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Duplicate AFCADs in FSX?

jordanal

jordanal

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us-florida
Hi Jon, Jim, et al,
I have a question regarding duplicate layered AFCADs in FSX. In the past FS9 days, it was considered a bad idea to ever have more the one AFCAD for a given airport even if it was properly layered and seperated. There was a tool called ScanAFD that was fantastic for quickly searching and presenting all AFCADs under the FSX tree. You could then tell ScanAFD to either rename or delete any of the duplicate AFCADs in a matter of minutes.

In FSX, is it still considered a bad idea to have more than one AFCAD (even layered) for a given airport? I have a large AFCAD collection from various freeware sources and layered them by author, based on my personal taste and quality the author usually publishes. Obviously Jim's are at the top of my stack :wave: But, I can't be sure that there are no duplicates in this collection, or elsewhere under the FSX tree.

If the no-duplicates mentatlity still holds true in FSX, is there, or could there be, a way to search for and manage AFCADs from within the ADE menu? My thinking is, ADE already has the AFCAD search engine built-in, and if the list of all AFCADs, and there respective locations, could be presented with Rename and Delete button, that would give us the same functionality as the original ScanAFD utility. Maybe there is already a way to do this in ADE, but I haven't made the analogy yet.

Thanks again for ADE guys!
 
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We have been thinking about this for some time and there is a crude (and rather slow) test utility that does some of this.

In line with the ADE design philosophy I think we need to be clear what should and should not be done. Jim certainly has a clearer understanding of the issues than I do but I am aware that quite a lot of damage can potentially be caused by users deleting or otherwise moving airport files. We know that there can be multiple versions of airport records and these can include stub files to change altitude, the stock record and other enhanced or modified files. It is also possible for more than one airport record to be in a single file. This is clearly true of stock files that can contain many airports but is can also be true of third party airports and the removal of an airport file without taking account of whether there are other airports in the file could cause a lot of unexpected results.

So to summarize my ramblings - this is something that I see as important but we are still working out the best way to proceed that will give users control without undue risk
 
Al

Jon has pretty much summerized some of the pitfalls in finding FSX duplicate style airports. We continue to look at this as a added feature in ADE but there are many varibles that Jon list above that have to be considered.

Scan AFD was a fine tool but only as good as the User trying to use it to remove a duplicate airport. Utilities such as scan tools do not work with file names such as KATL.bgl, af2_KATL.bgl, afx_KATL.bgl, KATL_ade_jv.bgl which means a airport bgl can be any name you want it to have.

In order to find a duplicate airport a scan tool must read the airport header and that is what ScanAFD does. However many bgl's can have the same airport header based on what we put into the bgl. Most of my FS9 airports had multiple airport headers that would show in a scan tool or AFCAD as 4-5 duplicates even though there were no duplicates. That is because the default AP9 airport header was seen along with my airport header for the airport bgl, approach code bgl, taxiway sign bgl.

A true scan tool to find duplicate airports MUST read and validate what is in the actual bgl so a comparison can be made between the bgl's to see what if anything is actually duplicated.

Most everything can be duplicated and many airports that you download today have duplicate data which is not correct but FS9/FSX is very forgiving in some areas. Look at all the duplicate approaches that are listed in the approach page of the GPS reciever in FSX 3rd party airports. The one thing that can never be duplicated is the Start Locations. That is what causes a CTD with duplicate AFCADS.

Like Jon says, we continue to look at this feature but in doing so want the feature to work the correct way and not what was done in the past that caused more problems then less problems.
 
Duplicates can still be a problem.

I had one fella contact me using one of my airports, and he had a) no jetways, and b) aircraft taxiing through terminal buildings. Needless to say, I knew for sure that wasn't my work doing that.

Turns out he had a duplicate, even though he didn't think there was one. We had to dig and dig through his files to find the culprit.

The two biggest problems I have seen people run into are:
1) bad wing_span entries for AI aircraft
2) duplicates

Both of these wreak havoc on parking and other things like jetways.

Duplicates in some cases are necessary, such as when wanting to change the altitude of a stock airport as Jon mentions. But unless they are installed the correct way it can produce unpredictable results.
 
Mace

When I use the word duplicate I mean that everything in the XML tags is a prefect duplicate match. That also means the duplicates must be made by the same Airport utility.

A airport made with AFX or FSXP and a airport made with ADE placed into a active folder is not a duplicate airport and causes many problems like Jetways that will not appear.

If you make a airport like KSTL with ADE and then copy the same bgl x2 that is a pure duplicate and everything will work except you get a CTD because of the Start Locations are listed twice.

In FS9 we only had one utility that most everyone used which was AFCAD so they were pure duplicates. In FSX we have multiple Utilities that none do the same thing twice including using the deleteAll= the same or Tower SceneryObjects.

This picture shows that a airport which has a duplicate ADE bgl will load and display everything exactly the same. That is because they are pure duplicates and that is what we would see in FS9 since there could be more the one AFCAD. In my case here there are more then one ADE.bgl's

On the surface everything appears ok except my FPS is real low since all scenery is duplicated including the Jetways.

