‹›

Download

Hi Captains! 👋

Many of you will remember the excellent Virtual FMC CDU apps from the Prepar3D days — a favourite of mine for years. Since the move to MSFS 2020, several web-based CDU solutions have appeared and, while they work well, I've always missed the responsiveness of a true native app. Web apps are convenient, but native apps are simply faster, smoother and more reliable. So I decided to build one myself.

**FlightPadFMC** is a fully native Android app that turns your tablet into a CDU / MCDU for the **PMDG 737, PMDG 777, iFly 737 MAX, FlyByWire A320 and Fenix A320** in MSFS 2020 and 2024. No browser, no complex web server, minimum lag — it's designed to feel like the real hardware sitting on your flight deck.

**A note on iOS:** I know many would love an iOS version. Unfortunately I don't own a Mac to build and sign iOS apps, so I can't provide one at this time. The Android app source is already open on GitHub, though — if anyone in the community has a Mac and the skills to port it, I'd warmly welcome the collaboration.

**FlightPadFMC v0.4.0 — iFly 737 MAX support, Server Console with auto aircraft-detection, end-to-end visual polish on all 6 apps**

### What's new in v0.4.0

The headline of this release is **iFly 737 MAX support** as a brand-new app, and a **rewritten Server Console** that finally tells you, at a glance, exactly what's going on between MSFS, the server and your tablet. Plus a coordinated visual-polish round across all six Android apps — every CDU and MCDU now rendering closer to how it looks on the real flight deck.

- 🆕 **iFly 737 MAX support** — brand-new `iFly737MAX.apk`. Drives the iFly 737 MAX CDU end-to-end via the iFly Plugin's shared memory + WM_COPYDATA interface — no PMDG SDK setup, no SimBridge, no MobiFlight. Just install the iFly 737 MAX, make sure the iFly Plugin is enabled in MSFS Add-Ons, install the APK, and you're flying. All 5 LEDs (EXEC / MSG / FAIL / CALL / OFST) drive live from the plugin's shared memory. Works on MSFS 2020 AND MSFS 2024, supports all MAX variants (7 / 8 / 8200 / 9 / 10).

- 🆕 **Automatic aircraft detection in MSFS** — the server now identifies which aircraft you have loaded the moment you pick it in the MSFS profile menu, BEFORE you click Fly. Parallel SimConnect TITLE SimVar subscription (vanilla, no WASM) means changes are instant — same as MobiFlight does it. Five aircraft mapped: PMDG 777, PMDG 737NG, iFly 737 MAX, FlyByWire A320, Fenix A320.

- 🆕 **New Server Console panel** — a persistent black status panel sits next to the Connection Status card and surfaces non-scrolling state you'd otherwise lose to the activity log. Shows which aircraft is loaded, SDK health (PMDG broadcast / iFly shm / SimBridge / Fenix WS), aircraft-mismatch warnings (you opened the FBW app but loaded the 737), MSFS auto-exit countdown, outdated-Android-app warnings, and a sky-blue **"✈ Blue Sky Captain"** row when everything's healthy. Activity log still mirrors every transition with `[OK] / [WARN] / [ERROR] / [INFO]` tags so `.log` files you share for support carry the full story.

- 🆕 **Tablet-side status overlays** — when the server detects a known issue (PMDG SDK silent, SimBridge tray app not running, Fenix EFB not running, aircraft mismatch), the diagnosis appears as an amber overlay right on the tablet's CDU/MCDU screen. Long messages auto-shrink to fit any tablet width. No more "the tablet is blank, why?" confusion — the tablet itself tells you.

- 🆕 **SimBridge 3-state startup check** — distinguishes "package missing" / "package found but tray app not running on :8380" / "ready". The activity log message tells you exactly which step you're missing instead of a generic "found".

- 🆕 **Server connection status shows MSFS version** — "Connected MSFS 2020" / "Connected MSFS 2024" instead of bare "Connected", so the label always agrees with whichever SimConnect DLL the server is actually loaded against.

- ✨ **Annunciator text glow** — MSG / OFST / DSPY / FAIL / CALL now glow with a soft halo when lit (same colour as the label), mimicking how the real bezel annunciators look on the in-sim cockpit render. Applied across all six apps.

- ✨ **EXEC LED rounded corners** (PMDG + iFly) — the EXEC indicator above the EXEC button is now a rounded-corner rectangle in white, matching the in-sim render. 90% size of the bezel slot, sits properly inside the cutout.

- ✨ **Pixel-detected button shapes from the bezel skin** — no manual touch-area calibration needed any more on any of the six apps. The Calibrate button is gone from settings; defaults are baked from the cockpit-tablet sweeps. Press feedback uses a cockpit-feel fade-in/fade-out shadow tuned for rapid-press correctness.

- ✨ **FAIL annunciator now red** on iFly + FMC737 (was amber, both wrong vs the in-sim render).

