Making icons work

[sblzei]

Hi folks,
I'm still a 2D panel aficionado and I like to design my own 2D when it is not available in downloaded airplanes, or modify existing ones to make them more realistic.

The problem i'm regularely running into is to make icons work.
Map, GPS, radio, icons are OK, but when I make a new window I can spend hours in trying open it with any of the icons contained in common icons files such as "simicons.cab" or "simicons 1924.cab".
I understand that a link must be established with the line " ident=xxx" in the panel.cfg, but I'm not able to find any parameter in the icon gauge file capable to do this. Additionally, how to avoid the risk of modifying ALL the applications of the same icon?

Is there any tutorial that explains the process or is there anybody willing to give me some hints?

Thank you

Ezio

[Chuck_Jodry-VJPL]

Make your own gauge ,(>K:PANEL_3) by changing the number to associate the popup you wish to have attached to the icon ( small bitmap )


<GAUGE Name="camera" Version="1.0">
<ELEMENT>
<GAUGE Name="camera" Version="1.0">
<ELEMENT>
i have included one to use as a template , change it to an XML file for use
</ELEMENT>
<MOUSE>
<CURSOR Type="Hand" />
<HELP id="" />
</MOUSE>
</GAUGE>
<HELP id="" />
</MOUSE>
</GAUGE>

[rdyoung]

I use CPT.ICONS (search for cptts1.2.zip on AVSIM) for additional panel windows. You can look through this collection to see how they are done and customize for your purposes if these do not work for you.

This package of lights and icons was originally designed for FS2002 but seem to work fine in FS2004 and FSX, so far anyway.

Rick

[Moparmike]

The trick is finding the enumerated value that each one of those icon gauges is calling for the PANEL_ID_TOGGLE variable...
Each one of those gauges calls a specific value for that variable and that value is what needs to be placed in the IDENT= field for the pop-up window that you want to call.

Example from the Compass Icon sub-gauge of SimIcons.cab:


<click>{click}75 (>K:PANEL_ID_TOGGLE){/click}</click>

This one will set that variable to "75", so if you've got a pop-up with 75 in the IDENT field it will be toggled when that gauge is used.

This one is from the Overhead Icon subgauge...


<click>{click}225 (>K:PANEL_ID_TOGGLE){/click}</click>
It will call any pop-up window with 225 in the IDENT= field.


So...long story short...
Open up the XML for the gauge that you're wanting to use and see what number is being used, then set the IDENT= field for the pop-up that you want to control to that value.


There are a few predefined text strings (MAIN_PANEL, GPS_PANEL, THROTTLE_PANEL, etc...) that can be used in the IDENT= field, but they just wind up calling a specific enumerated value just as if you would use that number instead. I don't have my list of those text strings handy at the moment though.

[sblzei]

Thank you all. :ernae:

Will try pretty soon

Ezio