UK scenery (again)

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.microsoft.flight-sim (More info?)

Hi all

I finally took the plunge yesterday and downloaded and installed the
British Isles 76.4m Terrain, freeware from FSGenesis.

FS2002 gave me a nasty error message on my first attempt to use this
mesh, stating that the program was experiencing a "Scenery.cfg file
error!"

I had recalled recent post regarding a good directory structure for
add-ons and had tried to implement this myself. Bad idea. Well, Google
Groups Advanced Search is my friend so I found Bill Leaming's post
quite easily. Thanks, Bill.

<URL:http://www.google.co.uk/groups?hl=en&lr=&selm=3D2475D7.AB01C17%40attbi.com&rnum=1>

Having tried again with reference to Bill's wise words I managed to
successfully install the mesh.

I went for a quick flight along the valley between Inverness and Fort
William (the Great Glen?) and was pleasantly pleased with the results.

Without mesh:
<URL:http://homepage.ntlworld.com/c.butty/ScotlandNo.jpg>
With mesh: <URL:http://homepage.ntlworld.com/c.butty/ScotlandYes.jpg>

At last, something decent to crash into. (Before you ask, I didn't see
the Loch Ness monster!)

I have never been particularly concerned about frame rates as long as
I consider the performance of the simulator to be satisfactory.
However, I did notice a drop in the rate from the high 20s to the high
teens and the performance dropped off markedly on approaching
Edinburgh (EGPH).

I should point out that I soon realized that my PC had decided to
follow my instructions and do its daily anti-virus check at the same
time! Why do I never remember?

Also, all FS2002's view-sliders were maxed out on my Athlon XP1800+,
512MB RAM, NVidia GeForce3 Ti200 (blow those trumpets & sound those
horns) PC.

To close, many thanks to all you who have attemped to educate me about
the intricasies of add-on scenery during the last week or two.

Regards
James

 

[GREGORY]

Archived from groups: alt.games.microsoft.flight-sim (More info?)

On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 15:11:25 GMT, James Hodson
<jUNDERSCOREhodson@ntlworld.com.invalid> brought the following to our
attention:

>I finally took the plunge yesterday and downloaded and installed the
>British Isles 76.4m Terrain, freeware from FSGenesis.
>
>FS2002 gave me a nasty error message on my first attempt to use this
>mesh, stating that the program was experiencing a "Scenery.cfg file
>error!"
>
>I had recalled recent post regarding a good directory structure for
>add-ons and had tried to implement this myself. Bad idea. Well, Google
>Groups Advanced Search is my friend so I found Bill Leaming's post
>quite easily. Thanks, Bill.


Hi James.. which directory structure are you referring to? What Bill
wrote is a fine and detained explanation of the Scenery installation..
but what happens if dozens, scores, even hundreds of Sceneries are
being unpacked? i.e.. like up to [Area.209] already.

It would become confusing and difficult to manage.. not to mention
prioritizing (setting layer number). What's to stop defining folders
like.. \Addon Mesh.. or \Addon Land Class..? These wouldn't need
a \Texture subfolder.. would they?


Often.. users will reorganise their Scenery structure several times
as more and more `scenes' are brought in. Another question.. could
crashes be caused by `Layer Issues' ? and how to avoid them?


-G

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.microsoft.flight-sim (More info?)

On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 11:38:50 -0500, Gregory
<flightsim.maps@bkwds.comcast.net> wrote:

>On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 15:11:25 GMT, James Hodson
><jUNDERSCOREhodson@ntlworld.com.invalid> brought the following to our
>attention:

>>I had recalled recent post regarding a good directory structure for
>>add-ons and had tried to implement this myself. Bad idea. Well, Google
>>Groups Advanced Search is my friend so I found Bill Leaming's post
>>quite easily. Thanks, Bill.
>
>Hi James.. which directory structure are you referring to? What Bill
>wrote is a fine and detained explanation of the Scenery installation..
>but what happens if dozens, scores, even hundreds of Sceneries are
>being unpacked? i.e.. like up to [Area.209] already.
>
>It would become confusing and difficult to manage.. not to mention
>prioritizing (setting layer number). What's to stop defining folders
>like.. \Addon Mesh.. or \Addon Land Class..? These wouldn't need
>a \Texture subfolder.. would they?
>
>Often.. users will reorganise their Scenery structure several times
>as more and more `scenes' are brought in. Another question.. could
>crashes be caused by `Layer Issues' ? and how to avoid them?
>

I used the following structure, although structure's too grand a word
really. FS2002\ADDON SCENERY\British Isles Installing the mesh
from within FS2002 added a scenery folder thus: FS2002\ADDON
SCENERY\British Isles\Scenery

My initial error could well have been caused by my unzipping
everything into the British Isles directory. "Everything" included a
read me file and a JPEG showing the area covered by the mesh.

