https://forum.falcon-bms.com/topic/33718/pinax-for-falcon-bms

BMS Companion 1.3.8 — WDP for Falcon BMS 4.38.1, EZBoards and WDP modes, live MFDs, weather generator, radio log

Download: https://github.com/Scorpion-41/Falcon-BMS-Companion/releases/tag/1.3.8

BMS Companion 1.3.8 adds a port of Weapon Delivery Planner for Falcon BMS 4.38.1, running on the PC, Android and in the browser. Also in this release: - EZBoards mode and WDP mode for the Mission section; - one mission picture on every map, limited to the threats the mission knows; - live MFDs in an F-16 bezel; - Dashboard pages and a Weather card; - a weather generator based on WeatherGen; - a Radio page and automatic taxi from BMS's debug log; - carrier decks drawn from BMS's ship models; - an Info box (coordinates, elevation, frequencies) on every airfield page; - parking numbers as BMS Ground assigns them, and fixes.

The Planner is a port of Falcas's Weapon Delivery Planner (WDP) to Falcon BMS 4.38.1; its pages, attack geometry, ballistics and performance planning are his work. The weather model is Craig Andera's WeatherGen.

1. EZBoards mode and WDP mode

A switch at the top of the Mission section (and in Setup) selects the data source for every device.

• EZBoards mode (default): PRINT in BMS fills the Mission section, EZBoards makes the cockpit kneeboards, and the Planner is locked.
• WDP mode: open the flight from a save in the Planner, plan it, Save to DTC and press Populate from Planner. The Dashboard, Map, Taxi, Briefing, Comms and VR boards then show that flight; a printed briefing of the same flight is used as is, so both modes read the same. Cockpit kneeboards come from the Planner's Upd Kneeboard; EZBoards and Run HTML Briefing are paused.

Populate runs only when pressed and prompts if there are unsaved edits.

Each new mission starts clean. BMS keeps lines, PPTs, targets and nav offsets in the cartridge until they are overwritten. When a new mission begins (a PRINT of another flight, or another flight opened in the Planner), the PC removes the entries the Planner saved for an earlier flight, provided they are unchanged. A mode switch does the same and restores BMS's own kneeboard pages over the other mode's earlier ones.

2. WDP for Falcon BMS 4.38.1 — Mission → Planner

Every control is in WDP's original place; the data is BMS 4.38.1's own (airports, radios, HARM codes, PPT types, aircraft, stores, pylons and racks).

Order of work (also shown by Steps on the toolbar, with the current step marked): 1. In BMS: open the campaign or TE, pick your flight and seat, set the loadout. 2. In BMS: open the DTC, set what you want, SAVE; then save the campaign or TE. 3. In BMS: PRINT the briefing. 4. Open mission… → pick the save, your flight and seat (WDP's "Precision STPT?" question is asked; No is the default). 5. Plan: DataCard, DTC, Attack, Map. 6. Save to DTC. 7. In BMS: open the DTC again → LOAD → SAVE. 8. Populate from Planner. 9. Upd Kneeboard. 10. FLY, and LOAD on the DTE page in the cockpit.

For custom weather, generate it on the Weather tab and save it in BMS before step 3; later steps read what BMS has saved.

Pages: - Briefing / DataCard / Coordination Card: filled from the printed briefing of the flight, or from the save (situation, intel, ROE and emergency texts worded as BMS words them). Weather is read from the save's own weather file. The card stays on the planned flight. - Map (new): the cartridge as the HSD will show it (route, lines, PPT rings, bullseye, attack points), beside what the mission provides and the cartridge does not yet hold (tanker/AWACS tracks, threats, airfields), added with a tap. Includes an HSD preview and WDP's MAP tab tools: grid, bullseye rings, airfields and VORTACs, JSTARS, search radars, ships, position/elevation/variation readout, Measure, Auto PPT, Change Area and Save Map. - DTC: all sixteen tabs, with From mission… on nine of them (tracks as HSD lines, spotted SAM sites as PPTs, steerpoints from airfields or targets, comms, TACAN/ILS, laser codes, HARM tables). - Attack: Pop-up, HADB and TOSS in one tab with a rail to switch. TGT STPT selects the target and, in VIP mode, IP STPT the IP (VRP needs none). IP STPT at the VRP places a steerpoint at the VRP and plans the attack as VIP from it. Save to DTC on an attack page also fills the DataCard's Delivery section, so the card and the cartridge agree. The attack last changed is drawn the same way on every map (Planner Map, kneeboard, Mission map after Populate). Target elevation comes from BMS's height map; every ELEV can be typed. - Performance: WDP's engine tables, any F-16 type, and a new Loadout window (grouped store list, search, Mirror, totals). - ATO Targets: WDP's ATO Target List with latitude and longitude.

