Heathrow (EGLL) SMR "Dark Mode"

[luke11brown]

Summary of issue/change

New SMR system in use @ EGLL.

Adjust SMR regions, geo and labels to match.

Reference (amendment doc/official source/forum) incl. page number(s)

https://www.indracompany.com/sites/default/files/innova_integratedtowersyst_en_baja_1.pdf https://www.indracompany.com/en/noticia/london-heathrow-goes-operational-indras-latest-generation-smgcs

Affected areas of the sector file (if known)

\Airports\EGLL\SMR\Geo.txt \Airports\EGLL\SMR\Labels.txt \Airports\EGLL\SMR\Regions.txt

[PLM1995]

Ooooooh, exciting!!! Probably best to wait until #3332 is merged before editting the SMR files (to avoid any messy conflicts) :)

[PLM1995]

Does anyone know: Why are some taxiway centre-lines drawn and not others? Is it to do with this being an "integrated" system, not just an SMR? And how do people want to handle it for the VATSIM sector file? Should we have taxiway centre-lines or not? If we do, which ones should we include? Personal opinion: They don't add any information, would be time-consuming to create and keep updated, and make the sector file larger than necessary.

I assume we want to keep stand and hold labels, even though they don't exist real-world? I guess the more hard-core controllers could turn them off anyway if they chose.

A wider/full reference image to work from would be ideal. Does anyone have one or can get one? (I'm thinking specifically about how far the SMR extends east of the eastern edge of A.)

Looks like the current .kmz is very out-of-date (and in many places inaccurate), so if there's a more up-to-date version floating around anywhere that would be very handy :)

[luke11brown]

The yellow lines indicate A380/Code F able taxiways AD-2-EGLL-2-3 refers. I would class this as useful info and would therefore include it.

Keep the stand labels, however, I would change the stand areas from their current shade of green into outlines. as is depicted.

The KMZ is likely out of date as WIP areas have sometimes just been drawn using the .sline command in EuroScope. Areas such as the green stand regions were all a mish mash of previous SMRs, so yes, I imagine it's a bit of a mess.

In summary:

• Edit the regions and associated colours to look like the reference image. (Regions.txt)
• Draw yellow taxiway centrelines to depict Code F/A380 taxiways. (Geo.txt)
• Edit the colour/position of hold lines where required. (Geo.txt)
• Adjust Labels as required as they may not work well with the new colour scheme.

[PLM1995]

The yellow lines indicate A380/Code F able taxiways AD-2-EGLL-2-3 refers. I would class this as useful info and would therefore include it.

Oh that actually makes a lot of sense, they do add useful info then, ta! May be worth mentioning this when it gets released, so people are aware of the significance, and don't complain some bits are missing haha.

Keep the stand labels, however, I would change the stand areas from their current shade of green into outlines. as is depicted.

Yep, was planning that!

The KMZ is likely out of date as WIP areas have sometimes just been drawn using the .sline command in EuroScope. Areas such as the green stand regions were all a mish mash of previous SMRs, so yes, I imagine it's a bit of a mess.

Yeah, the WIP I added in #3334, but the vast majority of stands are missing. The ones that aren't are in the wrong places anyways, so I'm basically re-doing the entire .kmz :P Should keep me out of mischeif for a day or two haha.

In summary:

* Edit the regions and associated colours to look like the reference image. (Regions.txt)

* Draw yellow taxiway centrelines to depict Code F/A380 taxiways. (Geo.txt)

* Edit the colour/position of hold lines where required. (Geo.txt)

* Adjust Labels as required as they may not work well with the new colour scheme.

Sounds good!!! Thanks for the clarification.

[PLM1995]

I have now had a crack at this. See below an image of my work-in-progress state.

Note: There are known issues with this; most noteably I haven't re-positioned the labels yet.

I want to get people's opinions on a few things:

1. Is there a reason the link labels are included as seperate free-text items? This means they use the free-text colour set in the symbology for the .prf, which in the 2020-14 CP is blue-ish per the above image. (Blue is used presumably so the airspace base labels match the airspace boundaries on the APP displays.) To me, it would make more sense to include the link labels as regular labels in Labels.txt, allowing customisation of their colour, independant of they symbology, in the same way stand and hold labels are individually coloured. Do many/any people leave the disabled? I think they're off by default in the CP, but in my opinion they're very handy.

2. What colour is best for the stand and hold labels? The above image is using 'standhold', which I think is relatively bright, perhaps a more subtle grey??? Then again, it does display pretty clearly against the grey backgrounds, so maybe it's good as it? The links in blue actually kinda suit the overall colour scheme imo, so I could even make the stand and hold labels match the link labels?

