- Messages
- 34,905
- Country
Time for another poll. This could be answered by users as well as developers. Given the arrival of another new version of FS I am wondering about the best way to support FSX and FS9 with my software.
-
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.
Best way to support multiple versions of FS?
- Thread starter scruffyduck
- Start date
- Messages
- 33,155
- Country
Hi Jon,
I am still not sure how to do it for my tools, but in general I would say go for the latest version only. Maybe keep a version that works for the previous version around for a little while, but stop supporting it after a while (that is how I did it with CAT for example).
For small tools, it might be an option to support both in one tool. That is what I am thinking about for Library Creator XML for example. As the changes should not be very big. But for complex programs I doubt it is worth the trouble.
I am still not sure how to do it for my tools, but in general I would say go for the latest version only. Maybe keep a version that works for the previous version around for a little while, but stop supporting it after a while (that is how I did it with CAT for example).
For small tools, it might be an option to support both in one tool. That is what I am thinking about for Library Creator XML for example. As the changes should not be very big. But for complex programs I doubt it is worth the trouble.
- Messages
- 317
- Country
I see you have FSUIPC as an example of "separate versions", but of course, in fact, FSUIPC3 supported all the previous versions of FS back to FS98, even including CFS1 and CFS2.
This was getting pretty messy though. The common code concerning user facilities was fine, but the "offsets" interface was becoming unwieldy, with multiple tables directing code off into the most appropriate way of reading or writing each element of data for each version of FS. I spent a lot of time on each FS release not only hacking into FS but also making the resulting structure as efficient as possible where it mattered.
Even so, if FSX was to be another similar growth from FS9 and FS9 was from FS8 etc, I would have just extended the tables and added whatever new code was needed. I'd rather maintain one lot of code than two, and FSUIPC3 will unfortunately still need my attention for several years, I reckon. Believe it or not I still get queries for FS2000 users! And of course there are still plenty of FS2002 ones.
The deciding factor in FSX, which effectively forced a separation, was SimConnect. At last MS were doing what I had been jumping up and down asking them to do for seven years or more!
The change for FSUIPC from foraging into FS's innards to using SimConnect was total. Well, at least for 95% of the stuff -- the other 5%, currently hacked, is still being negotiated.
There was really no way to force such a completely different way of doing things into FSUIPC3. I would have still been struggling!
Regards
Pete
This was getting pretty messy though. The common code concerning user facilities was fine, but the "offsets" interface was becoming unwieldy, with multiple tables directing code off into the most appropriate way of reading or writing each element of data for each version of FS. I spent a lot of time on each FS release not only hacking into FS but also making the resulting structure as efficient as possible where it mattered.
Even so, if FSX was to be another similar growth from FS9 and FS9 was from FS8 etc, I would have just extended the tables and added whatever new code was needed. I'd rather maintain one lot of code than two, and FSUIPC3 will unfortunately still need my attention for several years, I reckon. Believe it or not I still get queries for FS2000 users! And of course there are still plenty of FS2002 ones.
The deciding factor in FSX, which effectively forced a separation, was SimConnect. At last MS were doing what I had been jumping up and down asking them to do for seven years or more!
The change for FSUIPC from foraging into FS's innards to using SimConnect was total. Well, at least for 95% of the stuff -- the other 5%, currently hacked, is still being negotiated.
There was really no way to force such a completely different way of doing things into FSUIPC3. I would have still been struggling!
Regards
Pete
- Messages
- 34,905
- Country
Thanks Pete. I certainly agree that maintaining more than one lot of code is a PITA. I find it a nuisance to maintain separate production and development versions. If I bug is found in the production version then that needs fixing and also in the development code.
However I am beginning to think that maintaining a maintenance only version for FS9 and concentrating on developing the FSX version is the way to go.
It never ceases to amaze me how many older versions of FS are still being used. I wonder if FSX will be different in that the adoption/switch over time for the majority will be longer than in previous versions but I don't really have any experience of that prior to FS2002 to FS2004.
However I am beginning to think that maintaining a maintenance only version for FS9 and concentrating on developing the FSX version is the way to go.
It never ceases to amaze me how many older versions of FS are still being used. I wonder if FSX will be different in that the adoption/switch over time for the majority will be longer than in previous versions but I don't really have any experience of that prior to FS2002 to FS2004.
- Messages
- 42
- Country
Personally Im completely behind FSX and won't be looking back at FS9 for my carrier addon 3wire. This is probably not much of a suprise given the new functionality in FSX that is just not backwards compatable with FS9. Im looking forward to getting stuck into some programming with SimConnect.
- Messages
- 34,905
- Country
Not sure I can, maybe Arno or Nick could do it 
- Messages
- 34,905
- Country
sure looks that way