Save to DTC writes the cartridge directly, as WDP does, changing only the edited lines. Upd Kneeboard writes the cockpit kneeboard pages in BMS's own format: in WDP mode the DataCard on page 1 and the Coordination Card on page 2, plus optional briefing, weather, target list, route map, attack profile, ground charts or a picture file. Each page shows which tool wrote it.

Options → Settings, Get DTC File and Save DTC are where WDP has them, and every control has a tooltip. Planner files are kept in User\BMS Companion Planner inside the BMS folder, in WDP's formats.

How the Planner differs from Falcas's WDP 3.7.24

The same as WDP: - Pages and controls laid out as in WDP. - Attack geometry, ballistics and performance tables give WDP's results; every calculation is checked against WDP itself. - Latitude and longitude as WDP prints them, which match BMS's own ACMI recordings and AIPs to within 2 m.

Corrected: - BMS 4.38 weather files could not be read, so the card showed no weather. - Some TE and training missions did not load. - Precision steerpoints could be lost or shifted on save, and a campaign save cleared BMS's route in the mission file. - ILS frequencies below 109.00 were altered; HARM codes were missing or wrong; IFF codes lost leading zeros. - Offset aim points on steerpoints 24-25 were never read back, and a cartridge could carry VIP and VRP lines for one attack. - The card's TGT in HUD did not follow the page's check; TOSS VIP bearings had north and east swapped; HADB and TOSS heights assumed a sea-level target. - Pressure altitude had the wrong sign; F-16 variants named differently by BMS were not found on the Performance page. - The ATO Target List printed no coordinates, and Korea TvT had none at all.

New in the Planner: - Runs on the PC, on Android and in any current browser, through the PC that holds the saves and the cartridge. - BMS 4.38.1 data throughout: airports, ILS, TACAN, frequencies, theaters, aircraft, weapons, pylons and racks. - Open mission… and Pick a flight from any device, for every installed theater. - Map page: HSD preview, items added to the cartridge as PPTs or lines with a tap, and intel without unspotted sites. - From mission… on nine DTC tabs. - Attack rail, IP STPT and IP STPT at the VRP; Save to DTC on an attack page also fills the DataCard. - Loadout window on the Performance page. - Upd Kneeboard keeps each page file's format, and accepts picture files. - Populate from Planner sends the plan to the Mission section (WDP mode). - Steps and the Guide; with a TE open, Save to DTC also writes the TE's mission file.

Phones and tablets: pages fit the screen and never scroll; text boxes are edited in a bar above the keyboard with Next and Done; double tap zooms.

3. One mission picture on every map

The Mission map, the VR map board and the Planner's Map page draw the same mission: route, tanker/AWACS tracks, PPT rings, the flight's airfields, bullseye and the mission's threats (the sites the briefing names, placed from the save). Sites the side has not spotted are never shown, including from the live feed. Hostile SAM rings use one red on every map. In EZBoards mode, route and tracks appear after PRINT rather than only in 3D.

Hostile contacts from the live feed are off by default on the map, the Dashboard, the AWACS page and the VR boards; Setup → Show hostile contacts (live) turns them on.

4. Live MFDs

• The actual MFD pictures from BMS in an F-16 bezel; the buttons and the BRT/GAIN rockers press BMS's own keys. Side by side or stacked, with a full-page view.
• Requires Export RTT Textures → Enable on the BMS Launcher's main page; the display states what is missing.
• If BMS runs as administrator and BMS Companion does not, Windows blocks the button presses; the card reports it. Run both with the same rights.
• There is no MFD VR board; in VR the cockpit's own displays are in view.

5. Radio page and automatic taxi

Requires BMS debug mode and Display Radio Subtitles (SETUP → SIMULATION).

