• Which the release of FS2020 we see an explosition of activity on the forun and of course we are very happy to see this. But having all questions about FS2020 in one forum becomes a bit messy. So therefore we would like to ask you all to use the following guidelines when posting your questions:

    • Tag FS2020 specific questions with the MSFS2020 tag.
    • Questions about making 3D assets can be posted in the 3D asset design forum. Either post them in the subforum of the modelling tool you use or in the general forum if they are general.
    • Questions about aircraft design can be posted in the Aircraft design forum
    • Questions about airport design can be posted in the FS2020 airport design forum. Once airport development tools have been updated for FS2020 you can post tool speciifc questions in the subforums of those tools as well of course.
    • Questions about terrain design can be posted in the FS2020 terrain design forum.
    • Questions about SimConnect can be posted in the SimConnect forum.

    Any other question that is not specific to an aspect of development or tool can be posted in the General chat forum.

    By following these guidelines we make sure that the forums remain easy to read for everybody and also that the right people can find your post to answer it.

Simple Airport Scanner Finds Sceneries No Longer Active

Messages
223
Country
us-idaho
I recently completed a massive undertaking correcting over 60 airports in FS2004 in Alaska using ADE with ProKey. This task was difficult at times because over the years of adding addon sceneries for many of these airports the actual scenery files were in a wide variety of places and checking each one proved daunting.

Some of the addons were simply scenery objects enhancing a default airport while others were airport fixes and adjustments plus objects. Some .bgl's were named with the ICAO identifier, some with the FAA identifier, and many with simply the airport or city name.

During the process of updating these airports I gathered all the .bgls and corresponding texture files, if any, for a single airport and placed them in newly created folders using the ICAO. So, for example, before my update, the Talkeetna Airport had objects in FS2004/Addon Scenery/Scenery and an airfield mod in FS2004/AddonScenery/Talkeetna. I combined these into one folder FS2004/AddonScenery/Alaska/PATK/ and used Scenery Configuration Editor (SCE) to add /PATK and remove /Talkeetna and also remove just the objects from AddonScenery/Scenery by cutting and pasting to /PATK.

Many of my Alaska Airport Add Ons were in three different folders, AKAFCADS2/Scenery, Alaska AFCADS/Scenery, and RANDYS ADE/Scenery. Each Scenery folder held many different airports, some by ICAO, some by FAA, and some by Name. During the update process I built separate ICAO/Scenery and ICAO/Texture folders for each single airport and combined the BGLs and textures from all the various places I had installed them into one place, the ICAO folder.

Once I was done with my update, I used SCE to add all the new ICAO folders to my FS2004 Addon Scenery Library and, once empty, I deleted with SCE AKAFCADS2, ALASKA AFCADS, and RANDYS ADE. I saved the work in SCE and then started FS2004. It did it's typical scenery update that happens when you add or remove a scenery to/from the library.

Then I glanced at the library and all was good. The new ICAO sceneries were there and the three I removed were gone from the library list. next I actually went to many of the airports in the sim. All was good.

This was all some months ago and I have been happily flying ever since. Then one day here in the FSDeveloper Forums I saw a reference to the SimpleAirportScanner. I though, what the heck, I'll download it and run it to see what it tells me about FS2004 and FSX.

When I ran the scanner it pointed to several duplicated airports and I fixed each one when necessary, not all were actual duplicates. What surprised me was that it said it could not find three active scenery files, AKAFCADS2, ALASKA AFCADS, and RANDYS ADE. I had removed them a couple of months ago after doing what I described above. So I got to looking to find out why SAS was still expecting to see them.

Turns out I have two Scenery.cfg files for FS2004. One, the one SAS is pointed to, is in C:\USERS\Randy\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\FS9\ and the other one is in the actual FS9 folder in C:\Microsoft Games\FS9\ Reading through the one in USERS I can see AKAFCADS2, ALASKA AFCADS, and RANDYS ADE in the list of active areas, but I assure you they are not active. The cfg file in the actual FS9 install location is almost a mirror of the one in USERS, but the three files SAS says it cannot find are not listed as areas.

Before you tell me there should only be one scenery.cfg file in use I urge you to look at your install of either FS2004 or FSX (there are two config files for FSX also) and you will find two configs in your install also I am sure.

Why is the one in the actual install location updated and the one that both SCE and SAS is pointed to in USERS/AppData not updated? Any ideas?

Randy
 
Top