PDFKneeboard
Every serious flight-simmer eventually ends up referring to charts for their flying adventures. Whether it's a VFR sectional or more likely an approach chart for self-study or while flying under virtual ATC services (e.g. in IVAO).
The best coverage and free source for those charts are PDF files available for download. Unless these pilots have a second screen to render those charts in heavyweight PDF-apps this means juggling the external application, fighting for screen estate and struggling to have flight-simulator as well as chart right at hand ... without getting into each others way.
Now - imagine PDFKneeboard - this flight-sim module renders PDF documents right inside the simulator. It remembers what part of the chart the pilot is looking at (section, zoom, rotation - for each page), it lets the simulator window keep the focus, remembers opened charts and offers various kneeboard-related key and button bindings. When the important instrument approach chart is needed a simply joystick button click or hotkey brings it right back where the pilot needs it.
PDFKneeboard is packaged in two versions - one for FS9/2004 (pdfkneeboard##.zip) and one for FSX SP2 (pdfkneeboard##X.zip)
Please follow the packaged installation instructions.
Find the kneeboard menu item in the modules menu inside MS Flight Simulator.
PDFKneeboard|Show Kneeboard - show kneeboard
PDFKneeboard|Hide kneeboard - hide kneeboard
PDFKneeboard|Open Document - open PDF document
PDFKneeboard|Close Document - close currently displayed PDF document
PDFKneeboard|Settings... - edit settings
The following keyboard shortcuts are pre-defined by default and available while the FS9 window is active (can be changed in settings):
K - toggle kneeboard visible/hidden (Note: ctrl-K in 0.9 beta)
Ctrl+O - open PDF document
Ctrl+W - close currently displayed PDF document
Ctrl+Shift+W - close all PDF documents
Ctrl+Tab - switch to next document
Ctrl+Shift+Tab - switch to previous document
Page Up - prev page (Note: not in 0.9 beta)
Page Down - next page (Note: not in 0.9 beta)
Ctrl+1+2+... - goto page 12...
Ctrl+= - zoom in (Note: not in 0.9 beta)
Ctrl+- - zoom out (Note: not in 0.9 beta)
Ctrl+0 - zoom to 100% (Note: not in 0.9 beta)
Use the following mouse actions to manipulate the kneeboard view (the mouse pointer has to hover over the PDFKneeboard window, the meaning of Ctrl can be changed in settings):
Mouse Wheel Up/Down - prev/next page
Ctrl+Mouse Wheel Up/Down - zoom in/out
Shift+Mouse Wheel Up/Down - counter/clockwise rotate page
This module contains code from the following products/projects:
- fitz/mupdf (source contains fixes/improvements by Krzysztof K made available as part of his SumatraPDF)
- freetype
- libjpeg
- zlib