Selection dialog filters in the new user interface

Ryan Douglas

Administrator
Staff member
Past versions of RealFlight have offered some minimal filtering options in selection dialogs, particularly the Quick Select (vs. the MFC dialog from the main menu). RealFlight Evolution expands this idea with a much more powerful set of filters that you can apply to aircraft, airport, and scenario selection dialogs. I'd like to point these out because I think they're incredibly useful and I think a lot of you will also enjoy having them.

Let's use selecting an aircraft as an example.

First, open the Free Play --> Aircraft menu.
RF Evo filters_1.png

Then, click the "Show Filter" button or press Ctrl-F on your keyboard to open the filters.
RF Evo filters_2.png

The default sorting is by name, but you can click that to select a different option.
RF Evo filters_2b.png

You can also enter text in the "Filter By Name" box which is useful if you only know part of the name of the thing you're looking for and aren't sure what it starts with, or if you want to see all the E-flite models for example.

Scroll down to see more filtering options.
RF Evo filters_3.png

And the rest:
RF Evo filters_4.png

You can combine the above however you see fit. After you've made your selections, simply click the "Hide Filter" button or press Ctrl-F again on your keyboard to go back to the standard selection dialog and see your updated results.
 
My comments are aimed more at basic navigation within RF Evolution. Why reinvent the wheel here for the main menu selections? While the use of a different approach for filtering may be great, this could have been done without eliminating the menu bar for basic navigation. Anyone that has ever used a Microsoft Windows PC expects there to be a menu bar (and right mouse click to context sensitive selections). The menu bar in RF9.5 worked great and conformed to the Windows programming style. Eventually people will maybe figure out this approach but RF just burdened themselves with a huge unnecessary support load. At the very least, RF should have had a PDF users manual available at release.

For me, the 'old style' menu bar is quicker and easier to navigate. Wish there was an option to select 'menu bar' or 'Evolution navigation approach'.
 
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