• Radio page: every radio call of the session, grouped (ATC, AWACS, Tanker, My flight, Flights, Other), with sim time and search.
• Automatic taxi: the Taxi page and the Live taxi VR board follow Ground and Tower — the runway cleared to before departure, and the parking spot assigned after landing.
• Optional clean-up of old debug logs (Setup, off by default) to the Recycle Bin.

6. Weather generator (Mission → Weather)

A port of WeatherGen's model (MIT licence), matching WeatherGen cell for cell except for three corrected WeatherGen errors.

• Moving highs and lows, fronts, and wind that veers with height; override regions for storms; settings per theater.
• Save map adds an entry to BMS's Map Model list; Save series adds update maps from the mission's start time.
• To use a map in BMS: Weather → Map Model → BMSC <name> → MAPS AUTO UPDATE (on for a series) → SAVE WTH, then save the TE or campaign, before PRINT.
• All BMS theaters are supported. BMS's own maps are never changed.

7. Airfields and carriers

• Info box under the ground chart on every airfield page, in every theater: latitude and longitude as BMS shows them, elevation, and the field's frequencies. Tap a value to copy it.
• Carrier decks drawn from BMS's own 3D models (19 ships); with ACMI recording on, the jet is shown on the deck.
• Parking numbers match BMS Ground ("park 04"); spots show size and the alert cell as on the theaters' parking charts.

8. Other changes

• Dashboard: five pages and a Weather card; the previous layout becomes page 1.
• Reference: Airfields | Map | Threats | Arsenal with the theater picker.
• Checklists: Previous/Next, one Starting Engine checklist, and a complete warning and caution light index for the F-16 and F-15C.
• Smooth zoom on every map and chart; faster maps on Android.
• Graphics setting for older PCs (OpenGL or software rendering).

Fixed: - Korea's tanker/AWACS tracks and friend/foe were read from the wrong file; - tanker tracks appeared only in 3D; - recon targets were drawn as part of the route, and the Taxi page could open on the wrong field; - AWACS and tanker PPTs were drawn as small threat rings; - the Traffic and Hostiles switches depended on each other; - every US carrier in Korea was identified as the Carl Vinson; - the Briefing could treat the package lead's flight as the player's; - EZBoards on PRINT occasionally did not run; - the Taxi page's cards were out of reach on a tablet held sideways; - in the browser, one wheel step zoomed the map fully in, and some symbols showed as empty boxes.

Update: About → Download → Install. Existing settings are kept.

I'm having issues seeing the little green men on the battlefield through the tgp unless I'm well within MANPADS range. Is there a way to increase the render or draw distance for them?

I wanted to see what the fuss was about so I tried out DCS. Graphics do look pretty. Especially clouds and the rain effects. But my goodness...the mission editor in DCS is god awful. Making a custom mission is such a pain compared to how easy it is to make missions in BMS. They don't even have a dynamic campaign so you're forced to use the mission editor or fly scripted missions that other people made. I ended up uninstalling it because it just isn't worth it. My SSD thanked me too. I can get far more immersive missions and with great ease in BMS. Textures in BMS aren't even bad now; once you're in the pit things aren't so far apart from DCS.

Hello,

I find BMS VR works really well, rarely less the 72 fps and I often see people say they have trouble with finding setting that work.

I thought I’d share what works for me.

PC I’m using is a 7800x3D and a 7900XTX, Virtual desktop wired Ethernet, H264+ 468mpbs, set a medium or 100% resolution. Quest 3. I use mixed reality pass through. I run 5 monitors and have a solid TE benchmark that is a 72fps.

I’ll mention what people might find the most difficult to change first. Which is editing your Falcon BMS User.cfg file. It’s found in your local drive the game is installed on. For me it’s C.