- ✨ **FM annunciator now white** on FBW + Fenix (was amber).

- 🐞 **Settings-save manual-IP reconnect bug fixed** across the fleet — saving a manual IP in the in-app Settings now properly triggers a clean reconnect to the new IP without needing to close and reopen the app.

- 🐞 **EXEC LED flicker on iFly fixed** — surfaced during live testing, the legacy embedded `led` field in the per-tick `screen_update` was clobbering iFly's EXEC state every refresh. Now picks the right cached value per aircraft.

- 🪶 **Launcher labels unified** — `PMDG737` / `PMDG777` / `PMDG777-Silence` / `iFly737MAX` / `FBWA320` / `FenixA320` for consistent ordering on tablet home screens.

> ⚠ **Upgrading from v0.3.x?** Uninstall the old Android apps first (Android Settings → Apps → 737PMDG / 777PMDG / FBWA320 / FenixA320 → Uninstall) before installing the v0.4.0 APKs. Installing a new APK on top of an older signed build can fail with a "package conflict" / "app not installed" error. The server's `settings.ini` carries over automatically. The new iFly737MAX APK is a fresh install — no old version to remove for that one.

### What it is, for newcomers

A Windows server runs on the sim PC and connects to MSFS via SimConnect (PMDG), Win32 IPC + shared memory (iFly), proxies SimBridge (FBW A320), or proxies Fenix's GraphQL stream (Fenix A320). The server streams the CDU / MCDU screen over your local WiFi to the Android app, and key presses on the tablet go back to the sim in real time. Five separate APKs, one per aircraft — install only what you fly:

- `737PMDG.apk` — PMDG 737 NGXu

- `777PMDG.apk` — PMDG 777

- `iFly737MAX.apk` — iFly 737 MAX (7 / 8 / 8200 / 9 / 10)

- `FBWA320.apk` — FlyByWire A32NX

- `FenixA320.apk` — Fenix A320 v2

Native Android — not a web page, not a browser trick. Pixel-accurate skins, real touch calibration baked in, runs all the way back to Android 4.4.

### Install

The `README!!!.txt` in the release archive has the full step-by-step install guide, split by sim version (MSFS 2020 vs 2024) and by aircraft. There are separate sections for PMDG users, iFly users, FBW users and Fenix users, so you only do the steps that apply to you. The MSFS 2024 PMDG paths in this release also list both filename variants (`737_Options.ini` / `737NG3_Options.ini`) — PMDG appears to have dropped the NG3 suffix on some MSFS 2024 builds, and the README tells you which to look for.

### Optional: auto-launch the server with MSFS

If you haven't already enabled it from v0.3.0 — turn on the **"Close server when MSFS exits"** setting, then add a `<Launch.Addon>` block to your MSFS `exe.xml` pointing at `FlightPadFMCServer.exe`. The server will start when MSFS starts and quit when MSFS closes, no manual lifecycle. STEP 4 of the README has the exact paths and the snippet.

### Download

- Release: https://silencediy.com/dl/dl1776106237549

- GitHub: https://github.com/diymarcus/FlightPadFMC

- Discord: https://discord.gg/YVn92NGYpt

- email: marcus@silencediy.com

### Credits

- **PMDG Simulations** — for the 737 NGXu + 777 add-ons and for shipping the PMDG SDK that makes external CDU clients possible

- **iFly Simulations Software** — for the iFly 737 MAX and the iFly Plugin SDK

- **FlyByWire SimBridge** — © FlyByWire Simulations — GPL-3.0

- **Fenix Simulations** — for the Fenix A320 v2 + the open GraphQL interface

- **B612 Mono font** — SIL Open Font License — originally designed for aviation cockpit displays

Big thanks to PMDG, iFly, the FlyByWire team and the Fenix team for the SDKs and open interfaces — they're what make this project possible.

### Feedback & bug reports

If you run into anything strange, please open an issue on GitHub (or reply in this thread) — I read everything. Short excerpts from the server Activity Log and the Android app really help me track things down. Especially helpful for v0.4.0:

- **iFly 737 MAX owners** — confirmation that the CDU drives correctly across the common FMS pages (INIT, RTE, LEGS, PROG, PERF), and that all 5 LEDs (EXEC / MSG / FAIL / CALL / OFST) light at the appropriate moments during a normal flight

- **Anyone running MSFS 2024** — confirmation of the actual filename in your `pmdg-aircraft-738\work\` folder (`737_Options.ini` vs `737NG3_Options.ini`), and confirmation of the `exe.xml` path on your install (MS Store vs Steam)

- **All users** — confirmation that the new Server Console "Aircraft" row updates immediately when you change aircraft in the MSFS profile menu (matching MobiFlight behaviour). And — if it doesn't classify your aircraft, please share the raw title shown in the "Unrecognised — ..." row so I can add it to the substring map for the next release.

Happy flying! ✈️

— Marcus (SilenceDIY)

https://silencediy.com