In retrospect, I probably should have used British Isles\Mesh as the
place to put the add on.

Future British Isles addons would then be placed within a directory in
the FS2002\ADDON SCENERY\British Isles - ADDON SCENERY\British
Isles\Airports\LGW, for example.

However, as I have only the one add on as yet, this is not too
important.

What would you recommend as a suitable structure?

As for those other issues ... well, those hurdles will be leaped as
and when.

James

 

[GREGORY]

Archived from groups: alt.games.microsoft.flight-sim (More info?)

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 14:33:47 GMT, James Hodson
<jUNDERSCOREhodson@ntlworld.com.invalid> brought the following to our
attention:

>On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 11:38:50 -0500, Gregory
><flightsim.maps@bkwds.comcast.net> wrote:
>
>>On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 15:11:25 GMT, James Hodson
>><jUNDERSCOREhodson@ntlworld.com.invalid> brought the following to our
>>attention:
>
>>>I had recalled recent post regarding a good directory structure for
>>>add-ons and had tried to implement this myself. Bad idea. Well, Google
>>>Groups Advanced Search is my friend so I found Bill Leaming's post
>>>quite easily. Thanks, Bill.
>>
>>Hi James.. which directory structure are you referring to? What Bill
>>wrote is a fine and detained explanation of the Scenery installation..
>>but what happens if dozens, scores, even hundreds of Sceneries are
>>being unpacked? i.e.. like up to [Area.209] already.
>>
>>It would become confusing and difficult to manage.. not to mention
>>prioritizing (setting layer number). What's to stop defining folders
>>like.. \Addon Mesh.. or \Addon Land Class..? These wouldn't need
>>a \Texture subfolder.. would they?
>>
>>Often.. users will reorganise their Scenery structure several times
>>as more and more `scenes' are brought in. Another question.. could
>>crashes be caused by `Layer Issues' ? and how to avoid them?
>>
>
>I used the following structure, although structure's too grand a word
>really. FS2002\ADDON SCENERY\British Isles Installing the mesh
>from within FS2002 added a scenery folder thus: FS2002\ADDON
>SCENERY\British Isles\Scenery
>
>My initial error could well have been caused by my unzipping
>everything into the British Isles directory. "Everything" included a
>read me file and a JPEG showing the area covered by the mesh.
>
>In retrospect, I probably should have used British Isles\Mesh as the
>place to put the add on.
>
>Future British Isles addons would then be placed within a directory in
>the FS2002\ADDON SCENERY\British Isles - ADDON SCENERY\British
>Isles\Airports\LGW, for example.
>
>However, as I have only the one add on as yet, this is not too
>important.
>
>What would you recommend as a suitable structure?

Sounds like what everyone goes through when getting into scenery.

It's ok to put the preview JPGs and readme.txt in the new folder.. and
of course the BGL files must go in the \Scenery subfolder.

Any structure that makes sense for the scope of your collection works
fine really. Best to assign folder-names in a `self explanatory' way.
It makes sense to have separate ADDON folders for MESH, LC, and
SCENERY objects when you get lots of them.

Once you have a system.. what happens then is.. the folder names get
edited and changed so as to keep the whole collection organized.. i.e.
38m This place, 38m That place, under which is 76m The Other place..
etc. Read over what Bill has above because it contains subtle details.


-Gregory


>As for those other issues ... well, those hurdles will be leaped as
>and when.
>
>James

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.microsoft.flight-sim (More info?)

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 11:36:40 -0500, Gregory
<flightsim.maps@bkwds.comcast.net> wrote:

[SNIP my stuff]

>>Future British Isles addons would then be placed within a directory in
>>the FS2002\ADDON SCENERY\British Isles - ADDON SCENERY\British
>>Isles\Airports\LGW, for example.
>>
>>However, as I have only the one add on as yet, this is not too
>>important.
>>
>>What would you recommend as a suitable structure?
>
>Sounds like what everyone goes through when getting into scenery.
>


>It's ok to put the preview JPGs and readme.txt in the new folder.. and
>of course the BGL files must go in the \Scenery subfolder.
>

I must have erred in some other way in that case.
>Any structure that makes sense for the scope of your collection works
>fine really. Best to assign folder-names in a `self explanatory' way.
>It makes sense to have separate ADDON folders for MESH, LC, and
>SCENERY objects when you get lots of them.
>

That does make more sense. However, if there are products that have
several scenry types - MESH, LC, and SCENERY - in one package, and
all in one compressed file, I can see problems. Of course in this
case, most structures would fail if used.

James

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.microsoft.flight-sim (More info?)

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 11:36:40 -0500, Gregory
<flightsim.maps@bkwds.comcast.net> wrote:

>Read over what Bill has above because it contains subtle details.

Appreciated. I merely wished to get a rough idea of what I might use.

James