1

Show and Tell / Re: WH.TKSZ-16S

« on: February 06, 2024, 04:03:07 PM »

Run through Google translate:

“I found it by chance online. Aliexpress /WH.TKSZ-16S
It looks like it's always just one sound.

It's expensive, but if you want to build a new model!

And professional electronics engineers will definitely find a way to change the sound.”

So basically an alternate control board with specific sound sets.

2

Open Panzer Help / Re: OP Panel size

« on: January 11, 2024, 07:05:06 AM »

I had a little play and it does improve a bit if you scale the layout down a bit.

It's still not perfect though.  I've attached two screens.   Both are on a high resolution of 2880*1800.  One at 200% text scaling, the other at 100% (you don't appear to go smaller).

Interestingly, if you have OP-Config open when you are up at 200% and then scale down to 100% it also scales most of the field values (although not all of them) and it's much more readable.

If you scale first and then open OP-Config it doesn't scale the field values so well.

Hope that helps for now anyway.

3

Open Panzer Help / Re: OP Panel size

« on: January 11, 2024, 06:48:49 AM »

Hi Steve.

There is an issue with running the downloadable installer version of OP-Config on High DPI/Resolution monitors.

There is a fix for it but it hasn't made it to a downloadable installer version yet.

I think there are two options at the moment and one is easy, one not.

1) Change the Scaling and Layout options on Windows.   The reduces the size of the text so the field labels at least are readable although the text in the fields themselves is still a bit too big.  How to reduce DPI

2) Uncomment one of the lines of code and run it yourself locally.... this requires the use of the Qt Creator software.

I might try and see if I can work out how to build a new installer version that I could send you somehow but I'm not sure what the process is for building that yet.

I did mention this on another thread here: https://openpanzer.org/forum/index.php?topic=313.0 but haven't pursued it further yet.

Chris.

4

Open Panzer Help / Re: OP-Config not finding I-Bus radio with an FS-A8S and Arduino Mega

« on: January 10, 2024, 02:13:34 AM »

Good morning all,

Luke was absolutely correct (as usual  ), it did turn out to be something simple.   Using the ibus2pwm example program from the IBusBM library I tried to see if the serial port was seeing anything at all from the receiver and it wasn't.

Tried a few other things and nothing.   Did some more googling (and I had already done quite a bit before but not found this) and discovered a comment on this forum (https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?2792377-FS-A8S-help) complaining that to switch the FS-A8S receiver from the default ibus to sbus you had to press and hold the bind button for 2 seconds and it wouldn't remember it (rendering sbus a bit useless).

This is in addition to setting the output mode on the transmitter (which was already ibus).

In my initial attempts to get things working I had tried a couple of times to rebind the receiver without any obvious success but it looks like in attempting to do that while the receiver had power (which isn't the process for binding anyway) I must have switched it to sbus output and it looks like they fixed it's ability to remember the setting.  With the transmitter set to ibus and not having the required reversing circuitry needed for sbus connections nothing was getting through.

Pressing and holding the bind button for 2 seconds (while powered and bound to the transmitter) it suddenly started spouting serial data out!   Woohoo!  I now have 10 channels in Op-Config to play with.

The receiver came with the transmitter and the manual for the transmitter doesn't contain any information about the receiver at all so knowing you have to actually do something on the receiver to switch between the modes is voodoo at best. 

Sorted...   

5

Open Panzer Help / Re: OP-Config not finding I-Bus radio with an FS-A8S and Arduino Mega

« on: January 09, 2024, 05:20:43 PM »

Found the section in opsettings.h for tcb diy to switch the pins to 20/21 for MG and Airsoft so will have a play with that too.

 

6

Open Panzer Help / Re: OP-Config not finding I-Bus radio with an FS-A8S and Arduino Mega

« on: January 09, 2024, 05:06:47 PM »

Excellent thanks Luke.

I tried a few permutations of settings but still not detecting the I-bus.  Will have a go with that sketch and check if the receiver is outputting anything.