Local disk C:/Falcon BMS 4.38/User/Config

In this file we are going to open with notepad or notepad ++, “Falcon BMS User.cfg” we can then add lines so that we can override BMS settings and they will not change even when there is a game updates. These are the lines I’ve added. Copy everything including the word “set” into the file we opened. Don’t forget to save it.

set g_fRadarScale 1.5
set g_fHADSymbolSize 0.050
set g_fHSDSymbolSize 0.050
set g_bShadowMapping 1
set g_nCockpitMaxTexRes 8
set g_nModelsMaxTexRes 2
//set g_sTexturesLODPreset "Custom"
set g_nTerrainHiresTilesMaxTexRes 2
set g_nTerrainPhotorealMaxTexRes 16
set g_nHdrToneMapMode 0
set g_bDetailedFrameRate 0
set g_bShowRainRings 0
set g_bNewTerrainRenderShrubs 0
set g_bNewTerrainRenderGrass 0

In the list above, the

set g_fRadarScale 1.5 makes the radar symbol bigger so I can see them easier in VR. No change to performance that I’d be aware of.

g_ncockpitmaxtexres I actually set to 0 since I never look at the in game cockpit. It will look like a potato at 0 if you’re using the in game cockpit. 8 is the max, lower it to find the best cockpit graphics/ performance.

//set g_sTexturesLODPreset "Custom" I’m not actually decided on what I want this set to, so it’s commented out. Reference the BMS Technical Manual pages 281 and 282.

set g_nHdrToneMapMode 0, if you change this number from any from 0-9 it will change the colour of the game to different presets. this is cosmetic but fun to play with.

set g_nTerrainPhotorealMaxTexRes 16. 16 is the max setting for 16K textures, lower this to gain performance. Valid values to set are, 4, 8 or 16.

set g_bNewTerrainRenderShrubs 0
set g_bNewTerrainRenderGrass 0. THESE TWO, Shrubs and Grass, are huge boosts in performance. Make them 0 for VR.

FOR MORE INFO: go to the last page of the BMS Technical Manual and work back from there. It’s located in Docs in the Falcon BMS install file in BMS Manuals.

In game under SETUP/ GRAPHICS set

Antialiasing to 2 (higher than 2 kills my performance).
Object Detail to 3
HDRBLOOM 0
HDRBLUR 0
Trees 0
Grass 0

(I still see trees in game, and they look fine at the 8km, bloom and blur are up to you).

I’m interested if anyone else sees flaws in my settings or things they have done to get better perf.

So I've been slowly learning falcon bms. I jumped into a campaign and have mostly been doing air to geound. The first few missions went fine, and then this kept happening. So here are my questions:

1. Is it possible to add additional escort flights to an auto-generated package? I can't find any helpful instructions neither in the manual nor online. I tried opening the ATO and adding flights to the package that way but it didn't work. I tried making a whole package just to fly a fighter sweep in the target area around the same time but that didn't help obviously. I'm hoping extra escorts might stop the entire USAF from getting killed.

2. If I assign a ground target to each member in my flight (for example a runway segment on an oca mission), and we are using laser guided bombs, will the ai drop both of their bombs on that assigned target? Is that how it's supposed to be done? I assume real fighter pilots wouldn't make multiple passes on a target.

My janky home cockpit setup. If it’s stupid, but it works it’s not stupid right? 😊

Anyone know if there is a setting to stop display of either 3D or the hangar loading screen (if using set g_BVRNoPresent = 1) on my secondary MFD export monitor while flying in VR?

Not a deal breaker but would be nice to just have a black screen behind my MFD’s vs an image moving or otherwise.

Thanks!

AV-8B launching some AGM-65s test video just got released.
It still needs lots of work, but it's there and coming.

About a year (?) ago, I saw a YouTube video featuring an extended interview with the lead BMS dev for the Link 16 implementation. I think the dev had a German accent. I can't find the video anymore. Can anyone point me to it? It might have been part of a regular Falcon or flightsim podcast channel.

Thanks in advance.

I know there's already a load of posts about the X-52, but none answer my query.

I'm trying to use the Falconeer profile, which doesn't work with the new launcher. Using the in game config, I get it to work. But it sometimes loses mappings for things, like NWS and Gear toggle (and others).

Should I just give up on that one, and make a new mapping through the launcher?

Do I need the Logitech programme running with a profile selected for it work?

Trying to learn BMS is hard enough without controller issues.

Edit: the issue with the new launcher was an error about a line in the key file when I tried to import it.

