HOWTO: Radio Mayak, its back !!

This HOWTO demonstrates howto broadcast commercial radio station aka. Radio Mayak in DCSWorld. Tested with the Ka-50. Its per-mission.

What you need;

* Some mission editor experience.

* A tool which can create OGG-vorbis sound files (audacity, for example)

Steps;

1. Start Audacity. Create, or convert an appropriate sound file, of say.. 15 minutes playing time, save in OGG-format .

2. Start DCSWorld, choose mission editor.

3. Create a triggerzone 'RadioMayak' of 30km radius around Maykop airbase.

4. Create a once-off trigger '4 mission start'

* type=Coalition has aerodrome, aerodrome=Maykop Khanskaya

* action=flag 1, value=On

6. Create another Once Trigger, No Event, condition=Flag is true (1), then select Action-->

Radio transmission, then choose <<file you created>>, zone='Radio Mayak', value=FM, loop=on, frequency=103400, power=200

5. Add a Pilot flyable Ka-50 taking off from ramp at Maykop.

6. Save the mission.

7. Start the mission, tune radio to 103,400Mhz FM and.. low & behold.. RADIO MAYAK!!! :D:D

tested with Ka-50, might work with P-51D with adjustments to LUA-scripts.

Great idea, pappavis.

Only downside I see to this is the fact that the radio OGG file is mission centric, which means that you would have to include the soundtrack with every mission in which you included this feature. This would up the size of missions (not to mention download speeds for clients) and potentially distribute licensed media without authorization.

However, as a fan of Radio Mayak, I love the idea. Hopefully the folks who do MIST could code something like this, but with an external script that calls an open source media player and a playlist. This way, you would need only call the script in your mission with the 30km trigger zone to get it working again.

A few months ago, I decided to create a "radio station" that would resemble one of the GTA radio stations, basically. We could have fake adds for things like "Digital Combat Farming Simulator", or I could rip some fake adds from GTA; instead of ABC or CNN radio news, it would feature Onion radio news; instead of real songs, it would play stuff like "White and Nerdy". The radio's callsign would be WRZN, the Warzone. The sounds would be compressed using either a very high compression .ogg or a GSM .wav codec, so I could get about 30 or 40 minutes into 3 or less MB.

Anyway, this is all very doable, and could be a fun diversion for pilots on long ingress/egress flights.

Unfortunately, with all the other stuff I had going on, I was never able to finish it.

I love the idea given I owned every module but did not discover Mayak except after newer modules. Maybe ED feared copyright issues and trashed it because of that.

Now, if you could rig this up to an on-line radio station that would be great..

Well, even a trigger that can call a file or all files from a specific directory would enable the mission builder to use what is installed with DCS World... great to reduce miz file sizes and if ED or the community come up with a collection of royalty free music... :thumbup:

I like the RadioStream option as well.

Falcon BMS does something where a hidden menu in the UFC/DED will control a WinAmp playlist from within the game, even putting the track name in the DED. That sounds like too much to ask for with DCS, but the base implementation of a trigger calling an external media player and playing the current playlist might be just what the Doctor ordered. This way, we could choose our own radiostream, playlist, etc.

Now, if you could rig this up to an on-line radio station that would be great..

^^ this, would be awesome.

would be cool if one could open a TCP port using LUA, then push a stream to the DCS World engine.

Link it to my Pandora radio station and I am set! :)

Even just taking the IL-2 or Orbiter route of hooking it up to a folder where you could put your own collection of MP3s would be awesome. I feel like such a bum running a music player in the background.

Anyone know if you can get it to work with the A10?

I have only gotten it to work with the Ka50 so far.

Hmm, that's not that hard.

..and into the Radio Frequency simulation? Pleeease! That would be awesome!:thumbup:

... I feel like such a bum running a music player in the background.

Me too!

I was semi-joking about the Pandora thing, but it truly would be an awesome app if I could run it through the Ka-50.

I did a Cross-country flight last week with my station on and it was like going for a relaxing car ride. :)

would be cool if one could open a TCP port using LUA, then push a stream to the DCS World engine.

Hmm, that's not that hard.

..and into the Radio Frequency simulation? Pleeease! That would be awesome!:thumbup:

+1, Now this would be great, C0ff if you could get this included, it would be stunning. I think it was a real shame when we lost Radio mayak the first time round.

Cowboy10uk

Hmm, that's not that hard.

This way one could have TARS-like funcitonality in the sim itself.

This sort of thing currently works in IL2 by having sound files in a specified directory for a radio tower object and when your in the air you can tune in and its there playing away.

Why call external apps? As mentioned already above its a system that works fine.

Radio Mayak also works in DCS: UH-1H :)

A few months ago, I decided to create a "radio station" that would resemble one of the GTA radio stations, basically. We could have fake adds for things like "Digital Combat Farming Simulator", or I could rip some fake adds from GTA; instead of ABC or CNN radio news, it would feature Onion radio news; instead of real songs, it would play stuff like "White and Nerdy". The radio's callsign would be WRZN, the Warzone. The sounds would be compressed using either a very high compression .ogg or a GSM .wav codec, so I could get about 30 or 40 minutes into 3 or less MB.

 

Anyway, this is all very doable, and could be a fun diversion for pilots on long ingress/egress flights.

 

Unfortunately, with all the other stuff I had going on, I was never able to finish it.

GREAT IDEA RE: commercials. I just created a "radio station" in my test mission and like you said it made the mission over 60MB, I rendered it (in sony vegas) at the highest setting which I think was unnecessary. If you already have those commercials recorded I could use them.

Anyone know if you can get it to work with the A10?

I have only gotten it to work with the Ka50 so far.

Sure can, in whichever mission you'd like either do it the way indicated in the first post or (as I did) have one of your friendly units transmit a combined .WAV or .OGG file. So to be clear select unit,set freq (I set mine to 40 FM but any freq in the AM or FM will work),set transmit message,in the file box select your file. When you're in the pit tune to the same freq as set in the mission editor.

I used sony vegas to combine all the songs into one .OGG file but i'm sure there are free programs to do the same. Feel free to download my test mission and look at the unit labeled "radio" and see the options I have set. Tested with the hog, the shark, and the Huey.

Very cool! I did it with a test ogg file already in DCS World and it worked fine with the R-800.

I am not able to get it to work with the R-828... is it possible?

This works fine in SP, but if a client joins after the transmission has started it is not heard. I've tried with both the RADIO TRANSMISSION trigger and ground unit transmission.

Anyone been able to get it working in MP?

His example has the trigger as do once, I believe.. have you tried to edit that?

Very cool! I did it with a test ogg file already in DCS World and it worked fine with the R-800.

 

I am not able to get it to work with the R-828... is it possible?

You'd have to assign the "transmit message" to one of the preset channels in the R-828 radio. Off the top of my head i'm not sure what those channels are. I've not testing the radio station idea in MP so I'll get back to you that one. You may have to have multiple units broadcasting on diff channels for more than one player to pick it up? I'm not sure. Also if you have to tune to a channel besides 1 then you have to hold down the tune button on the R-828 radio to tune it to the new channel.

Normaly when we use TARS we use the R-828 for inflight comms and have the lead tuned into the intraflight R-800. I say the lead's too busy to hear music anyways :thumbup: