Transponders

[fierce ibex]

In this suggestion, I'll explain the what, why and possibly how transponders would be a great addition to Aeronautica.

I. What is a Transponder / What does it represent in aviation ?

According to Wikipedia, a transponder is defined as :
"A device that, upon receiving a signal, emits a different signal in response. The term is a blend of transmitter and responder".

In aviation, a transponder is used as a more reliable way to locate an aircraft and track it, usually doubled by primary radar.

The transponder transmits important information :

• Airspeed
• Altitude
• Heading
• Flight Identification
• Squawk Code

The transponder transmits the information given by the aircraft's sensors, there is no calculation made, unlike a radar.
Lastly, the Squawk Code is a 4-digit number which is chosen by ATC and given to pilots, this code allows controllers to differentiate aircrafts in an easier way.

There are three special codes :

• 7500 = Hijacking
• 7600 = Communications Failure
• 7700 = Emergency

II. Why would it be relevant in Aeronautica ?

In Aeronautica, a transponder feature would provide :

• Additional roleplay depth, allowing controllers to give squawk codes to facilitate sequencing and distinguishing different airplanes and furthermore allowing pilots to use one of the three special codes to induce roleplay situations.

• Currently in game, it's hard to use stealth aircraft, as you can't see them on the map or radar, which is especially a problem when flying in formation, where speed is key, or controlling an airspace, where you can't see their position. Transponders would allow to see these aircrafts when the pilot doesn't need to be stealthy, if he doesn't want to be seen, he can turn off his transponder and disappear from the map, and radars.

III. How would it be implemented and how would it work in Aeronautica ?

From another player perspective, transponders could affect :
ATC / AWACS RADARS : See (fig.1)
MAP : See (fig.2 & fig.3)

For the player, the transponder could be manipulated via :
MULTI-FUNCTION PANEL : See (fig.4)
SQUAWK CODE BOX : See (fig.5)

IV. Additional Ideas

Transponders could have a section in the settings with things such as default Transponder status (ON by default or OFF by default) or different Transponder modes, although I think it would be too complex. Lots of things possible with such and addition.

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed reading this suggestion and understood my reasoning behind the idea of Transponders in Aeronautica, I'm open to feedback and questions regarding my vision of transponders in and relative to the game.

[upper warren]

no, i dont see a point in this

[fierce ibex]

Read the actual suggestion

[upper warren]

youre asking for squawk codes yes

[fierce ibex]

I, too, didn't see the point, but there's actually a few points that would require such a system, or atleast something of the order

[fierce ibex]

not only that

[upper warren]

but still why should this be added, other than something else

because the only coding dev is hyperant

and from what ive heard he isnt active much

its like asking for an APU

like i mean sure, but whats the point?

[fierce ibex]

See section II maybe you'll get why

Already wrote it once

[upper warren]

still

not much of a problem imo

[fierce ibex]

I do controlling quite a lot, and especially military controlling. Directing an aircraft you don't see is pain, you don't know where he is, what's his speed, nothing.

And when you have lots of people in the pattern, it would be very useful to have squawks

[upper warren]

then i feel like a switch for turning on/off your ability to be seen would be more intuitive than a whole new feature that serves very little purpouse

[fierce ibex]

That's the use, but while you're spending time making a feature that would have a niche use, spend a bit more time on it and you have a feature that would have a broad use

[upper warren]

but, like, i know where youre coming from, but i genuinely dont see an issue apart from the very small and niche ask for fighter non-stealth, and from my time controlling civil in aero, i had zero issues

so i dont really see why youd want this for non-military use

formations, i mean, sure, but why not use callsigns?

[stone steppe]

This would be something that would be ver appreciated by the ATC community.

[upper warren]

like i amnt saying that this shouldnt be added, im saying that this shouldnt be prioritised over other more important things imo

[fierce ibex]

I agree with that

[upper warren]

right

[fierce ibex]

Clearly some coding things are far more important

and with the hum lack of coders

[upper warren]

but also aero is a fair simple game and adding an in-depth XPDR system would add bloat imo, a toggle of on/off for radar on map/ATC would be more suitable imo

[stone steppe]

LUAU is just a niche to program in, there are far morepeople who can write python, java, javascript, etc then this so i think that'"s the base of this problem.

[fierce ibex]

if it was reliable to code in a language then convert it'd be less of a problem

thing is, converting codes between languages can be sketchy

and from what I've read, there's apparently a lack of trust for new coders if there were some

[stone steppe]

that could work to Lua itself, but because it's roblox there are a lot iof things that aren't in lua and definenlty not in other languages.