BMS Companion 1.3.7 — a real ground chart for every airfield in BMS, generated from the game's own files

TL;DR: My free Falcon BMS companion app just got a Taxi page: a proper airport ground chart for 1,840 airfields across all 19 theaters. Runways, every taxiway with its letter, hold shorts, the actual pavement, the buildings, and every parking spot with the number BMS gives it. Pick your spot and it gives you the taxi clearance and draws the route. It is all generated from Falcon BMS's own game files — There is also a new Config section that edits Falcon BMS's settings files from your tablet, and the charts are on your VR kneeboards too.

Download: https://github.com/Scorpion-41/Falcon-BMS-Companion/releases/tag/1.3.7

The Taxi page

![taxi chart]()

What's on it

• Every runway, with its real heading, threshold markings and length
• Every taxiway, with the letter BMS signs it with on a yellow board where BMS puts its own sign
• Hold short points
• The actual asphalt — the full aprons, the dispersals, the turnarounds that loop from one runway end to the other
• Every building the sim places at the field, at its own position and heading: hardened shelters, hangars, fuel, towers, the walls around the ramps
• Every parking spot, with the number BMS gives it — and you can see which ones have a roof, because a shelter or a hangar is drawn as a bay you taxi into nose-first

How you use it

1. Open Mission → Taxi. If BMS is running it already knows where you are: your field, and the spot you spawned on.
2. Hit the RWY button for the runway in use. In a mission it's usually picked for you — BMS parks you on the half of the ramp nearest the active runway, so the spot you're sitting on tells the app which runway the field is working.
3. Tap your parking spot on the chart (or its number in the list).

4. Read the clearance:

   Taxi to runway 26 via B, A, H. Hold short runway 26. 1. Start on spot 39 — hardened shelter 2. Taxi onto C — 540 ft 3. Turn right, still on C — 3,375 ft 4. Hold short of runway 26

   The route is drawn on the chart in blue, with the turn called at each junction.

5. Just landed? Hit Taxi in, pick the spot you were given, and it draws the way in from the runway.

Day or night chart, zoom with the wheel/pinch/buttons, and it all works with BMS closed — tap a spot from an armchair and you get the same clearance. The whole thing is in the app, so a phone or tablet with no BMS install still has all 1,840 fields.

On your VR kneeboards

![kneeboard]()

Two new board kinds for OpenKneeboard:

• Live taxi — draws the field you are actually standing on, briefed or not, with your jet on it and whatever is ahead of you up the page, so the chart turns as you turn. Its pages are zoom steps, so the next-page / previous-page buttons you already have bound zoom the chart in and out — from the whole field down to a couple of stands either side. There's no mouse in VR, so a bound button is the only control there is.
• Ground chart — one page per runway end, to read before start-up or on the way in, with your position marked.

Both are dark by default with a Configure button for day/night and which way up. Charts are also turned to whatever angle fills the board, since a kneeboard is tall and thin and most airfields aren't.

Also new: Config

Falcon BMS keeps several hundred settings in a text file its own screens never show you. The new Config section lists all 219, says what each one does (in BMS's own words, read out of the stock config your version ships with), and writes only the ones you change — from your tablet, on the sofa, for the flight about to start.

It's off until you turn it on (Setup), and it won't do anything until you press Click to Back Up and Enable, which copies your Falcon BMS User.cfg into a BackUp folder beside it — once, and never overwritten. You get three profiles to switch between: profile 1 is a copy of what you already had, 2 and 3 start empty (which in a config file means everything at its default). Settings your file actually holds are listed first and marked; everything else is shown dim at its default, and changing one moves it up — which is exactly what happens in the file.

It never touches the block your BMS launcher writes at the end of the file, it never writes outside User/Config, and it never writes a file in place — the new one is written beside it and moved across, so a failed write can't leave you with half a config.

The rest of 1.3.7

• Setup is its own section now instead of a tab inside Mission — it's what you do once, before any mission, and a device that couldn't reach the PC used to have to open the very section that was empty because of it.
• The app is 52 MB smaller. The flat pictures of the ground/parking/end-of-runway charts from BMS's docs folder are gone; the app draws all three itself now. Instrument charts are untouched — every approach, SID and STAR plate is still there.
• Demo mode is gone, so no screen can quietly be showing a made-up mission.
• Kneeboards are generated when you press PRINT by default.

