would post an email address here to me so you can respond by email with your address and I can then reply with the notepad saved attachment. It views as unicode under kwrite but CX notepad works well if you don't have Windows. I could also publish it on my website and link it here if that is preferable.

Please let me know your preference as I think you need to see the whole tree with data for ControlSet001 and duplicate it for the other two.

Regards, Roger

Hi Roger,

Yeah...sorry to put you through that arduous task -- I was looking at what the
wine patches were attempting to do versus how a 'real' windows system was handling
the device I have here in an effort to draw some conclusions about proceedings (and
obviously I need suspect your HID controller may differ in this respect). I'll email
your directly and you can post to that address -- thanks for investigating this...

Don

Hi Don,

You can email me at <deleted> and I will attach the file in a reply.

Thanks, Roger

Edit: Oops, never mind. I just saw you email and the attachment is on the way 😊 Deleted email above.

Hi Back Don,

I did a little more Win2K investigation this AM and confirmed that ..\ControlSet001 and ..002 are indeed clones. CurrentControlSet is also a clone of the others but does have a few additional sub keys not found in the other two. When you get through the 001 mess and if you find you need to see the CurrentControlSet stuff, I'll email you that data as well.

Roger

Hi Roger,

  Just letting you know I haven't forgotten about this ;  

I had a read of all the issues and submitted (but rejected)
patches pertaining to this USB device communication issue,
and it's a truly convoluted affair and difficult to implement
'properly' relative to how windows manages this...

...anyhow, I've concluded to buy realflight & controller for
myself in the next half-dozen weeks -- in truth it's actually a
title that links back to my youth, when I used to fly both
control-line and R/C planes, so in no way do I feel put out ;)

Cheers!

Hi Don,

Glad to hear you're considering getting the sim. I know you will enjoy it, especially considering your past flying days :). The latest version is G5.5 and I cannot even get the G5-Demo to work with CXG or Wine as of yet. It appears the newer demo looks for certain info obtained from DirectX 9 or later and when it doesn't find the data, it gives an error and a exit application option.

BTW, I used to fly control line as well and it was a lot of fun. I haven't yet soled with R/C but I am getting a trainer ready now and with the experience gained from the sim, I feel confident of success.

Thanks for getting back,

Roger

Hi again,

   I think it's Sod'a Law that maintains the premise of not having money enough to   

buy something when it's available, only to later find when you actually have the money,
the item cannot be sought =) Not to worry, another G4 will show itself eventually....

...in the interim, I got to thinking - issues with DRM Dongles and such are one thing,
but in the end they have nothing to do with what one is trying to achieve sometimes,
that being getting accustomed with digital-proportional R/C controllers, and how to use
the things from a fixed vantage point for example - it's not as easy as many would think...

..so...while looking about ebay, I came across this...USB-3D-6CH-RC-Flight-Simulator-J9

For the cost, right? =) I just had to...it turned up today ... what is it? Well, it is actually
how it looks -- it's a 6CH R/C transmitter housing without the radio. Even the battery compartment
and cover, and everything else is still there -- all they've done is ripped out the radio gear,
and put a USB interface in it's place. In linux, it identifies as..;

usb 1-2: new low speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 30
input: WAILLY PPM as /class/input/input17
generic-usb 0003:06F7:0003.0003: input: USB HID v1.10 Joystick [WAILLY PPM] on usb-0000:00:02.0-2/input0

...and immediately maps to the next available joystick device (/dev/js?) and all works as expected.
The unit itself bundles with 'FMS' (Flight Model Simulator, freeware), which unfortunately doesn't
work (runs but doesn't draw to screen) -- I've entered it into C4 anyhow as it may be able to work
someday....

...however, I did just have a bash with it in rFactor, with a R/C car loaded and on one of the R/C
dedicated tracks (which gives you the same fixed position vantage point thing), and it works like
a treat there, so I'd expect it to work in a R/C flight sim just as well...oh, and it's setup as
a Mode 2 controller (throttle stick on left)...

..as an aside, the electronics the unit includes are exactly what I've been looking for as a
'quick and easy hack' to interface to a 'driving seat' (for car-racing sims) that a mate & I have
been working on, so now I've gotta buy a few more of the things (now they I know the picture ;)...

"An interesting purchase", he said, "Just thought I'd let you know about it"....

...now all I need is a working R/C FlightSim ...<grin>...or a heads-up from ebay =)

Cheers!