Help on fixing airport dat

[scott967]

I've done some experimenting, and reading the manual, but I'm still a little uncertain about updating the airport list.

Let's say I have a bunch of "AFCAD" files, some might move (more likely change elevation) some airports (probably not a big deal to AI) and more importantly new airports are added. What is the preferred way to update my AirportList.dat? What seems to work (but haven't fully investigated it) is that I use the Airports -> find/collect airports menu and then check "include stock airports" for both fs9 and fsx, and also check "use provided base data", and the check "and/or add-on airports for" and check "fsx" (assuming at the moment I am interested in FSX, but I might also want to do the same for fs9 at some other time) and also check the "update stock airport with add-on data".

And then in the future if I want to do this again, I just repeat the process (maybe this time using fs9 addon airports instead)?

What I am looking for is to take "AirportList_Base.dat" and then just add in any updates or delta from my fs9/fsx installs. How does the "AirportList-updates" file play in this?

scott s.
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[bobbyjack]

I certainly like to use the Collect Airports method. I select the sim of interest plus add on airports for that sim. I do not use the provided data base. This way AIFP seems go collect data on your airports as you have them in the sim. Including any changes or additions.
You can add all that stuff manually, but I type so slow that I let the computer do it.

Bob

[gadgets]

AirportList_Base is all the stock airports for both FS9 and FSX. So long as AirportList_Base has not been corrupted, you should get exactly the same result whether or not you check "use base data" - with one exception. That exception is that where an stock airport exists in both FS9 and FSX but with different data, the FSX data is saved. (There are a number of FS9 airports that had incorrect data in FS9 but have been corrected in FSX. I know of none that were correct in FS9 but incorrect in FSX.) So, if you collect data for FS9 only and don't check "use base data", you'll get the old, incorrect data for those airports whereas if you check "use base data" you'll get the corrected data from FSX (even if you don't have FSX installed).

In any case, Find/Collect Airports is the way to update airportList.dat.

Don

[bobbyjack]

Don

Thanks, good to know.

Mistakes in FS9? Gasp!!

Bob

[scott967]

I've been doing a lot of work in Asia, and there are many changes/missing airport (esp in China) so I have been updating my airports list quite a bit.

So it seems like when I use the "collect airport data" I should always keep that "use provided base data" checked, but do I also have to check the "include stock airports for fsx/fsx boxes checked"? Otherwise will they get stripped out of the active file?

scott s.
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[gadgets]

If you are only interested in FSX, it doesn't matter whether or not you check "Use provided base data" - other than the collection process will take longer if you don't.

Unless you are collecting airports for a special purpose, you'll want both stock and add-on airports, so both boxes should be checked. The "Use provided base data" simply directs AIFP where to "look" for the stock data.

Don

[scott967]

Thanks. BTW thanks for update .28, new features work as expected.

scott s.
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