Re: Any W&B calculators that work in 640x480 on HP4700 PDA?

[Jose[_1_]]

> I am after a simple W&B calculator for a PDA, with a few E6B
> calculations (density altitude, say) but nothing else.

Try CoPilot, for the palm. It does more than just w&b, but you don't
have to use it. IT is outstandingly excellent though.

Jose
--
"Never trust anything that can think for itself, if you can't see where
it keeps its brain." (chapter 10 of book 3 - Harry Potter).
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

[Jose[_1_]]

> I used to use CoPilot on a *Palm* and it was exactly what I am now
> after, but the HP4700 is Pocket/PC.

Alas and alak.

If it can run excel, you can dummy one up pretty quickly. There is one
at http://www.flying20club.org. At the top, click on "our aircraft",
then at the bottom of that prose, click on any of the actual aircraft.
There are "bring up spreadsheet" links I've set up for our aircraft.
The "new style" one has the graph.

You are welcome to use them as templates, download the spreadsheet and
update it with your own aircraft info, and TEST it. The lawyers are
going to make me emphasize that it is YOUR responsibility to ensure that
your W&B is correct, and that this spreadsheet implies no legal
obligation or liability on our part.

But you knew that.

Jose
--
"Never trust anything that can think for itself, if you can't see where
it keeps its brain." (chapter 10 of book 3 - Harry Potter).
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

[Tim Ward]

"Jose" > wrote in message
t...
>
> If it can run excel, you can dummy one up pretty quickly.
(etc etc)

I'm missing something here. Unless I've completely misunderstood the
context, W&B for a light single is a couple of minutes with pencil and
paper. What's the need for computer gadgets?

--
Tim Ward - posting as an individual unless otherwise clear
Brett Ward Limited - www.brettward.co.uk
Cambridge Accommodation Notice Board - www.brettward.co.uk/canb
Cambridge City Councillor

[[email protected]]

In rec.aviation.owning Tim Ward > wrote:
> "Jose" > wrote in message
> t...
> >
> > If it can run excel, you can dummy one up pretty quickly.
> (etc etc)

> I'm missing something here. Unless I've completely misunderstood the
> context, W&B for a light single is a couple of minutes with pencil and
> paper. What's the need for computer gadgets?

Well, no one NEEDS a powered lawn mower either.

It is a matter of convience.

A decent utility is usually faster than pencil and paper and less error
prone.

A graphical display give you a better feel for where you are in the
envelope.

Ones like copilot that are integrated in the planning will show you
your WB on the ramp, TO, and landing automatically, which is a big
plus for some aircraft.

The speed of doing the calculations makes it easier to shuffle people,
baggage, and fuel to get within the envelope.

--
Jim Pennino

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[John R. Copeland]

"Tim Ward" > wrote in message ...
> "Jose" > wrote in message
> t...
>>
>> If it can run excel, you can dummy one up pretty quickly.
> (etc etc)
>
> I'm missing something here. Unless I've completely misunderstood the
> context, W&B for a light single is a couple of minutes with pencil and
> paper. What's the need for computer gadgets?
> --
> Tim Ward
>

Peter, the original poster, didn't specify a light single.
I don't know about Peter, but I fly a light twin, with five fuel tanks,
four baggage locations, and three rows of seats.
I use my own, purpose-written Excel spreadsheet in my PDA,
for both weight AND balance, on virtually every flight,
except for occasional flights without baggage or passengers.
With the spreadsheet, I juggle baggage locations for balance,
and I adjust fuel load to stay within max-gross weight limits.
For me, it saves much more than "a couple of minutes with pencil...".

[john smith]

> I'm missing something here. Unless I've completely misunderstood the
> context, W&B for a light single is a couple of minutes with pencil and
> paper. What's the need for computer gadgets?

Six seats, four fuel tanks, fore and aft baggage compartments.
Calculate hourly W&B for fuel burn, adjust pax seat postions to allow
best outcome.

[Tim Ward]

> wrote in message
...
>
> A graphical display give you a better feel for where you are in the
> envelope.