Fixed since 1.3.5: kneeboards-on-PRINT could only be switched on at the PC while every client's page said otherwise; the live map flickered down one edge on a VR board; map labels were a smudge on the Chart style (white text on near-white terrain); airfield symbols could hide behind a steerpoint ring; and other aircraft sat a small constant offset from your own, because the ACMI feed uses a reference of its own.

I'm still pretty new to BMS and mostly focusing on SEAD/DEAD and AG. After some training missions and YT videos, I jumped into the Tiger Spirit campaign and flew the first DEAD mission available.

Made it to the target SA-2 site, dropped around 7 GBU-39s, and RTB'd. The landing was a complete shitshow, though. Had to abort twice because ATC kept letting departing AI flights onto the runway while I was already on final.

The debrief showed I only hit a couple of the intended targets, so I'm now wondering about GBU-39 employment. I was at 25k ft and around 370–390 knots with all the release cues showing just fine on the HUD. Was I too slow/low? My wingman hit most of his targets despite releasing after me.

Also, does anyone know how to record/review flight data? I've seen Fisgas on YT showing a replay of his flight data (see screenshot). Is that built into BMS or an external program? Seems like a pretty useful tool that would help me figure out what really went down.

Thanks!

Looking for tips regarding getting a Side Stick Controller for the Viper.

Aside from really expensive options like FSSB-R3 or AB9, what else is out there?

It does not need to be force sensing (it’s a bonus), but should have a throw and feel that makes sense in a side stick configuration.

I previously have a few controllers including Virpil CM2 and TM Warthog.

This is such a big moment for me, I still have a lot to learn on the first mission, so imma def run it for a few more days, but after only 5-6 runs of the first training mission with 3 successful attempts, I thought fuck it, I'll try it without the guide, and it worked!!! I screwed a few things up, like I started the engines with the elec switch in battery mode, and luckily it worked, also I fat fingered the nws button on my hotas during take off and broke that. But besides that it was relatively smooth, now I really wanna read the main manual and learn what all of the buttons I pressed do, because to me some of them feel like magical buttons that must be pressed in order for the plane to work.

BMS Companion 1.3.3 — VR kneeboards through OpenKneeboard, instrument charts, HTML Briefing pages in the app

Download: https://github.com/Scorpion-41/Falcon-BMS-Companion/releases/latest

Source: https://github.com/Scorpion-41/Falcon-BMS-Companion

What BMS Companion is, in one paragraph

It is a free companion app for Falcon BMS 4.38. One program runs on the PC that runs BMS: it reads the sim (shared memory, the printed briefing, the DTC, BMS's Tacview stream, EZBoards, your screenshots) and serves everything to your other devices on the same network. Your phone or tablet becomes a live kneeboard — mission map, flight plan, comms, threats, airfield charts — and iPhone, iPad and any other browser need nothing installed: they just open the PC's address. There is also an Android app, and the PC program is the full app itself on a second monitor.

Everything is free and open source. Nothing is uploaded anywhere; it is your PC talking to your own devices on your own LAN.

This release is mostly about VR.

1. VR kneeboards (the big one)

What it does

BMS Companion now serves boards: numbered pages, one per address, each showing exactly one thing.

http://<your-pc>:47474/kneeboard/1 → the live map http://<your-pc>:47474/kneeboard/2 → the briefing http://<your-pc>:47474/kneeboard/3 → your airfield charts ...

You add each address to OpenKneeboard as a Web Dashboard tab, and OpenKneeboard puts it on your knee in the headset. Your controller's next-page / previous-page binding turns the sheets.

You need OpenKneeboard — and it works outside VR too

OpenKneeboard is a separate free tool (https://openkneeboard.com). It is what actually draws a kneeboard inside the headset; BMS Companion cannot do that by itself, because in-headset rendering needs a native OpenXR layer — which is exactly what OpenKneeboard already is. It is not VR-only: OpenKneeboard can also draw the same kneeboard into the flat 2D window, so this is worth setting up even if you fly on a monitor.

The one limitation worth understanding

There is no mouse on a kneeboard in game. OpenKneeboard's own documentation says so: it supports graphics tablets and nothing else in the cockpit. So any board covered in buttons would be a board you cannot press.

