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Enhancement request

C

curbz

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unitedkingdom
Hi Don,

I'm hoping you might be able to help... I've been using your excellent tool to replace AI traffic due to the reduction in fps that even low levels of AI introduces on my system - my main priority is always smooth flight. So I have AI traffic set to 0% but of course now my airports are deserted - so I was really pleased to find your tool that enables me to add static aircraft.

The main problem for me though was the time it took to add sufficient aircraft to airports - especially the larger hubs. So I decided to write a tool to automatically and intelligently add the static aircraft to the airport gates/ramps.

I've pretty much completed the development (v0.0.1 anyway) and am very pleased with the results - just a couple of mouse clicks and the selected airport is full to the brim with SAMM aircraft! Here's Gatwick looking very busy will no reduction in FPS that with the required % level of AI would previously have brought my rig to not much more than a slideshow...

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-D-tr0XgvWxw/UJUB3fQM1JI/AAAAAAAAEeg/sEZulkJPhlM/s600/EGKK.jpg

It works by referencing the txt file that SAMM produces once a library is created. From here it pulls the GUIDs for each aircraft as well as the aircraft title. The next step is to locate the aircraft.cfg for each aircraft to grab essential information to ensure aircraft are parked at appropriate gates. The information read is as follows:

wing_span
atc_parking_codes
atc_parking_types
atc_type
atc_model
title
texture

The first 3 are essential whereas the others are just useful to have available. As I say I'm able to read this information fine but it isn't optimal as it's not straight forward to locate the aircraft.cfg file from the just the aircraft title.

So, getting round to my enhancement request (eventually!)... I'm assuming you are reading the aircraft.cfg at some point during SAMMs execution - would if be possible to extract the information mentioned above and add it to the txt file that SAMM produces when the library is created? Or alternatively produce a CSV file with the values and GUIDs? It would make my tool more robust and also allow the original AI models to be uninstalled from FSX as they would no longer be needed.

Another aspect you might be able to help on is the wingspan value. I'm not entirely sure the values entered in the cfg of some AI aircraft are 100% accurate as I've seen some aircraft side by side at gates where they should comfortably be accommodated yet the wings overlap by a small amount. I'm wondering if you are able to extract a more accurate wingspan value from the model itself?

One final question... I'm using WOAI aircraft and some aircraft I cannot convert with SAMM due to the following warning "The static model name/version is (still) too long. The model cannot be saved". Is there a length restriction SAMM has to keep to?

Sorry for the long post but wanted to explain as much as I could and the reasons for the request... really hoping you can help. Thanks for releasing SAMM - great tool that lets me have the appearance of bustling hubs with great frame rates at last! :)

Regards
Darren
 
Last edited:
Hi Darren. Thanks for the post and for the idea for populating airports with SAMM. That's not something I have ever considered but which I can see could be very useful - especially for "challenged" systems.

Re the aircraft.cfg data, I could easily save the AI variant data you need in a text file. Without having done any analysis, I would probably save the the [Fltsim.x] block for the selected aircraft supplemented by the wingspan value or, if you wish, the parking radius derived from the wingspan.

As you probably know, FS8/9 models derive their parking radius from a value saved in the .mdl file. That is easily accessible to me and I could, alternately, provide that radius instead of the wingspan value. In fact, I compute a actual model radius for all static models so could provide both values. The computed value reflects the actual size of the static model and, hence, may be preferable to the wingspan value which can be arbitrary. In fact, doing so would solve the obvious problem in FS9 where an's aircraft wingspan is substanially shorter than the model radius (e.g., Learjet).

Is it your intent to make this new capability available to others? If so, and if it meets your need, I would be happy to consider it as an extension of SAMM - for which you would receive full credit, of course. As you may be aware, I have just completed development of a traffic analyser addition to my AI Flight Planner. Without knowing the extent of your development, I can envisge re-using some of that code to create a "point to an airport .bgl and have that airport automatically populated with relevant aircraft" feature - without the user even having to first create the static models. But, I suggest we continue that discussion by e-mail.

Regarding the name assigned the static model, there is a "hard" limit in the .mdl file to the length of the name assigned to textures (64 characters). To enable SAMM's texture folder approach, the static model name cannot be longer than (63 - length of the longest texture name). But, you are not required to name the static model as the aircraft model. Name it anything you like - but keep it short.

Don
 
Thanks to Darren's suggestion in the first post in this thread, when I finished the new traffic and parking analyser functions in my AI Flight Planner, I realized most of what I had developed for AIFP was directly applicable as an airport populator in SAMM. SAMM Development Release 2.2.00(c), available at http://stuff4fs.com, is the initial implementation.

SAMM 2.2.00 allows you to designate one or more traffic files and have SAMM place static models representing the AI aircraft in the parking spots normally occupied by those aircraft at a day and time you specify. SAMM modifies the revelant airport "afcad" setting the radius of the parking spots occupied by static models to 1m. so that FlightSim won't place AI aircraft in them as well. Thus, it is possible to have SAMM-placed-in-parking-spots static models co-exist with AI.

You might ask "Why would I want to do this". For small airports with minimal traffic, you probably wouldn't. However, where there's lots of AI traffic, you get traffic jams on taxiways and at hold-short points and lots of go-arounds - not to mention the computing overhead. The new SAMM capability allows you to have lots of "eye candy", but minimize the downside of heavy AI.

To accommodate the extra controls, SAMM's main dialog has been split into two - one for aircraft selection, the other for model creation. The revised user documentation in the archive reflects the new design.

I would appreciate a few "power users" giving this new capability "the once over" and report any issues encountered or suggestions to making the new capability more user friendly. Comments on the usefulness of this capability are also welcome; there are several obvious extensions if the concept seems worthwhile.

While anyone may download the Development Release, I suggest inexperienced users wait for a later release in which the initial issues have been addressed.

Don
 
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