I even hooked up a few LEDs to check the outputs when activating switches and things.  A little confused that the MG LED doesn’t have a pin on Arduino but I assume that is just a PIN number allocation in the code and I should be able to tweak that.  I guess the Arduino pin layout is the way it is because you designed the pins were they were convenient on the chip when mounted directly but they are relocated to different places on an ardunio board?

7

Open Panzer Help / OP-Config not finding I-Bus radio with an FS-A8S and Arduino Mega

« on: January 09, 2024, 03:01:11 PM »

I have been trying to get OP-Config working with an Arduino Mega standard board (well I say standard it’s an “Elegoo” model rather than Arduino) and it fails to read the radio when trying to use I-bus.

I’m using a FlySky i6s with a FS-A8S as per the recommendations on the wiki.  I have the output mode set to PPM and Ibus for serial.  I connect the ibus cable to pin 15 as per the guide for Arduino but op-config fails to find the radio.

If I connect the ppm cable to pin 3 it finds it ok and can read the data ok.  Ppm of course only gets the 8 channels and I was hoping to use ibus to make use of the extra couple of switches.

Before I go trying to diagnose if pin 15 is even getting a signal or if the receiver/transmitter are even talking ibus is there anything I am missing or any known issues/workarounds?

Pretty sure the code on the TCB project is set to subs initially by default and the tries ppm and ibus.  Not sure which it tries next but it either isn’t getting ibus or not seeing it on pin 15.   

Might have to go and put some diagnostics in the radio class to see if it’s even trying or if the receiver is duff.

8

TCB Dev / Re: QtAssistant/Help Files

« on: January 04, 2024, 02:45:54 AM »

I haven't gotten to actually look at how the application is being built yet to include the assistant and the help_files and plugins and things.   

It doesn't included them by default in the debug build for the application so I assume this is done as part of the actual build process of the installer/exe program iself.

I haven't found any notes yet on how Luke did this other than he didn't use the Qt build tool itself.

If you see this and have any pointers Luke that would be appreciated.  I can work around it by just copying the right files/folders into the debug folder for now anyway to poke things :-)

9

TCB Dev / QtAssistant/Help Files

« on: January 04, 2024, 02:42:40 AM »

Following previous conversations about the OP Config tool, I have been having a nosey at the Qt Assistant issue and why the help files no longer work.

Turns out the use of QtAssistant is more intended to be used on machine that has Qt installed specifically but you can (and as Luke has) bundle the Assistant application as part of the build.   There is also a QtHelpFile API in the Qt suite now that can be used to display the content of helpfiles within any type of window you like but will take a look at that later.

Poking the current deployed version of OPConfig on my machine I have tried to launch the qch collection file using the Assistant.exe included in the build and get a library error initially (see attached files) but that is because I ran the assistant from within the assistant folder.  The library file it moans about is in the main directory and if you run the assistant from there it works although the actual display then has no content.

The actual application uses assistant\assistant to call the tool anyway so that's probably correct, why the qch file appears to be empty is different.

I get the same if I use the actual QtAssistant on my Qt install to point at the deployed qch file as well so not sure why the qch file would be empty or perhaps it is just because I haven't specified a page in the call but on a newly generated qch I don't need to so that's strange.

If I generate a new qch file in the source I get output but most of the links in the TOC don't actually work and try to open an "untitled".   Turns out in the qhp file each of the sections is referenced using .\ in the file location which appears not to be working.   removing the .\ renders the section links operable again.

e.g.
<section title="Program Layout" ref="./formlayout.html"></section>   -- doesn't work
<section title="USB Drivers" ref="drivers.html"></section>                -- works

I'm also getting some interesting output in some of the help files where certain graphics or links are used (DodgyGraphics.png).

The HTML file itself displays fine so it looks like rendering of the h4 heading type in the css is a bit broken.  Somef  othe spacing is as as well on other pages and the fonts appear to be a but up and down.

