After some time the routine startup of the F16 in Falcon BMS turns into a mindless flipping and switching. The problem is that there's no need to verify that a switch is in the correct position according to a check-list because you know that it is (fixed by the game). I was wondering if there's a way to randomize it.
I've gotten my answer pretty quickly. Apparently it's unrealistic to have it randomized, because the ground crew sets it up in always the same way. Since it wasn't going to be added officially in the game, I had to solve it myself.
At first I thought I could just send certain commands like "flip this switch" via some kind of API. But Falcon BMS lacks such a thing, so I had to resort to a more hacky solution in the form of Falcon-BCC.
It works by reading the keyfile and then sending the proper keyboard keystrokes. After trying it out for some time and a few fixes, I'm pretty content with its state, but not with its insides. I used nmeier's great Python implementation for reading the Falcon BMS shared memory. I also had to find a simple way of sending keystrokes without using an additional library. The biggest problem and one where I haven't found a solution for yet was reading the FalconSharedMemoryAreaString content and getting the keyfile programatically instead of having to enter it manually.
I'm pretty happy with it in general though and I use it every time I play. Just make sure to use those check-lists now or else you might find yourself out of flares because you forgot to check that the JETT switch on the CMDS panel is off.