Ok, so what the heck is an RSS? The RSS is a central location in the simulation for all of the radio stuff.
The Analysis NexGen can handle any type of radio interface, but not limited to ARINC-410, ARINC-429,
MIL-STD-1553, or anything else you can dream up ie. Sub Space Radio in Star Trek. The 5 in 1 pictured on
the right is an ARINC-410 head, they are cheap and plentiful on eBay. Radios with dials generally fall into the other category of other ie. you are on your own. The ADF pictured on the right is has a synchro transmitter in it which controls the receiver in the electronics bay. Then you have ARINC-429 which is used on more modern control heads with LEDs.
The RSS is also responsible for driving meters, turning lights on or off, and changing instrument flags under control of a slave microprocessor via RSS_Control, but commanded by the simulation. In the lower right I have included a photo of an ADI showing the various flags.
The Audio portion of this system is the ASS or Audio SubSystem. Needless to say we have a Linux Box which houses multiple audio interfaces and the OS must have the Advanced Linux Sound Architecture or ALSA included in the build but more about that later.
There are several pieces of software running to put this all in motion.
- RSS_Control program on the LinuxPc and I talks via USB to the control heads and Ethernet to the simulator.
- Slave a generic program that runs on an embedded microprocessor on each control head. The Slave program is named Slave_410, Slave_429, etc.
- Slant_Range is a program that runs on the LinuxPc that performs slant range calculations to see if you can tune in the required radio station.
- Morse is a program that runs on the LinuxPc that generates all of the Call Signs for the bacons.
- FAA_DB is a program that on the LinuxPc that has all of the Call Signs, Frequency and Locations.
Here we will only concern ourselves with two programs and four protocols: (The ones in black)
- RSS_Control
- NavGroup Listener
- Listens to Simulation
- Talks to Simulation
- Listens to Slave
- Talks to the Slave
- Slave
- Listens to RSS_Control
- Talks to RSS_Control.
Keep Tuned In More To Come
Cris ~