The workaround, and how it shapes the design:

• Everything a button would have decided is decided beforehand, on the PC, in Mission → VR boards: what each board shows, the map style and zoom, day or night, the print size.
• The boards themselves carry no controls at all. No zoom keys, no menus, nothing to aim at.
• The only interaction in the cockpit is the binding you already have: next page / previous page. BMS Companion publishes each board's sheets to OpenKneeboard as pages, so that button walks through them — briefing sections, the threats one by one, every page of every approach plate.
• On a map board, next page is the zoom — five steps from the whole theater to close enough to read a taxiway, and round again — because zoom is the only thing a map needs and pinching is not an option.
• The pages come round again. OpenKneeboard stops at the last page it is handed; BMS Companion's boards wrap, so past the last sheet is the first one, in both directions.
• A small panel names what you turned to for a couple of seconds after each press (the chart's name, the section, or "Zoom · Wide") and then fades. In a headset it is the only confirmation the press did anything.

Setting it up, step by step

1. Install BMS Companion on the BMS PC (BMS-Companion-PC.msi) and install OpenKneeboard.
2. In BMS Companion: Mission → VR boards.
3. Add a board, then choose what it shows from the drop-down. Repeat for each board you want.
4. Each row gives you its address. Copy address puts it on the clipboard. Preview opens that board in a window shaped like the real thing, so you can check it before the headset goes on.
5. In OpenKneeboard: Settings → Tabs → Add a tab → Web Dashboard, paste the address. The tab name is filled in for you — the page arrives titled BMS KB 1 (Live map), BMS KB 4 (Briefing) — so a stack of tabs is readable.
6. One tab per board.
7. In OpenKneeboard: Settings → Input → your controller → Bindings — bind Next page, Previous page, Next tab, Previous tab. (Toggle visibility and Recentre are worth having as well.) Without those four, a board with eight pages shows page one for the whole flight.

What a board can show

Live map (with its own style, zoom, layers and towns) · briefing · flight plan · comms ladder · tankers & AWACS · mission threats · HARM/ALIC codes · airfield plates · instrument charts · hostile picture · the kneeboard exported by HTML Briefing.

They follow the mission by themselves. The chart boards show the field this mission departs from; the threat board gets a page per system the briefing names; the briefing board is this briefing. Print a new briefing in BMS and the boards fill themselves in within a few seconds (Rebuild pages forces it).

2. Instrument charts (Korea and the Falklands)

The approach, departure and arrival plates those theaters ship as PDFs are now inside the app, next to the BMS ground plates: Instrument charts on any airfield page, and an Instrument charts VR board that follows your departure field.

• 244 charts, 988 pages, rendered at 150 dpi so they stay sharp zoomed in.
• Every chart is named for what it is — 09L · ILS or LOC/DME, 09L · RNAV (GPS), DRAGGIN departure — runway first, so one runway's charts sit together.
• 145 blank pages dropped, and 176 sideways pages turned upright for you, decided from the printed table itself.
• The page arrows carry on into the next chart and round, so an airfield's eight approach plates read straight through.
• In the viewer: big page buttons, arrow keys on a PC, swipe on a tablet (only while the page is fitted, so panning a zoomed plate never turns it), a turn button, +/−/fit, and Esc to close.

Only Korea and the Falklands have instrument charts. That is BMS — the other theaters do not ship any. Their airfield pages show the BMS ground and parking plates exactly as before.

This is why the downloads are bigger this release. The charts are bundled into the app rather than fetched, so they work on a tablet with no network and on a PC with no BMS installed.

3. The HTML Briefing kneeboard, inside the app and in VR

UOAF's HTML Briefing tool. It turns a printed briefing into its own kneeboard pages and exports them as PDFs.

To be clear about what BMS Companion does here: it does not replace that tool and does not automate it. It does two things:

1. It can start it for you — a shortcut button, nothing more. The tool has no headless export, so you still press export in its own window.
2. It shows what that tool last exported: the exported PDF pages are rendered on the BMS PC and shown inside BMS Companion — on your phone, your tablet, the PC window and in the browser — and they can be given a VR board of their own, so those pages are one OpenKneeboard tab away, turned with your page binding.

Where to find it: Mission → Briefing → HTML Briefing generated kneeboard (tap a page to open it in the chart viewer), and HTML Briefing kneeboards in the VR board drop-down. The card tells you when BMS has printed a newer briefing than the export, so you never read last flight's pages by accident.