A problem will surface when I try to use the Go TO or fly into the visual airport Zone (108NM radius) and a CTD will occur since the Start Locations have also been duplicated.

If I duplicated the airport with 1 ADE and 1 AFX or FSXP then I will see other problems with Jetways not showing up.

Did you and I once talk about apples to apples ? :)



 
Has there been any progress on the business of 'duplicates'? I run FS9 in XP. I've installed a lot of superb Finnish scenery files from FSID. Recently I've had some CTDs in around some of these airport zones, and wonder if there is any easy way to check if I have duplicate 'Start Locations'.

I also need to know what the priority is between AD2 .bgl files and ADE9_XX.bgl files. I have these two types of file in Addon Scenery\scenery. Some of these refer to the same airport. I suppose there is a risk of problems but I do not know for sure.

I'd be glad of advice. Thanks.

John
 
I am not sure I can answer all of this. Are you talking about accidental duplicates where you have several bgl files containing the same airport on your system and these conflict, or are you talking about deliberately creating overlay AFD files for some purpose?

I also need to know what the priority is between AD2 .bgl files and ADE9_XX.bgl files. I have these two types of file in Addon Scenery\scenery. Some of these refer to the same airport. I suppose there is a risk of problems but I do not know for sure.
Click to expand...

Again not sure quite what you mean. .ad2 is a project file extension and should not get placed in the Addon Scenery\scenery folder. If it is then no harm is done since it is not a bgl file and FS cannot read it so it will be ignored. However it is a waste of space to place it there.

ADE can produce more than one bgl file. Any file with _CVX (FSX only) in it contains only terrain information and no airport information. If the compile is split between airport and objects then there will be a bgl file created with _OBJ in the name. Although this refers to the airport ICAO it does not contain any airport date - only object placement data and exclusions - so again it does not duplicate anything of the airport itself. The ICAO_ADE9_XX bgl file is the one that contains airport information.
 
scruffyduck said:
I am not sure I can answer all of this. Are you talking about accidental duplicates where you have several bgl files containing the same airport on your system and these conflict....
Click to expand...

Yes.

scruffyduck said:
Again not sure quite what you mean. .ad2 is a project file extension and should not get placed in the Addon Scenery\scenery folder....
Click to expand...

Sorry, I meant AF2.bgl files. :o

scruffyduck said:
ADE can produce more than one bgl file....The ICAO_ADE9_XX bgl file is the one that contains airport information.
Click to expand...

I am trying to find out that when there are AF2_XXXX.bgl and XXXX_ADE9_JH.bgl files for the same airport in the Addon Scenery\scenery folder, which gets priority? Also, is this likely to cause an FS9 CTD because of duplicate Start Locations?
 
John Hubbard said:
I am trying to find out that when there are AF2_XXXX.bgl and XXXX_ADE9_JH.bgl files for the same airport in the Addon Scenery\scenery folder, which gets priority? Also, is this likely to cause an FS9 CTD because of duplicate Start Locations?
Click to expand...

In a single folder loading is based on alpha order which would get loaded first is not something we can predict but for all ICAO starting before AF2 then chances are the AF2 one will take precedence over the ADE one and the other way round later.

Since each one of these should be set to delete anything that has been loaded before it then no you won't get a problem with duplicate starts. However what you do get could be unpredictable and therefore you should not have more than one bgl file (AF2/AFX or ADE) for an airport in the same folder and really not at all unless you have overlay airports.
 
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Just as an opposing viewpoint, I have dozens of duplicate AFCAD files for various airports in my FS9 installation, and never have a CTD when going to an airport. They are all in proper (active) scenery layers, and the highest one is the one that is used and acted on.

I use this technique all the time with my classic airports, and have never had a problem in FS9. I have my Classic airports listed highest in the Scenery Library, modern addon airports listed in the middle, and replacement AFCAD files for the stock scenery in my Addon Scenery folder, listed at the bottom. All are active at one time, and all contain AFCAD (or ADE) files for the same airports.

All works just fine. If I want to fly in the modern world, I uncheck my classic airport layers and I am now in the modern world. No messing with copying backup AFCAD files, just a few quick clicks in the Scenery Library. The default enhancement AFCADs in the Addon Scenery folder are used if I don't happen to have an addon airport in use at the moment, and are not used (but are still active) if I do.

I do monitor that I do not have duplicate AFCAD files in the *same* scenery folder - this is indeed a bad thing.
 
Hi Tom

That makes a lot of sense and seems to me to be a very good way to do things :)
 
tgibson said:
snip------

I do monitor that I do not have duplicate AFCAD files in the *same* scenery folder - this is indeed a bad thing.
Click to expand...

and that is the key that many do not understand. When we say use layers in the scenery.cfg file and the highest takes priority then many try and place multiple same airports in just one layer which causes the CDT.

Tom's way of using multiple same airport bgl's work fine as long as the scenery.cfg has layers and each duplicate airport is it its own layer.
 
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