Yeah, before getting to communication it would be rather splendid if I understood the actual plane and it’s systems. You start out thinking it’s all fun and games, open the manual, 5 lines into it in some foreign announcer voice you read to yourself “The heart of the onboard system is provided by the Up Front Controller (ICP & DED) and the 2 MFDs”. And then it hits you… “I have no idea what an ICP is or what a DED is or what a MFD is…” (well i got the last one relatively quick)
What follows is a little scroll through the pages just to see whats up and then you feel like you need a manual for the manual. A glossary would damn near kill that problem. should it include brief 1-2 line explanations, it might just kill it completely.
For example MFD- Multi functional Display - The screens in the cockpit that can display a variety of things such as the radar and weapon stores.
ICP- Integrated Control Panel - (well i clearly can’t explain this one too well) “Some main interface that is right under the HUD” Which brings up another point, when using an acronym in a line used to explain say… another acronym, it’s probably a safe bet to have the explanation of said acronym right before the other. So i’d explain HUD right before ICP and the DED right after that as something like
DED- Data Entry Display - The LED display to the right of the ICP ( by now I already read what an ICP is so seeing the acronym wont throw them off even for a second)
And keeping things simple without going through the details which would be shown in parts of the manuals. And the glossary could be put in a manner that places acronyms relevant to each other together. for example anything related to the Air to Ground can be clumped together as it might be more likely to be seen together when reading the manual/performing anything Air to Ground and so on…
It’s a lot of work, but for complete beginners that do seek some realistic Fighter Jet simulation, it could be the difference between dropping it or going through with it. The newbies (seen plenty bitter comments from the past to be honest) see such an insane, authentic simulator and end up giving up filled with regret, but at the same time it’s so inaccessible that they feel like they cant do jack about it.
Just imagine the community if all the people who were interested in a genuine F-16 simulator could go in, learn the thing and start improving on a steady-ish basis. A whole lot of fun is what I can see. But of course, everything is easier said than done.
Oh and the Wiki also has heaps of acronym lists in alphabetical order, but since it’s not really 100% aircraft/F-16 specific it’s still kinda scrambled.