MSFS simple airport -or- simple scenery?

[astaticmusic]

What's the difference in the 2 different samples/ cant you use just one to do the whole airport ground and buildings? or do you have to do the airport ground and markings in one format and do the buildings in the other? cant it all be combined into one simple package folder?

Running into all kinds of problems with the file system and the package building parts... got some nice looking airport going on but it seems im stuck with a few things

I'm getting totally different ways of doing it from every different tutorial i find. must the package be built and put in community before it can be observed in the editor - just to be built again?? I'm not following that. or just built once? i like to test half way through the building process...

1st ---cannot get the ICAO code to show in the sim after creating the airport and filling in all the blanks --- is there some trick to this?

2nd---- in the project editor window i have a myscenery BGL and a airport BGL... and a couple other files.. but if i load one the scenery is completely missing, but if i load the other the buildings are missing..

when saving the scenery, do these have to be highlighted in order to save to the right xml? do they have to be saved to a certain folder or just saved to the main title xml?

confused but trying...

 

[YohanNaz]

Flying Theston has been putting out some quality tutorials on modifying and or creating airports and this should help out a lot. It's possible that you don't have some .xml files that are necessary for proper package building. If I were you, I'd make a backup copy of all your work and then try to modify your project files according to how Flying Theston set up his airport. Can't remember if everything you need is covered in this specific tutorial so you may need to also watch the next one as well #16. Ultimately, any project type that you want to work on needs to start with sourcing the SDK samples and then modifying them to suit your needs. GL

 

[Av8rThor]

To build, based on Thestons work with some things I have discovered. If you are going to modify the Airport “runway, ICAO, taxiways, lighting, tower” then start with the simple airport (it comes with data and materials folder). Add in model, just copy and paste from “simple scenery” xml file And add the folder of course. The data folder will be your scenery folder for an airport design. If you are just going to “add to“ an airport or scenery, maybe while hiding some autogen stuff, then simple scenery (it comes with scenery, materials and model folders) is your guy. If you look at a created package, the sdk will build almost identical files for airport and scenery But I think it needs a folder labeled data to override the Data that builds airports automatically Wherein scenery can be put in either type of folder.

 

[astaticmusic]

Flying Theston has been putting out some quality tutorials on modifying and or creating airports and this should help out a lot. It's possible that you don't have some .xml files that are necessary for proper package building. If I were you, I'd make a backup copy of all your work and then try to modify your project files according to how Flying Theston set up his airport. Can't remember if everything you need is covered in this specific tutorial so you may need to also watch the next one as well #16. Ultimately, any project type that you want to work on needs to start with sourcing the SDK samples and then modifying them to suit your needs. GL

thanks, I have watched and have been learning from that series of videos. He just doesnt do airports from scratch. but theres a few others that cover that, my main question was how to combine the two, but i think ive figured it out mostly.
theres still a few items i cant seem to get, like how to make the taxiway signs...

 

[toprob]

I've tried a few test projects, initially using the 'simple scenery' as a base. One of these tests started out just replacing some hangars etc, but it has grown a lot since then. At one point I added an 'airport' object, then runways, taxiways etc, and it all worked nicely. The OCD side of me really enjoys seeing the list of what I've added neatly sorted, with the airport features all together I believe you could start with either 'simple' project, although now I am confident enough to just begin a project from scratch.

 

[Benney]

It's not too hard to create an airport from scratch, I personally find it much easier than copying the sample projects and editing all the XML files. There are just a few gotchas which you need to be careful with otherwise the package won't build (setting the asset folder is the one I always seem to forget). I've got an airport tutorial series in the works and my second video shows how to set up a new airport package from scratch.

 

[JohnC1]

Here are my observations.....Flying Theston is a great YOUTUBE instructor.

He started off on 002 in an airport removing a hangar with SceneryEditor , so I used his tutorial to try out cleaning up my KBTV with SceneryEditor, not AirportEditor.

But ... the xml in PackageDefinitions appears to have a "fat finger" error.... line 25 is <OutputDir>scenery\mycompany</OutputDir>.

Shouldn't it be <OutputDir>scenery\mycompany-scenery-simple</OutputDir>?

In any case, using SceneryEditor to draw a polygon doesn't work for me. The expectation is that using a click on the add button allows one to get a little red x at the end of the cursor and allows one to define a polygon and delete the surrounded item. I don't get the red x. FT did.

The best I could do is click around and get an error, then the red x appears and then I use the red x somewhere else. I tried this on a taxiway light, and a hangar and the delete button doesn't work.

Reminds me of FS2000 when it came out.

 

[Benney]

Only thing I can think is make sure you don't have the polygon section minimised in the scenery editor. I do that all the time and it means you don't get a red x on your cursor.

 

[mariorc]

Hi have give up and create 2 projects for each airport. One runways, another customised buildings.

 

[BattleMetalChris]

Flying Theston has been putting out some quality tutorials on modifying and or creating airports and this should help out a lot. It's possible that you don't have some .xml files that are necessary for proper package building. If I were you, I'd make a backup copy of all your work and then try to modify your project files according to how Flying Theston set up his airport. Can't remember if everything you need is covered in this specific tutorial so you may need to also watch the next one as well #16. Ultimately, any project type that you want to work on needs to start with sourcing the SDK samples and then modifying them to suit your needs. GL

Plus, he has THE BEST brummie accent ever

 

[FlyingsCool]

What's the difference in the 2 different samples/ cant you use just one to do the whole airport ground and buildings? or do you have to do the airport ground and markings in one format and do the buildings in the other? cant it all be combined into one simple package folder?

Running into all kinds of problems with the file system and the package building parts... got some nice looking airport going on but it seems im stuck with a few things

I'm getting totally different ways of doing it from every different tutorial i find. must the package be built and put in community before it can be observed in the editor - just to be built again?? I'm not following that. or just built once? i like to test half way through the building process...

1st ---cannot get the ICAO code to show in the sim after creating the airport and filling in all the blanks --- is there some trick to this?

2nd---- in the project editor window i have a myscenery BGL and a airport BGL... and a couple other files.. but if i load one the scenery is completely missing, but if i load the other the buildings are missing..

when saving the scenery, do these have to be highlighted in order to save to the right xml? do they have to be saved to a certain folder or just saved to the main title xml?

confused but trying...

Yes, you can do it all in one project. Biggest point I missed was that you have to give the shp and airport xml files different names, or you'll keep losing all your buildings every time you open the project (the .shp file has its own xml file).

Per your second point, yes, you can only edit one "asset" at a time. But you can include all your buildings and polygons and everything else in your "airport asset". I just copy and pasted the <scenery object> etc cards into my kash-airport.xml file associated with the airport asset (KASH being the airport I'm currently working on).

Yes, once you've developed your project, you have to build it and put it in community before you can see it in game. But when you load your asset into the project editor, it should look just as you left it even if you don't put it in Community. But, of course, in dev mode with the asset open, all ambient traffic goes away.

This may be obvious, but, if you don't want to see the clutter of say, the parking spots, or maybe if you keep selecting an apron instead of the taxipath you want to select, you can click on the little arrow to collapse that section in the scenery list window, and they will turn off from view and selectability (but are still there).

I haven't had an issue with my ICAO code showing up. I didn't notice any trick, I followed @DragoB's directions pretty exactly, with the added point that the you have to use different file names for the airport xml and the .shp file. It's implied in his directions, but not explicitly stated (he might have changed that by now, I haven't looked at it in a while).