The h4 entry is meant to be non-repeating but it appears to be ignoring it:

h4
{
   margin: 0px;
   padding: 0px;
   border: 0px;
   margin-top: 20px;
   margin-bottom: 10px;
   font-size: 18px;
}
h4.entry
{
   padding-left: 15;
    background: url('images/h4_icon.png');
    background-repeat: no-repeat;
}

These all look very much like issues that probably were absolutely fine on older versions of the application 8 years ago but Windows and/or Qt have moved on and things have gone a bit squiffy.

Fun fun fun :-)

10

TCB Dev / Re: High DPI Issue

« on: January 02, 2024, 02:55:20 PM »

Oh and I would be happy to recommend changes on a pull request from the fork if helpful.

One of the main differences in the later version is the settings in the user file but of course that contains user specific environment variables/paths and aren’t great for inclusion in the source control as it isn’t transferable between different environments.  Might have a think about that too.   

Not a Qt user before so it’s an interesting journey so far.   

11

TCB Dev / Re: High DPI Issue

« on: January 02, 2024, 02:48:53 PM »

I did see a comment about the Qt assistant and I think I did get an error about it myself when I tried something.

Happy to have a nosey when I get a mo.   I am primarily a Mac user myself normally but have this Windows machine for various reasons so I can try things on both.  Obviously there are already known issues with a Mac because it uses WinSparkle for the updates rather than sparkle and the code isn’t currently set up to work differently depending on the O/S.

There are a couple of compilation warnings already popping up on the Mac when trying to build and there was an issue running Qt at all on Mac OS X 14 Sonoma but there was a known fix for that.

I’m looking at using the software to run an Arduino with an external motor controller (actually a Raspberry Pi Hat version so should be useable from Arduino or Pi with Judicious use of headers/connectors and a bit of PCB).   The fun bit is getting the extra external components on a PCB with a suitable power supply rail to allow the current without being supplied by the Arduino or the Pi or too much wiring.

I would love to build a board specifically or the Heclo hat but I’m starting with a few separate components at the moment just to get my head round it a bit.   The only downside of the Heclo board I can see at the moment is the use of the jst/xh connectors for some of the lighting while the Henglong 7.0 uses DuPont connectors for those.  It would be really nice to have a straight swap for the Henglong boards without extra converters or connectors but I get that the TCB is designed to be more than just a replacement for one specific solution!

12

TCB Dev / High DPI Issue

« on: January 02, 2024, 02:21:57 AM »

I searched the forum and couldn't find anything specifically about this but when using a computer with a high DPI or resolution the OP-Config tool may not display properly as it fails to scale both the window and the fonts to handle the high resolution.

I downloaded the Windows installer version and got this on Windows 10 Professional running on Bootcamp on a MacBook Pro running at 2880 x 1800 pixels. (See attachment NoScaling.png).

I know Luke is aware of this issue because there is a fix sitting in the code waiting to be used and a comment about how he couldn't test it at the time due to still compiling on qt 5.4.   That change was made 8 years ago of course and the code isn't currently regularly updated.

But if anyone does stumble into this like I did getting Qt installed and working isn't too hard (although I have used Qt 5.15.2 at the moment as the release 6 of qt looks to be a more comprehensive upgrade and I haven't got the environment setup correctly just yet for it to compile with that).

A few quick notes on that:

• There is a commercial version of Qt and an Open Source one.  Clearly this is open source so you need to use the online installer to install the open source one.  You will need to create a Qt account.
• If you do try version 6 of Qt then the SerialPort library is now an extra you will have to add in the custom installation or later using the Maintenance Tool
• The default user file in the current main repo isn't compatible with the newer versions of Qt so you get a warning when you open it.   The recommendation appears to be to delete the old *.user files and let it create a new one (there are some variable type changes from the old one)

I currently have OP-Config compiling and running on Qt Creator 12.0.1 with Qt 5.15.2 with a MinGQ 8.1.0 64 bit compiler.

I haven't tested the WinSparkle updater or tried to build an installer from this yet but may have a go.

I've forked the repo here with the High DPI change included (and WinSparkle updated to 0.8.1 because it complained when I was still using the old one) https://github.com/ChrisSwallowWL/OP-Config