Vacation

Time to escape the daily grind for a bit.  I shall be away from Sept 1st thru Sept 16th.  I will not have any internet access during this time – especially since I intend to spend as much time as possible by the pool drinking cold beer. 

XNA Game Studio Express Beta Available Today

Well – it should be available from Microsoft this day as a download .  For any curious enough the main XNA page is here  http://msdn.microsoft.com/directx/xna/

XNA Game Studio Express

The XNA Framework is the latest stuff from Microsoft for Games Designers.  It is intended to make writing games better and easier.  Also Games should work on both Windows and XBox.  The Express Edition is an IDE based on C# to write Games.  It will be a free download.  Read about the XNA Framework here: http://blogs.msdn.com/xna/default.aspx

XNA uses DirectX and  would have made writing LOV a whole lot easier.  I plan to port LOV onto the XNA Framework just to see how it goes.

LOV Beta 0.20 Released

Now available on my site and will be uploaded to AVSIM over the weekend.

Next LOV Beta

Beta 0.2 is ready to release bar the documentation. I am now working onthe video tutorial which is completely new for this version. Mostly bug fixes and this is likely to be the last beta for a bit as I am now looking at the object format used in FSX – I would like to be able to display FSX object in LOV as well.   I have not had many problems reported with the current beta so I will probably release it on AVSIM.   I was hoping to get it done this weekend but my day job is getting in the way so it may take a little longer than expected.

FSX First Impressions

Well FS9 objects, scenery files etc work in FSX as one would expect.  I have been able to place buildings etc in FSX with no problem.  As I mentioned in my last post the MDL format for FSX is different than the one for FS9.  There is a new animation system which has been talked about over on Sebbys’ Blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/sebby1234/default.aspx. 

Also interesting is that MakeMDL is being depreciated in favor of  XtoMDL.exe, and the target input format will be a .X file (although an intermediate xml file also looks to be available).  This is the native format that DirectX uses and is also the way in which LOV works (well in reverse)  taking an mdl file and converting it to a .X file which is then used by DirectX to display the image.

The new MDL Format seems to have lost the BGL section and also the Animation Sections.   There are a couple of new sections including one which provides an internal name for the object and another which looks like an index.  The section containing vertices no longer decompiles using a bgl opCode decompiler (in fact none of the sections seem to at the moment but it is still too early to tell).  DirectX works using Vertex Buffers and Index Buffers so I think there may be a link there.

Also interesting is that fact that FSX uses Shaders which conform to HLSL.    This is the high level shader language used by DirectX and generally defines how things are lit etc.  There are vertex shaders and pixel shaders.  Shaders are used in hardware and more modern graphics cards should be able to use later more complex versions with potentially better lighting, reflections etc.  

An interesting source of potential confusion is that shaders use the same extension .fx as FS effects but they are not the same thing at all.  FSX seems to use the same format for effects as FS9. 

Finally the format for textures seems to have changed to .dds.  Well that makes sense to me.  the BMP textures used in FS9 were pretty thinly disguised DDS.  Also if the Sim is moving closer to a tighter relationship with DX then this eliminates at least one bit of code.  DX cannot read the BMP texture format directly at least not in the managed code I am using.   I assume that the ACES team are using the unmanaged interface so I can’t tell how they handle the conversion of textures to DX.

The format for BGL files also appears to have changed.  AP files are different than those for FS9 and there seem to be a lot less different files there.   AFCAD2 can read the basic airport information such as country and city but not the airport details about runways etc.  Scenery bgl files also look a bit different when de-compiled. The SceneryObject is there but the libraryObject Definition might have changed.

Anyway lots of interesting time ahead……………

LOV and FSX

Well I guess that some of you will have downloaded the demo!  I suspect that you are all too busy flying around to delve into the innards.  But in case you do please be aware that the format of object mdl files in FSX is different than that in FS9.  LOV cannot display them.  You will get a decompiled list but that is all.  LOV will tell you that it is not an FS9 object – which is true.  Also the actual format of the object file has changed.

New Utility in Development

As a result of a request I am developing a new FS utility which will be called Way-point Manager.  It’s main job is very simple – to collect and manage any way-point which may be of interest to you.  They are captured by placing your plane at the way-point.  You can then add extra information about it – give it a name and so on.  Once it is created then you can move your plane back to it at any time using the program.

The initial requirement came from a scenery designer looking to collect co-ordinates for use in design but it occurred that it might be useful more generally since I can see the use of being able to record way-points – whether they be locations we would like to return to or maybe sightseeing points etc which are not that easy to save at the moment unless you create and save a flight.

Should be a first beta in a week or two.

LOM/Scenery Maker Version 1.003 Available

This is a cumulative bug fix release.

It fixes two recently found bugs

1) – the rotation values were not correctly used in the quick place and quick line functions
2) – libraries could not be deleted from the library filter list

Both these are fixed in this release

This is an executable only release – replace the existing ObjectManager.exe with the one in this zip file.

Note if you have not updated to version 1.002 from version 1.00 you should read the enclosed release notes for Version 1.002 which describe the changed functionality introduced in that version.  You do not need to install version 1.002 – changes in that version are included in this release.