@james_pattison Thanks for pointing these out - and for working with the partners. I hope they will see the value of being more active in this manner.
The survey you referred to (and intend to do again) - was that geared to devs primarily or to Ardupilot users at large?
The only direct request for public feedback that I have seen recently was in a google docs survey last year prior to the developer meetup. @james_pattison posted it here: Have Your Say: a short questionnaire to help the Unconference shape ArduPilot. There were quite a few comments about mission planner from users, and that was part of the reason I havenât dropped the conversation. Itâs interesting that about 50% of the users who responded are hobby users.
I shared the link to a few groups on facebook to get more appeal. The posts looked like this:
@Implicit, I also donât understand why itâs so contentious⌠but Iâm following this thread to understand why we all have differing opinions. Like @camti said, itâs a concrete vision that should unite us, and right now we each have a different one.
It is contentious because the different users all have different needs. But the biggest point is that there is no they out there to do this type of work. You just donât seem to get that volunteers are what drive this type of organization beyond the core developers and it is not appropriate for the people with highly technical skill set to be managing user advisory committees etc.
So if you want it done you have to do it.
I think what I quoted before remains worth noting:
For this project to be sustainable, be trusted and relevant, I believe it has to grow and look towards new horizons. This is unlikely to work without a sharpened focus.
24 posts were split to a new topic: Funding/Donations to solving specific issues
Upon request of @Naterater the posts were moved to a new topic
Thank you for the clarification. I also hope that my stance can be clarified a little. Itâs no doubt my stance on how MP should be improved, however I do not blame anyone or hold anyone here accountable. Iâm not demanding that anything be dropped or re-prioritized, I can only suggest. I do, however, expect some communication to know whatâs going on and whatâs being planned. That helps me and everyone expand and focus their efforts without waste. If I go fully document MP right now, and then in a month it goes through this awesome change, you might see that everything must be re-done.
I think it would be great if there was more focus on finding more resources or personnel to support MP. I hope that @proficnc follows through and MP is actually focused on, but I still donât know. Just like an unstable market, thereâs little certainty without communication, and the volatility doesnât make it attractive to invest (contribute). I donât know if there is/was a search to have more people help on MP, and it didnât really appear on the roadmap.
I think that we already discuss the MP makeover many times and each time we donât manage to agree on something.
To be honest, I donât like it for 3 reasons : C#, not really cross platform, and a big mess inside its codebaseâŚ
Instead of a makeover, I would really love a clean new GCS that people can easily contribute too⌠But as always, that is not the same amount of works and knowledge (without speaking about the transition for user and branding or commercial mess)
Sorry, @khancyr I splitted the thread upon request of the original poster. Perhaps, if you feel appropriate, could you repost this message to the MP thread?
edit:
I splitted again here, per request of the requester
@khancyr that is invaluable information related to this thread. You appear to know whatâs going on a lot better than most of us. Said another way, Iâm hearing that itâs more worthwhile to start new than improve MP. Is that correct?
Is it really that much effort to change GUIâs?
Yep, that is my opinion. But as always, not everybody share the same point of view.
Moreover, the task to make people accept a lot of change at once is a real challenge⌠You can see that with chibios for example! People complain that it is a waste of effort, suddently find issue due to chibios(without reason), etc. Or you can still see people using old apm2.5 boardâŚ
Creating a new gui will be costly and need some guys that know gui development but should be a huge gain in future.
Agreed, I think it was a strategic mistake a long time ago not to support qgc but continue with a windows software.
100% agree with you
Corrado
We do support QGC.
As a little history, APMPlanner2 started out basically being a new UI over QGC, as users (at the time) preferred the Missionplanner interface. Both APMPlanner and QGC are valid cross-platform options (as is MAVProxy).
I think thereâs merit on having options for users. QGC is the option of choice if using iOS.
If this is the route that we end up going (QGC for user friendliness and cross-platform), then Iâll put more effort toward it instead of MP. I just really love MP features and wish it could really shine for everyone.
I canât use qgc because it doesnât support rc override so i canât use joystick with it. It does support manual but arducopter doesnât support buttons in manual.
You could always ask for that feature over there: http://discuss.px4.io/c/qgroundcontrol/qgroundcontrol-developers
Already did, they say it is arducopter that should support manual including buttons and i already asked here if it is possible to work with them to solve the issue but never got anywhere.
It looks like even is Ardupilot supports manual (for joystick) it doesnât release the button usage, so if you try to configure joystick in QGC it says buttons are reserved for firmware.
Hello,
@anon67614380 could you open an issue about that on ardupilot github. It shouldnât be long to make a an AP_Virtual_Joystick class that implement and handle both rc_override and manual control.
Ok done. Hope will work