Well, if you're doing it with pencil and paper you've got the graph in the
POH in front of you anyway, so you know exactly where you are in the
envelope.

> The speed of doing the calculations makes it easier to shuffle people,
> baggage, and fuel to get within the envelope.

Yes, if you have that many options. Like I said, maybe I was missing the
context - if you've got something with lots of seats and lots of fuel tanks
and the option of carrying a non-trivial amount of baggage then that's
beyond weekend local flying in a 172.

--
Tim Ward - posting as an individual unless otherwise clear
Brett Ward Limited - www.brettward.co.uk
Cambridge Accommodation Notice Board - www.brettward.co.uk/canb
Cambridge City Councillor

[Tim Ward]

"john smith" > wrote in message
...
>> I'm missing something here. Unless I've completely misunderstood the
>> context, W&B for a light single is a couple of minutes with pencil and
>> paper. What's the need for computer gadgets?
>
> Six seats, four fuel tanks, fore and aft baggage compartments.
> Calculate hourly W&B for fuel burn, adjust pax seat postions to allow
> best outcome.

Ah! That explains the desire not to do it with pencil and paper.

--
Tim Ward - posting as an individual unless otherwise clear
Brett Ward Limited - www.brettward.co.uk
Cambridge Accommodation Notice Board - www.brettward.co.uk/canb
Cambridge City Councillor

[[email protected]]

In rec.aviation.owning Tim Ward > wrote:
> > wrote in message
> ...
> >
> > A graphical display give you a better feel for where you are in the
> > envelope.

> Well, if you're doing it with pencil and paper you've got the graph in the
> POH in front of you anyway, so you know exactly where you are in the
> envelope.

Well, yes after you plot your calculations on the graph.

However, if you put the actual points on the graph, you'd better be
using copies or the graph is going to get really tattered after a
while.

> > The speed of doing the calculations makes it easier to shuffle people,
> > baggage, and fuel to get within the envelope.

> Yes, if you have that many options. Like I said, maybe I was missing the
> context - if you've got something with lots of seats and lots of fuel tanks
> and the option of carrying a non-trivial amount of baggage then that's
> beyond weekend local flying in a 172.

I doubt most people do a WB for weekend local flying in anything as the
conditions are probably the same as they were the last 50 times they
did it.

The situations where a WB tool becomes handy is when the brother-in-law
and his wife show up and you need to juggle fuel or if you have one of
those A/C where you can take off within the envelope, burn fuel, and
be out of the envelope.

Some people find such tools handy, if you don't, don't use one.

--
Jim Pennino

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[Roy N5804F]

Here is a link.
http://www.pocketgear.com/software_detail.asp?id=20713&associateid=9

And to the person who likes pen and paper - It's 2006 !

Now where is that fireproof suit !

--
Roy
Piper Archer N5804F

"Tim Ward" > wrote in message
...
>
> "john smith" > wrote in message
> ...
>>> I'm missing something here. Unless I've completely misunderstood the
>>> context, W&B for a light single is a couple of minutes with pencil and
>>> paper. What's the need for computer gadgets?
>>
>> Six seats, four fuel tanks, fore and aft baggage compartments.
>> Calculate hourly W&B for fuel burn, adjust pax seat postions to allow
>> best outcome.
>
> Ah! That explains the desire not to do it with pencil and paper.
>
> --
> Tim Ward - posting as an individual unless otherwise clear
> Brett Ward Limited - www.brettward.co.uk
> Cambridge Accommodation Notice Board - www.brettward.co.uk/canb
> Cambridge City Councillor
>
>
>

[John T[_2_]]

"Peter" > wrote in message

>
> Unfortunately, Flytebalance (just installed & uninstalled it) is hard
> coded for 320x240... same as nearly everything around.

Actually, it's not hard-coded. :)

However, the .NET Compact Framework 1.1 doesn't automatically resize various
graphical controls when running apps on a VGA screen. Installing the .NET
Compact Framework v2 resolves that issue.

Thanks for trying it, though!