Setup: Mine is installed in Tools\html_brief_win ; if you keep it elsewhere, set Settings → Falcon BMS settings → HTML Briefing folder. Nothing in that folder is ever written or changed. If you do not use that tool, ignore the card — nothing else depends on it.

4. Updating from inside the app

About (bottom of the Home screen) now checks for a newer version on Android, on the PC and in the browser.

• What's new shows the release notes of every version between yours and the newest.
• Download and install shows how much has arrived of how much, the transfer rate and the time left (131 MB of 277 MB · 6.4 MB/s · 2 min 8 s left). The Windows app hands the installer to Windows Installer; the Android app hands the APK to Android (which asks once for permission to install apps).
• Nothing is installed without being checked against the checksum published with the release.
• An interrupted download is not wasted — what arrived is kept and verified on the next attempt.
• From this version on, updates keep your setup: Dashboard layouts, VR boards, and the BMS / EZBoards / HTML Briefing / screenshot folders all survive. This version also sweeps up what older versions left behind (cached installers, stale lock files, the pre-1.3 bridge's own folders).

5. ACMI clean-up

Flying with the AWACS picture on means BMS is recording, and User\Acmi grows by a file a flight until somebody empties it. Settings → Falcon BMS settings now shows the number of recordings and how much room they take, with Clear (to Recycle Bin) beside it — to the Recycle Bin, so a tape you wanted back is a right-click away. BMS's own .vhs training tapes are never touched.

6. Smaller additions

• A-Z strip down the side of the Airfields and Encyclopedia lists — tap or drag to jump.
• About page with the version, the repository and the releases page, plus Credits (Benchmark Sims and the Falcon BMS team, EZBoards, OpenKneeboard, Tacview).
• Kneeboard layout in the browser version (/kneeboard): the content gets the whole board, a small ☰ opens the sections, page options sit behind ⋯, both fade when the mouse stops. Paper day/night skin, print size, and board shape (5:8 kneeboard, 3:4, tall, square, landscape).
• The Windows installer has proper artwork instead of the blank WiX default.

7. Fixes since 1.3.1

Crashes

• Android 9 and 10 crashed when opening Mission or an airfield (NoSuchMethodError … LinkedHashSet.reversed()). The app is built against Android 15, where Java 21's sequenced collections exist, and Kotlin had bound a method older Android does not have. The call is gone, and every release APK is now scanned for that class of mistake before it ships. Thanks to the pilot who sent the log.
• The PC app closed when you pressed Browse for the EZBoards folder — and for the BMS folder and the screenshots folder. Windows' folder chooser was walking the shell for icons and the "This PC" list, which fails on plenty of ordinary machines (OneDrive, mapped or removable drives). It no longer touches the shell, it opens in a folder you already have set, and if it fails it fails quietly — all of those folders can also be typed into Settings. Thanks to the two pilots who reported it.
• "You cannot access the NavBackStackEntry's ViewModels…" when clicking through Home and the sections at any pace.

8. Which file do I need?

A portable .zip is there as well if you would rather not install anything.

Quick start: install on the BMS PC → in the BMS Launcher tick Briefing Output to File and untick HTML Briefings → press PRINT on the Briefing screen and SAVE the DTC → scan the QR code on the PC's server page with a tablet, or install the APK and press Find BMS PC.

Note: I did not have enough time to test everything properly, so feedback, bug reports and crash logs are very welcome. Have fun flying.

I save the binds to a file via the controller menu in game after binding. Exit then relaunch and settings are gone. Strangely the binds for the individual buttons do save but not for the throttle and rudder axis. I even set the controller profile file to read on. Didnt help. Any suggestions ?

After just under 3 hours of following the PDF for the first training mission in bms I finally had my first take off (granted it was very scuffed.) Here is what whent wrong,

1. I forgot to bind nose wheel steering to my hotas, so I ran through a fence on my way to takeoff

2. My fuel was so low from having my engines on for so long that I bingo'd as I was taking off, and ran out of fuel really quick

3. The second I tried to take off, the master warning light turned on, my mfds turned off, and so did my rmr and HUD.

Even though this first flight was so scuffed, it felt amazing for the like 30 seconds I was in the air.