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Display

The main, so-called map view of Cumulus consists of three information areas. These contain:
  1. the flight information
  2. a map
  3. a status bar
In addition, a menu bar may be raised above the display. This gives access to various setup menus and other options.

Flight information

The group of small windows on the left-hand side are (from top to bottom and left to right) as follows:

Of course all information is displayed in the units you selected in the Settings/Units dialog.

Map

The map displays a graphical representation of the current position (indicated by the intersection of the fuselage and wings of the glider symbol) and heading (indicated by the rotation of the glider symbol). If there is no GPS fix, Cumulus displays an X symbol instead of a glider. See under Manual Navigation for more details. The current scale is displayed in the lower left corner of the map.

If Cumulus is connected with a Flarm device and the current map scale is sufficiently low, the most important object reported by Flarm is also drawn on the map as a circle, labeled with the distance and the relative vertical separation. In the Flarm display menu a Flarm contact can be selected; this object will be displayed on the map too, if it is in view.

The map shows the terrain elevation using colours. The detail level of this display changes with the zoom factor: more zoom gives more detail in the terrain shapes. You can turn off the drawing of elevation on the Settings/Map Objects page.

Depending on the maps you installed, Cumulus displays airports (the type is indicated by the standard ICAO symbol), cities (yellow), highways (red/white), roads (red), railways (dark dashed line) and water (blue). Not all details are displayed at all zoom factors. Cumulus also displays airspace structures, the different types being indicated by different colours configurable under Settings/Airspaces. For basic information on an airport or airspace structure, simply touch the related symbol or area on the screen, when the info on the interesting object will appear in a pop-up window. The window disappears automatically after a certain time that can be configured in the Settings/Information menu.

If you touch on an airfield icon, you will get detailed information on this item. You can add an airfield to your waypoint list if it isn't in the list already. Added waypoints will have a normal priority.

Cumulus can calculate which airfields or waypoints are within reach. These airfields/waypoints have a green background to them. If you would arrive below the safety height, the point has a magenta background to it. The line to the currently selected waypoint is coloured to match, and will be in red if the waypoint is not within reach. The safety height margin is set at the Preflight Settings/Common page.

Status bar

The status bar displays the following items (from left to right):

The first item shows the mode Cumulus is operating in. If no GPS connection has been established (i.e., Cumulus is in Manual mode), G-0 will appear, otherwise G-N, where N is the number of satellites in use by the GPS receiver.

The next item in the status bar combines a logging and flight indicator. If IGC logging is enabled and running, the background is green, whereas if the logger is in standby mode (autostart), the background is yellow. A grey box means that the logger is not enabled. The flight status symbol is shown by one of the character symbols below:

The next item shows the number of received Flarm devices. If no Flarms are seen, F-0 will appear, otherwise F-N, where N is the number of received Flarms. Obviously this item is only visible if Cumulus is connected to a Flarm device.

The next item in the status bar indicates the current position in latitude and longitude.

The next item shows the glider selected.

The rest of the status bar is used to display warnings and other information.

If you want to maximize the screen area for the map display, you can disable the status bar via the menu entry Toggles/Statusbar.

Altitude display

The altitude display can present the aircraft's altitude relative to one of four different references. All are derived from the GPS altitude, unless pressure altitude information is being provided by an external device.

You can very easily change the altitude display reference: just tap on the display, and a configuration dialog is opened, where you can change the altitude reference, the unit, the height correction factor and the QNH. The height correction factor is used to compensate the difference between the altitude delivered by the GPS system and the true altitude. Both GPS and pressure altitudes often differ from the expected altitude.

Glide path

The glide path indicator gives you an estimate of whether or not your selected target is in range. This it calculates using the following parameters: It is assumed that you fly at the indicated best airspeed, S2f, for the currently-set McCready value. If, however, the indicator shows a negative value, you are below the glide path and the target is not within reach. If you are above the glide path, i.e., the target is reachable, you can probably fly a bit faster to reach it sooner, depending on the polar of your glider. The theoretical value of the speed to fly can be found by adjusting your McCready value in Mc until the glide-path indicator shows just slightly positive.

LD-Display

In addition to the glide path indicator you can check your situation with the LD display, too. A precondition for the LD calculation is likewise that you have selected a target, otherwise nothing is displayed. The LD display consists of two values, separated by a slash. On the left side is displayed the required LD to the selected target - normally this should show positive! The safety height margin and the elevation of the target are both taken into account in the calculation. On the right side of the slash is displayed the current LD achieved over the last 60s. If the current LD is higher than the required LD, you should be on a safe glide path to your selected target. If you have climbed or flown at the same altitude in the last 60s, the display shows a value like >99. If the calculation result is not sensible, a dash is shown in the display.

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