I'm not just a satisfied user. I'm the author. :)

--
John T
http://sage1solutions.com/blogs/TknoFlyer
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[Juan Jimenez[_1_]]

"Peter" > wrote in message
...
> In case anyone is interested, I settled on FlightCalc. It does the
> whole job OK.
>
> It has a European airports database which seems OK for the UK but
> elsewhere a load of smaller airports are missing. Anyway, I don't need
> this.
>
> Like most pocket/pc apps it is still hard coded for 320x240 but
> curiously its W&B graph comes up in full 640x480. It is much easier to
> use in 320x240 though.
>
> A lot of the other progs need Micro$oft NET framework version 1,2, or
> 3 and installing that overflows the memory on the PDA... The HP 4700
> is not exactly low-end so I don't know why programmers need to use
> these bloated software libraries (25MB) just to develop a trivial
> program like this.

..Net for the Windows mobile o/s is not nearly that big, Peter. The 4700 must
be an earlier model with low memory capacity.



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

[John T[_2_]]

Peter wrote:
>
> No pocket/pc applications I have seen actually resize their icons,
> i.e. none look the same in 640x480 as they do in 320x240. I think
> TomTom 5 gets closest to this, but then TT5 doesn't seem to use the
> standard pocket/pc graphical objects anyway.

As you've discovered, there are several ways to handle higher resolutions.
The underlying OS calls don't account for different screen sizes or
orientations. That's the developer's job. :)

For another non-aviation app, I actually did include 32x32 icons for when
the app was running in VGA mode for precisely the reason you mentioned
(image quality).

> I was unable to install .NET v2 on the HP4700 - the install crashes.
> It's a big object - the download is 25MB.

That's disappointing. I looked at the FlyteBalance code again just to be
sure and I definitely do not take resolution into account so the .NET CF v2
is most assuredly resizing the icons appropriately. (Under the hood, it
recognizes FlyteBalance and a v1.1 app and assumes control-resizling must be
needed.)

> I am not a Windows programmer but I guess a lot of people make the
> win32 API calls directly, rather than using .NET.

Yeah, see my first point above. :) Most PPC/SmartPhone apps are still C++,
but .NET is catching on quickly.

--
John T
http://sage1solutions.com/blogs/TknoFlyer
Reduce spam. Use Sender Policy Framework: http://openspf.org
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[Hilton]

Peter,

> The other thing, as I wrote, was that I would like something that runs
> in 640x480 mode. I did actually email everybody and so far only one,
> FlyteBalance, confirms that it does.

I seem to recall replying to your email(s). If not, sorry about that, but
yes, WingX will work with 640x480 and 480x640 (portrait/landscape).


> I don't like the manual way of working it out - especially if one is
> using the "slanted graph" representation where the x axis is the
> turning moment.

WingX 2.0 allows you to view the W&B graph by reference to weight or moment;
i.e. slanted and not slanted. FYI: WingX 2.0 also adds helicopter (lateral)
W&B.

Thanks,

Hilton

[John T]

"Peter" > wrote in message

>
> My HP4700 has 64MB of RAM & WM2003 SE v 4.21.1088 build 15045.2.6.0
>
> I do have a fair # of other apps on there already. 4.90MB is free
> (storage) and 8.38MB (programs). Not enough for .NET evidently.
> ...
> With the appropriate screen calls to get
> the current screen size, one can work in 640x480. But M$ is trying to
> get everybody to use .NET now. This may be OK on a PC (where the ~
> 150MB runtime is tolerable, and (like with Java) it's a fair
> assumption that most people will eventually have it) but on a PPC it
> is quite limiting. The latest .NET will eat up a lot of memory.


Just to clarify, the actual Compact Framework v2 installer is about 2MB in
size. The full download from Microsoft includes installers for several
different platforms, documentation, etc. that bloat its size.

Also, PocketPC 2003 and Windows Mobile 5 do ship with a version of the CF
installed, it's just that it's outdated. Windows Mobile 5 devices also don't
have a distinction between ROM and RAM.

--
John T
http://sage1solutions.com/blogs/TknoFlyer
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