Helm control is steering your ship where you want it to go. You do this by giving it a heading in degrees and a speed in meters per second. The degrees are taken with zero being straight up (the top of the screen) with 090 at the right side of the screen, 180 at the bottom, 270 at the left side and 360 back at the top.
Here is the helm control interface:
This interface is color coded:
Green: current actual heading and speed
Yellow: desired heading and speed based on commands that have been given
Blue: desired heading and speed that is currently being (but has not yet been) set
The circle shows the heading. Again, the green line is the ships current heading. The yellow line shows that the ship is currently turning to the right. The blue line shows that I am about to give it a command to turn right even more.
The bar below the circle shows the speed. The green "tick" shows the current speed. The yellow "tick" shows that the ship is currently slowing down to a slightly slower speed. The blue bar shows that I am about to give it an order to accelerate to about half speed.
When you first come into this panel, you will not see any blue. The blue is there for "pending" commands.
Clicking on the circle will place the blue line showing the "pending" course you have selected.
Clicking on the bar will place the blue line there showing the "pending" speed you have selected.
The two text boxes below will also show the course and speed numerically. If you prefer, you can type in these boxes instead of clicking on the circle and bar for more precise control.
These orders are NOT actually placed with the ship until you click the "set helm" button. When you do, a message will appear in the message box (down at the bottom of the screen) that the ship has received your orders. Clicking the "clear" button will erase the blue lines and cancel the pending order.
When you click "set helm", the blue lines will go away, and the yellow lines will move to reflect the new orders.
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