[upper warren]

there are a lot of lua coders, because roblox is a major game engine, but there isnt any new coders

theres one inactive guy

[silver garnet]

The main issue is that as some people out here mentioned is that Aeronautica's code is poorly designed

[upper warren]

(who has to manage 3 more games)

[stone steppe]

I don't know the code myself, but for me it's always be a pain in the ass to understand luau code, especially when one script reffers to another.

[silver garnet]

Component or Object-Oriented programming

[fierce ibex]

Only thing I code is Arduino Megas not roblox games lmao

[stone steppe]

I know, but still i like other type of interscript working more.

[stone steppe]

That's a good one to program in C++.

But like luau to lua it is an addition to C

[fierce ibex]

I looked a little bit into it and the tiny bits I saw looked like Python and C had a child

[stone steppe]

especially now roblox wants dev to use new functions, it's sometimes hard to find bugs.

[silver garnet]

Neither do I code in Roblox but I have some background in programming hence such huge projects require a lot of attention and time

[silver garnet]

Testing is absolutely separate thing and it is also specific

[stone steppe]

I code a bit of roblox, but not enough to start on programming Aeronautica without wrecking it totally. And i didn't find a good source with just every function.

[stone steppe]

The old delay function is repalcaed with a new one and sometimes it messes up whole scritps for no reason.

[silver garnet]

I mean as said again - some people consider Aeronautica not the best game in terms of code design, so it is understandable

• understanding a code of another person is a very hard skill to obtain

[stone steppe]

it isn't but in Roblox nobody comments code, and taht's painfull.

[silver garnet]

Not the easiest one at least*

[silver garnet]

Comment extraction is not only thing to consider, but yeah, they help

[stone steppe]

tbh every roblox game needs a flowchart to understand what script works with other scripts, and what script the second script influences

[silver garnet]

Deprecation. Either some library inside of some function was deprecated, either function as whole, either something was needed for substitution

[silver garnet]

UML diagram?

[stone steppe]

yes but it became everytime harder to program, i don't remeber the excact code, but insted of wiring delay(100) you need to write StrangFunctionName(100, millisSeconds, True, True)

[silver garnet]

that is a very weird construct of time-related function to say at least

I have never seen passing boolean value as an argument to time function

Especially two of them

[stone steppe]

if i remember well it was because people(not smart enought to read discriptions) did'nt knew it was in millis and thought it was in seconds, or otherwise(it's a long time ago),

[silver garnet]

I mean time functions usually come in millis (rarely in micros)

[stone steppe]

The first boolean was to say if the script needed to stop complete or not(why the hell would i ever don't let it stop complete) and the second i just alwys set to true if i need to)

i'm also going to be honest, it was something like this but there are other irritating theings i program and sometimes i mess the up.

so don't cath me on a wrong function, but hte delay becaem very irritating.

[silver garnet]

Concurrency? (I mean, running 2 commands at same time)

Although very weird to see such solution

[stone steppe]

maybe it is.

but hten i would recommend to run two scripts tbh

[silver garnet]

Everything is mostly sequential, to do multithreading you need to kinda do some construction here and there

[stone steppe]

You didn't program in roblox, a script is attached to something or you need to use server scritps and blablabla, so sometimes it is more easy to do it like this if you're spreading your scritps already.

[silver garnet]

Oh, okay, probably engine feature

[stone steppe]

it is. And sometimes it is better but most of the times it's not.

[silver garnet]

I mean everything depends

There is no generic solution to all of the problems

[stone steppe]

this is for a buged sword only, and you didn't saw the needed code

[silver garnet]

Okay, so operations on 3D models using code

That is sophisticated

It actually reminded me of some of my Unity projects long time ago

[stone steppe]

i looked at that got roblox PTSD and left it for what it was.

[silver garnet]

Crazy

[earnest gull]

people sure do seem to know a lot about aero code for someone who's never interacted with or seen them

[stone steppe]

I'm not talking about earo code but about luau code in main.

[earnest gull]

anyways its not like transponders would be hard to do in the first place

[stone steppe]

wth are you saying?

[silver garnet]

We were discussing some general things related to Roblox and coding in general

[earnest gull]

#1473387084981993734 message

[silver garnet]

Well I've heard that at least from some people in the community

[stone steppe]

don't ask how we came about it but the whole conversation was that it is hard to add transponders on base of code, not the plane type mentioned.

