MSFS ADE and POI Project

[Ironpot]

Hi Jon/Dick,
I’ve been creating objects for a few weeks in Blender (still going) and have now brought them into a project via the InSim Dev mode. However because it’s going to be a POI and this has no airport, I’ve hit some issues:
1. I cannot use Aprons and other items such as Helipad and Painted Lines
2. If I add an airport (and make it closed) the ICAO must be a legitimate one but not quite sure in what way. I used YTIS but that doesn’t exist in game that I can see and passes the compile. If I make it YTXX for example, the compiler fails it and drops the airport.
3. Making it an airport as such, after compile, none of the airport specific items show in game. The non-airport specific do - so scenery objects and polygons, Blender do
4. Somewhere I remember seeing (but I cannot find it) about priorities-I cannot get rid of the grass. So anything at ground level has grass showing through it. Again I cannot use Aprons so struggling to be rid of it

The other question is how does (if at all) ADE cope with a project that is a non-airport?

 

[scruffyduck]

The other question is how does (if at all) ADE cope with a project that is a non-airport?

Simple answer is no.

 

[Ironpot]

Righto thanks Jon.
Fixed the grass. A poly with a -1 priority, nothing else selected and gave it a surface type (at the bottom) of Dirt01 - only some work over grass.
I only care about question 2 now. Am about fed up with this project anyway and am going back to YMML….

 

[rhumbaflappy]

There are some good reasons not to include 'fantasy' airports, but the best is that if you pick an ID not being used, there is no guarantee that someone else won't pick the same ID.

Something you can do is to pick a default airport near your location, load that into ADE, increase the airport radius to a distance that covers the area you are working on (I just tried 50000 and it was OK). Make sure to NOT delete the old runways, aprons etc...

Then in your project, just delete all the airport objects (runways, aprons, etc...) and now you have a base project that doesn't exclude, delete or include anything except the airport reference position. This is how you can add an elephant to say C59, or an apron, without disturbing the default airport elements, but you can place it miles away. Because you extended the airport radius only for the default airport.

 

[Ironpot]

Ok thanks Dick. I think I went down this path but used a ICAO that sort of “fitted” and then probably deleted too much or not enough. Suffice to say it didn’t work. I’ll have another go following what you say above. There’s a little strip sort of nearby. I’m doing Tasman Island Lighthouse and it’s a rugged remote part of Tasmania. Absolutely awesome that can only been seen by air or sailing with 400ft + cliffs.
Thanks for the reply

 

[Ironpot]

Hi Dick. I tried this and got it all in (my models etc) however, extending the airport to 420000 allowed me to add a heliport and aprons but they don’t show once compiled.
I just saw your file attached so I’ll open it tomorrow-is there anything unit other than the base layout?
Edit
The helipad and aprons show in the immediate vicinity of the airport but not 40km away.

 

[rhumbaflappy]

I wonder at what distance aprons and helipads show. Runways also do not show at that distance.

 

[rhumbaflappy]

I'm finding the extent of the airport radius for aprons is around 9000 meters, or a bit more. Runways and helipads seem the same. This is at latitude N42.4. It might be different at other latitudes. Too bad it isn't 50000.

 

[Ironpot]

Yep same for me at 42degrees south. I guess just another limitation whereby it has to be attached to an airport.

 

[rhumbaflappy]

Aprons and runways and helipads are in the XML and the outlines show in the DevMode, so it is a limitation of the sim's core. I wonder why they bothered with the Airport Radius at all if the limit is 9000 meters.

 

[scruffyduck]

Aprons and runways and helipads are in the XML and the outlines show in the DevMode, so it is a limitation of the sim's core. I wonder why they bothered with the Airport Radius at all if the limit is 9000 meters.

Another bit of happenstance. I seem to recall the Airport Test Radius was 5000m in FSX etc. I don't have my development code with me since I am on vacation but I recall making some code that automatically generates it for P3D. I am wondering if that code slipped through into ADEE 2020

 

[Ironpot]

ADEE 2020

Seems like you’re into you vacation
I tested the limit in a two way project and a Dev only and the result was the same.

 

[rhumbaflappy]

I see MS/ASOBO has a developer Q&A website now. https://devsupport.flightsimulator.com/

Perhaps it's been there for a while. It gives us all access to the SDK creators so we can bounce ideas off of them as well. I may go there an see if we can get a response.

An idea I had concerned the airport ID. Right now they are generally ICAO designations, and we can have up to 5 characters. If this were increased to 16 characters, we'd have an almost unlimited ability to add heliports, water ports, ultralight ports, glider ports, military ports, and of course fictional ports. We could prefix them, for example, as AP, HE, WA, UL, GL, MI, and FI, and still have 14 characters to ID the "airport" (AP being an accepted real-world ID). It would solve a lot of problems like this. Another idea would be to allow redundant airport IDs and attach a GUID to the ID. Then you could have millions of C59 designators, but each built and accessed within the separate GUIDs.

 

[Ironpot]

I see MS/ASOBO has a developer Q&A website now. https://devsupport.flightsimulator.com/

Perhaps it's been there for a while. It gives us all access to the SDK creators so we can bounce ideas off of them as well. I may go there an see if we can get a response.

An idea I had concerned the airport ID. Right now they are generally ICAO designations, and we can have up to 5 characters. If this were increased to 16 characters, we'd have an almost unlimited ability to add heliports, water ports, ultralight ports, glider ports, military ports, and of course fictional ports. We could prefix them, for example, as AP, HE, WA, UL, GL, MI, and FI, and still have 14 characters to ID the "airport" (AP being an accepted real-world ID). It would solve a lot of problems like this. Another idea would be to allow redundant airport IDs and attach a GUID to the ID. Then you could have millions of C59 designators, but each built and accessed within the separate GUIDs.

Dick, I tried “making up” an ICAO = YTISX and the compiler failed saying it could not find the airport. Then tried YTIS and whilst it didn’t exist in the global lookup (or by ADE lookup) it accepted it as it was probably a known airport. This was true for a couple of other codes in the YT series. I just wasn’t sure I was clobbering some actual ICAO
I would love to see ASOBO add a check box to say “use my ICAO” to supersede the in-sim stuff” - you get what I mean?