compass request
 

would it be possible in future patches when we put the mouse icon on the campass it shows the heading.
even with trackir it is had to see.

Good idea. Its really hard to get a look at it especially in some of the British planes, even with TrackIR as you say.

I'd love a button like the "look at dashboard" button we have now, except the camera focuses down on the compass instead. :)

That was exactly my idea too, back when it was first discussed. I don't mind having to set the course setter to read the headings, in fact i like having to do the proper steps.

It's just that it's hard to see and at the same time fly the aircraft with its lack of aileron trim, so i pause my freetrack and move the camera with the mouse until i have the compass, the artificial horizon and a bit of the real horizon looking out of the cockpit in my view, otherwise the aircraft rolls and drifts off the heading while i'm setting it :-P

If we had a "look at compass" key it would be much simpler:
Press key to glance at compass, release key to go back to normal cockpit view. Now start rotating the course setter to the appropriate direction while looking outside the window and flying the aircraft. Press key again to glance at compass and see if any further corrections are needed, release key and keep flying. Then it's easy to set the directional gyro.

Heck, it would even be easy to use the course setter like a, well, course setter: say you want to fly a heading of 120 to Dunkirk, rotate it until it points to 120 and then turn until the compass coincides with it (the reverse process of obtaining the compass read-out).

So, my +1 vote for a "look at compass" command ;-)

RoF does this rather well, where you can assign various views to different instruments in the cockpit.

I don't know, imo a further 'look at X' option would confuse things. On the other hand, while I've pledged for a heading par formerly, that's how the compass is supposed to be used... I'm undecided.

All things considered you fly enough missions you start to recognize the land and the compass becomes irrelevant. Forget way-points. I know where I'm going! :D I only use it for fine tuning an approach but overall I know where France and England are located. :)

excellent idea

hmm indeed ! but when the weather comes your gona be a bit screwed lol

and +1 great idea OP. id go as far as suggesting this for all numericaly indicated aircraft statistics.

+1, I find this really difficult at the moment.

I was under the impression when I put my mouse cursor over the compass it does show the heading, of course in a Hurricane of Spitfire you have to set the gyro compass first to the correct heading, I as well get all other data shown from instruments tooltip-style when I move my mouse over them.
I am going to verifiy and post back if I am wrong.

Just took a screenshot.

Your right and this is easier to setup when your the ground but once air and you do some tight turn the gyro goes out and you have to do another setup and this a lot harder to do because you can't move the joystick out of the way and this is one of the main season i what a compass heading so i can re-dial in the gyro

NedLynch,
you're right, the directional gyro shows its direction in a tooltip and that's good how it is (damn, is the Blen's gyro compass hard to read...)
However, people here are talking about the magnetic compass, used for calibrating the gyro (it's done automatically on airstart, so you may not be aware of that). There, the tooltip shows the manually-adjusted value of the selector ring, which is brought in line with the compass needle to get the magnetic heading. And that's the hard part: the needle, as well as the entire magnetic compass is hard to see.

My newest suggestion would be: Make an insert of the compass, in a straight-down view, into the "look at panel" view. It could be animated to roll in neatly into the lower-left corner, or whereever it fits.

How about a setting that turns off the Control Column graphic?

Don't really need to see a stick waggling around in front of you. I'd rather see the instruments and I can't believe anyone really fires the guns using the mouse cursor in the spadegrip button.

Or just move the spadegrip down the screen out if the way?

Or why not add heading info to an info window?

I can see revs, speed, temp and even if I've killed the stuka gunner but I can't see which heading I'm on......

True when you put your mouse pointer on the compass the magnetic one it give you the heading. But not the true one!

I pleaded for that, too, in the beginning. But growing user-wisdom says it's actually already possible to re-create such an il2-style window. Have a look at the FMB-Forum... I forgot in which topic it was :(