[earnest gull]

do they happen to be aero coders

[earnest gull]

whar

[odd storm]

This seems interesting but idk

[stone steppe]

look if you can explain me what an unsigned int is, you can give comments on our conversation otherwise leave it.

[silver garnet]

Can't remember, so neither proving nor disproving

[earnest gull]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/804164658159288341/1454587513418158183/scorecard-saturday-i-missed-the-clean-sweep-by-only-a-little-v0-pt5iq87aks9g1.gif

I dont even know how to reply to that

[stone steppe]

to what?

[earnest gull]

to you

[odd storm]

You do know who hyperant is right?

[stone steppe]

no. But i know we had a conversation about how hard this would be to add and he came up and started to give comments.

[odd storm]

Click on his profile

[unkempt marsh]

Folk

[stone steppe]

yes?

[silver garnet]

@stone steppe I think it is not worth arguing at this point since we probably won't get anything out of it and be left with different opinions on the matter

[stone steppe]

yeah.

[plucky grove]

The ability to toggle stealth is a point that we just need, bad

[mild storm]

ehhhh

dont think so

[mild storm]

why do u think we need this?

[stone steppe]

suggest it, if you really want it.

[inner trellis]

Even the big H responded son your done for😹☠️🙏

[odd storm]

They don't know who he is

[inner trellis]

[fierce ibex]

oh my what have I initiated

[stone steppe]

Foundit out, fter needing to lok three times trouhg, but why doesn't he have a role icon?

[mild storm]

not your fault so dw

[mild storm]

[plucky grove]

I think i exaggerated the need for it a bit, but it’d be nice to just make it so a stealth plane can toggle being able to show up on map

[odd storm]

Probably so less people bother him or something

[lean agate]

So people aren't pawing at him for random shit

[mild storm]

so just a small qol?

[stone steppe]

you was just unlcuky i and takitur met in your suggestion.

[fierce ibex]

I just thought of transponders as a semi-realistic way to do so

[plucky grove]

Idk what that means but prolly

Nvm I got it

[mild storm]

quality of life

[fierce ibex]

And it could have a broader use as well

[silver garnet]

I mean Hyperant knows some aspects deeper than us and personally myself I respect him and find him a competent person at least from bug fixing side of matter,

Maybe he is trying to deal with poorly coded design, maybe with better one, but since the Aeronautica is not open source we will find ourselves pretty much reliant on word of other people

[mild storm]

[stone steppe]

that's true. I'm going to make a sugg'estion to make aezronautica ope source. Because why not.

[silver garnet]

Devs won't give up the code 1000% guaranteed

[mild storm]

quick question: how would that work?

[stone steppe]

open source? people can see the code and suggest things, but write them themself in the code and suggest that code, but if i really want something i can make it for myself in the sourcecode on my device.

[mild storm]

i dont mean to be disrespectful but learn how to type

[stone steppe]

don't ask my autocorrect what's it is doing. It just outputs random shit sometimes.

[odd storm]

Real

[mild storm]

ok lemme try and read this again

[devout vapor]

Wingz World, the predecessor to Aero, was made open-source, one of the reasons for Aero existing

So you can start from there

But getting Aero open sourced, good luck

[stone steppe]

i was just thinking what the time to ban would be.

[devout vapor]

What ban?

[stone steppe]

from suggesting that, it's a joke.

[devout vapor]

[foggy phoenix]

Do you know how one would find the code?
All I heard was it was given to Hyper and he made aero, not that it was made open-source (or even visible to the public)

[devout vapor]

I'm afraid I don't know that myself

But I know a lot of people made their own versions

[hoary summit]

We at the very least need to have stealth aircraft actually be stealthy

[stone steppe]

I'm going to search for it for a bit, but i'm working on a project for the moment so it can be that you'll need to wait some time.

[foggy phoenix]

I did a quick search, just googling, checking related Roblox games/communities/profiles and didn’t find anything, but if you want then go for it.

[stone steppe]

The reamlity is i have too much time... So i need something to do.

[foggy phoenix]

Found it

You can just “edit in studio” from the Roblox website

[stone steppe]

ok

[earnest gull]

https://www.roblox.com/games/3180659/Wingz-World-V

keep in mind i never did use any of its code so your mileage may vary

[fierce ibex]

I'm just coming back here cuz apart from emperium I didn't get any feedback regarding the suggestion in itself, before the coding debate started

[upper warren]

this is what im saying should be added instead of a full blown XPDR system

[lean agate]

Maybe advanced customization that gives it radar reflectors? Having them will make you show up on radar?

