X4-SimPit

Simulated Cockpit Telemetry: Get ship telemetry data from X4: Foundations to connect to your home cockpit.

This collects data from X4: Foundations and converts it to a format similar to the well known Elite Dangerous Status as described on https://elite-journal.readthedocs.io/en/latest/Status%20File/

The following events are (to some extend) implemented:

• Status
• Commander
• Loadout
• ShipTargeted

I wrote this to connect X4: Foundations to my simulated home cockpit (https://SimPit.dev) to bring my status indicators and my Primary Flight Display to live when flying around in my favourite Space Pew Pew sandbox.

Maybe it is of use for others too. Probably not. Anyway here goes.

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Requirements

Setting up the required game extension is out of the scope of this but this basically builds on the work of SirNukes Mod Support APIs (see https://github.com/bvbohnen/x4-projects/releases). I wrote this for Linux PC though and this requires (for now) my special branch of the SirNukes Mod Support APIs extension as described here: https://github.com/bekopharm/x4-projects/wiki/Quick-manual

Windows users can probably just use this but editing the pipe_external.txt file may be required.

I am looking for testers for both!

Installation

Clone this repository to the game/extensions/ folder.

$ cd /path/to/X4_Foundations/game/extensions/
$ git clone https://github.com/bekopharm/x4-simpit

And launch the game. The new extension Simulated Cockpit Telemetry should show up in the Extensions menu and a (socket|NamedPipe Server) should start (see above) on game launch.

Windows

You have to download and run the additional mediator application X4_Python_Pipe_Server. This is the file that starts the pipe in the end. See https://github.com/bvbohnen/x4-projects/releases and pick the ZIP file sn_x4_python_pipe_server_exe or sn_x4_python_pipe_server_py according to the description.

• Visit https://github.com/bvbohnen/x4-projects/releases
• Click "Show all assets" at the bottom
• Download sn_x4_python_pipe_server_exe_v ZIP
• Extract ZIP
• Run it and note down where it created the permissions.json file.
• Edit that permissions.json file with Editor.exe or Notepad++ (NOT Word!) so it looks somewhat like this and restart the X4_Python_Pipe_Server again (so it reads the file again):

{
    "instructions": "Set which extensions are allowed to load modules, based on extension id (in content.xml).",
    "ws_2042901274" : True,
    "x4-simpit" : True
}

Make sure this is a valid json file.

The pipe should become available on \\.\pipe\x4simpit' when loading a savegame in X4 from this point on.

Linux

Check out my linux-compat branch of the SirNukes Mod Support APIs extension as described here: https://github.com/bekopharm/x4-projects/wiki/Quick-manual

One installed:

• Launch X4 and start any savegame (mods will not be loaded before)
• Open option menu
• => Extensions Options
• => Named Pipes API
• => Pipe Prefix Linux
• Enter absolute path to savegame folder

My saves are under /home/beko/.config/EgoSoft/X4/save (GOG version) or /home/beko/.config/EgoSoft/X4/6336528/save (Steam version). You have to adjust that path!

Now restart X4 and load any game again. A socket should spawn at ~/.config/EgoSoft/X4/save/x4simpit.xml. You can quickly test if it starts spamming data using netcat:

nc -U ~/.config/EgoSoft/X4/save/x4simpit.xml

The linux-compat version does not need another mediator application. It raises the socket files itself on savegame load.

Deinstallation

Just remove the x4-simpit folder from /path/to/X4_Foundations/game/extensions/ again.

This does not affect game saves so any former saves should be fine (the modified tag will however not vanish again, of course, but that is from what I can tell not the fault of x4-simpit).

Run X4 for debug/development

Have some ideas how this may look:

./X4 -nosoundthrottle -nocputhrottle -skipintro -debug scripts -logfile debuglog.txt -scriptlogfile scriptlog.txt