3. Are the 'L' and 'R' stand labels necessary? In my opinion they're pretty cluttering, especially where they over-lap the 'central' stand number label. I do see that they add information, just they also make some of the other information harder to read imo.

4. I'm thinking I might 'stagger' the stand numbers where they're adjacent horizontally on small stands (e.g. 223-226 and 519-527), so they don't overlap each other as much. Obviously overlaping is dependant on SMR orientation, but I think 99% of people would use either true north or runway aligned (0.3 degrees), so this might improve readability of these labels for most users?

As ever, any other comments/thoughts/suggestions about the WIP welcome!

Peter

[hazzas-99]

This looks very nice!

1. Yes, having the Links on is cheating and unrealistic - unfortunately, if they’re added as Labels then they appear under Freetext -> SCT2 (an all or nothing affair), so there is no way to easily turn them off/on. In the past, I tend to have them on whenever I come back from a controlling ‘break’ until I’ve learnt them again, then I turn them off.

2. I’m indifferent

3. Yes - people don’t generally know where the L and Rs are / are not, but they can be very useful in events. I know I’ve just said it’s unrealistic to have links on, but I think knowing where L/R stands are is a step too far 😄

4. Makes sense!

[PLM1995]

Cheers for your thoughts Harry.

1/2. You could say all labels are cheating :P Holds and stands aren't on RW either, not just links haha. But I do get your point, it just allows for customisation of your level of cheatage ;) Only issue is the normal freetext colour being symbology not statically defined. So maybe the best option is to make the statically defined labels match the default symbology colour? The blue looks pretty nice I think, as long as it's visible enough for everyone?

3/4. Yeah, OK, I'll just have a play with their positions to see if I can minimise overlap then.

So something like this perhaps?

[cbyworth]

Firstly. That looks great. Well done.

Secondly, whilst I like this shade of blue personally, the contrasts isn't great for those whose vision is impaired. However, the white is too much contrast for my personal preference so perhaps a slightly brighter shade of blue might be nice? We can could change the default free-text definition in the profiles as well if needed.

[PLM1995]

Secondly, whilst I like this shade of blue personally, the contrasts isn't great for those whose vision is impaired. However, the white is too much contrast for my personal preference so perhaps a slightly brighter shade of blue might be nice?

Yeah, I'm not vision impared, so idk what's good or bad in this regard. But given the freetext is being drawn on black on the SMR, and the same colour is being drawn on black on the Radar ASRs, maybe it needs changing across the board if it does need changing? I think the links matching the other labels would be good personally, but they could also be different colours since they're labelling different things. Personally, while testing this out controlling, I like the blue labels, they're relatively subtle so son't distract too much, but easy enough for me to see. I'm absolutely all for inclusivity if they're not visible enough though! I guess the colour is based on the real world radar displays?

[PLM1995]

I've had a play with a few colour options for the labels (see below).

I guess we probably need the opinions of people who are visualy impared to know what works best? Or people can give me an R-G-B and I can try it out, given there's so many options for an R-G-B colour!

Ref	SMR View	R-G-B	.sct
A - Current freetext		000-120-120	7895040
B - Twice as bright		000-240-240	15790080
C - In between		000-180-180	11842560
D - Green		000-180-000	46080
E - Pastal Pink		180-120-120	7895220

[cbyworth]

So with all the labels set to 0,120,120 it actually looks much clearer! I'd stick with that. Perhaps my concerns about contrast were due to the white labels being adjacent, blah blah relative hue etc...

[hazzas-99]

I think I’m actually in favour of C - how best to get some colour experts on board do we think? A widespread poll may just end up getting the option that looks nicest over an option that looks nice and is more accessible...

[cpawley]

You could check how they might look for users with a colour deficiency using something like https://www.color-blindness.com/coblis-color-blindness-simulator/

[TheoBearman]

I am also a fan of C!

[kye-taylor]

C Looks amazing, Good work so far!

[PLM1995]

Thanks very much for everyone's comments on this. I have now opened the PR (#3351). It uses option 'C', since that seemed the most popular, and looks fine (to me) for all types of colour-blindness in the colour-blindness emulator Chris linked.

That said, it would be a very quick and simple to change to using a different colour if it is not clear enough for anyone!

Thanks, Peter

[GeekPro101]

C looks best imo.

[Bucklerz]

I am in fact colour blind, and while I'm a fan of E, C is the one for me 👌