From my understanding they put these on for training missions when they want to know where everyone is

[plucky grove]

That could work but it’d be kinda annoying to have to pay everytime you want to turn it on and off

[lean agate]

Could be a 0 wp option like formation lights

[meager oyster]

For ATC this would be like the second coming of jesus. Controlling who have callsigns different from their tailnumber (which everyone does) is a massive pain if you don't have access to Aero Radar which does this but only one way in that since pilots don't have transponders they cannot really accept the squawk you assign them on the radar client.

Furthermore the lack of actual transponders means that the process of radar identification can only really be done with position reports from the pilot instead of any Mode-C type methods.

Transponders have an ident function or the ability to squawk standby which allows a radar equipped controller to identify who is who based on the radar target flashing on the screen.

Transponders that link to some radar client (does not have to be the current Aero Radar) would be huge and plug long standing gaps in air traffic control capability.

https://youtu.be/sPtK3EEt_hk
Here's a short video that explains all the US methods. Note that because aero pilots don't have access to transponders there is no way to truly verify where a pilot actually is in game or with Aero Radar using the transponder(secondary radar) methods.

[woeful swallow]

Add a string value to interactable parts (gears, missile bay doors) name it RReflect, if true then show on map, else hide

-# F-117

[rapid scarab]

[rapid scarab]

For the non-stealth fighter that hide the identit should be marked by a dot rather than a symbol and no registration with just the basic infor for speed and altitude (or maybe heck for all planes that don't want to be spotted on the map) overall I really want this to be a real thing in-game (finally I can no longer get doxxed in aero )

[stone steppe]

We have them already, i mounted them on my F-35C because it was hard to Coordinate with sqadron members...

[stone steppe]

Wait you know this would require a new control structure for every stealt plane in game?
And why a string? Shouldn't it be a boolean?

[shut fulcrum]

personally im not sure i see the point of this in general but it could work for ATC events, especially the squawk feature

its a well written well thought out and well presented suggestion but im not sure how good the actual idea is

[sand cairn]

This may benefit one community but for everyone else it's just going to clutter their UI with something they have no need to use

[meager oyster]

The UI is very clean and everything can be minimized. It would also just be a small box with four digit places to put numbers like the frequency box to the right of the chat. Wouldn't clutter at all.

If you want an example of what it could be look at the NWX datalink box.

[fierce ibex]

Haven't checked here in a while, but if you check fig.5 you can see an example of how it would be implemented.

Furthermore, if it is in that spot, it can be hidden just like the chat frequency and chat UI as a whole.

With how I suggested it, I don't think it would clutter, but opinions may vary and your claim was actually solid tbf

[stone steppe]

More then a wekk later?

[fierce ibex]

First line of my message mate

[vernal crest]

i like this idea

[stone steppe]

month later.

[fleet fossil]

personally reviving this because the idea makes me froth at the mouth as an ATC player

basically ATC-only in fact

anything even closely resembling ADS-B functionality would be so peak

[meager oyster]

Genuinely it would be revolutionary

[fleet fossil]

the like color based on transponder code is also a really great idea

[icy wolf]

epic idea

(also for the one who said that it would only benefit a part of the community. Bro there is litterally a function in the game that allows to change the "frequency" of the chat and no one uses it 💀 )

[hollow lodge]

Ngl I think transponders would be a great addition. Especially for the AATC controllers in the other server. I suggest this to be added also.

[stone steppe]

I Full y agree, like stted before, i have the feeling alot of people don't use certain things in game, just liek indeed the frequency, or another example. The OBS system.
So in my personall opinon, this is not an argument to hold/reject this.

[fleet fossil]

speak.. of the devil.. maybe? #dev-showcase message

although not exactly an ingame thing, or maybe it will be. this news excites me and i am quite in the space to speculate as to what 'special integration' will mean

[icy wolf]

I hope that won't mean place Aero ATC aside because that would be sad

[fleet fossil]

yes it would

[icy wolf]

well thats is very sad honestly

It's like the server was nothing from a start

[sand cairn]

We didn't even ask for it to begin with

[meager oyster]

That's been a part of MSFX group games for like centuries.

Neo even has a datalink tool

Also seperte frequencies for each airport or area has been planned on the dev trello for a while so it's a pre-rec

[fleet fossil]

no no, i mean it would be sad if that happened