Hi All,
As part of a regular check-in with our users I’d like to know which QGC features / functionality you might want but is not there today. Important: There is no guarantee that any of it will be implemented. We have limited resources in the core dev team. But I want to find out if there are low hanging fruits we don’t know yet about or if there is a big feature missing that almost everybody agrees should be a priority.
Thanks!
-Lorenz
Last time we used MP instead of QGC because we wanted to see EKF/Vibration levels from APM at once. I’ve seen there is a vibration widget, however EKF info is still missing.
Oh, and really wanted feature by me:
QGC should request data streams from APM autopilot again when it was rebooted and a connection is still active.
Currently only heartbeats are coming in this case but HUD and other data are not updated.
Direct Gimbal control support upstream (via mavlink - we can pass on some details about this if needed).
Adsb dongle support (currently only supported via onboard Adsb)
Importing maps (can only import maps that were exported by qgc can be imported).
Locking access to parameters (with a password pane). Biggest thing we’ve seen is people changing things they shouldn’t and often by accident.
More control over the checklist (should be able to be specific although that might be a wip already).
Use only degrees during landing convention. % and degrees intermixed is chaos for people who don’t know what the difference is and how to convert from radians etc. one thing only to be consistent.
Scaling min speed by actual mtow from baseline - we have extensive testing on this and the backend math done for ourselves but would be great for other users to use and put into qgc.
Much more clarity (toggle) in the planning view on what the flight plan estimate will be when taking turning radius into account since we are rounding things out while flying.
Wind estimates pulled in from any of the public sources. Good for people to know that don’t have a anemometer.
Illustrate (just with a number or letter) which gps unit is being used for multi gps enabled systems.
Probably a lot more out there. That’s just off the top of my head.
Be able to import KML files. The ability to save KML is there, but not importing. thanks.
I’ve heard this one quite a few times, but I keep thinking it sounds like it should be more of a firmware level feature that actually locks the parameters (or subset), rather than the illusion of security. Thoughts?
I’m of two minds about it because you’re right, 99% of things don’t ever need people to touch once set correctly. But what about things like min speed if your weight is much higher. That’s the issue in my head. There are certain things, in often changing cases that do need to be changed and how do we block access to certain things and not just all (easily)? Another example is wind. When it’s windy landing with less flare is a safer bet but that needs the max flare param set.
Brings me to another thing to add to qgc - we could have some landing profiles. Probably just Normal and Windy. Maybe land a little faster and less pitch on the windy one but whatever preset you want. That would help because almost always need to assess that during a real flight pre takeoff.
Tracking! Support for a tracker like in mission planner. That one would be great since now the only way Is to build everything stand-alone and then send mav data wirelessly over to the ground station for control. That one gives mission planner a big one up which I find annoying since no px4 support. I messed with it on qgc awhile back and could sort of see it work but it needs real integration.
Few other desired features:
P.S. I’d also participate in QGC development but for some reason it is very hard to reach developers team. It would be great to know where is the primary place (Discuss or Slack or whatever) where I can ask related questions.
Unify Plan and Fly screens. Should really only need 1 map screen with the side toolbar changing between Fly and Plan modes. Top status bar should always be visible.
I have a much longer list that I may try to condense into this discussion when I have more time.
Speed and Altitude should be part of the always displayed info. Either in the top toolbar or part of the ARHS cluster. Ideally the Values widget would not be needed tor 90% of users.
Better QGC and vehicle status and interaction would be huge. Many topics out there but this one is a good starting place:
With regards to hiding the parameters, QGC already supports custom plugins that allow an “advanced mode” and a “standard” mode. The standard mode has whatever custom items turned off/hidden you program it to be. Advanced mode is basically the full QGC. Maybe there could be a community consensus about what would be hidden in a upstream standard build and a mechanism for how to enable/disable would need to be determined.
Better camera triggering near the edges of surveys:
I’m a little late, but I would like to see PX4 and QGC able to use MAVProxy to communicate with the Pixhawk like Ardupilot does. This would also add the capability for us to run Python programs on a Raspberry Pi and control the Pixhawk using MAVProxy.
Thanks,
Joe
You can import KML files to create either a Survey or a Corridor Scan. You can also import KML files to define Geo Fences.