Ending the blogging year

I started this blog in January of this year with the intention of sharing some thoughts and keeping folks up to date on flight simulation software development (mine and others) for Microsoft Flight Simulator, and as a soapbox for the occasional technical or philosophical musing.  I’m content the blog has served its purpose, with over 38,000 views in the last three months.  For fleeting moments, this blog has crept as high as 12th in the WordPress list of most popular blogs (out of several hundred thousand), and I appreciate that you’ve taken the time to drop by.

In the flightsim world, we’ve seen the release of FSX, and with my collaborators we’ve released new versions of Vancouver+ and Victoria+.  I’ve been delighted to work with such dedicated folks as Francois Dumas, Holger Sandmann, Bill Womack, and a host of others.  These folks have supplied photos, provided data, beta tested, co-developed, taken to the time to point out areas for improvement, and provided appreciation.  And of course thanks to the ACES at Microsoft who have created the sandbox in which we play.

I wish you a New Year in which your expectations are exceeded; may your life be rich and full.

Canada Place from the East

Click here for a higher resolution version.

More of Canada Place

More texturing done today on the convention/cruise part of Canada Place.  The IMAX theatre is visible in the middle.  Still have lots of to texture on the office/hotel tower base, and of course the details to do.  Then the self-illlumination (night) textures. 

Mission Building tips article

Paul Lange points us to this article on building missions in FSX.  Missions are one of the best new features of FSX.

Larry and Nick take a look at Vancouver+

Larry Mudge aka Skinny Puppy (with screenshots and assistance from Nick Churchill) has published a new review of Vancouver+.  Thanks for taking the time to explore the nooks and crannies, guys!

A tiny hint of things to come.

For Vancouver+ for FSX, we’ll be adding a few new objects.  Here’s early work on Canada Place.  This section still needs railings, lounge chairs, butlers, and of course, water in the pool.

Victoria+ available for download

Victoria+ is now available at AVSIM and flightsim.com.

If you have any questions about installation or the software, please visit the support forum.

Victoria+ is gold!

Folks, testing for Victoria+ is complete.  It’s now being packaged for uploading to the major sites for distribution.  I’ll post when it’s available.

Thanks to an awesome test team for shaking all the apples from the trees…

Carcross Hanger

Here’s “the” hanger at Carcross and adjacent building, in a couple of shots.

The home stretch for Carcross

Myles from Whitehorse was kindly able to get me some more photographs, so I’m able to finish off my contribution to Holger’s Glacier Bay, this week: the town of Carcross.  Here’s a couple of storage buildings beside the runway.

What you will get with Victoria+

A Release Candidate is now with the test team.  Here’s a summary of the features in Victoria+.  You can download the documentation here.

In Victoria+, we’ve added a wealth of features, while optimizing the scenery so it has less of a performance impact than previous versions. Many bugs have been addressed, and existing features improved. We’ve worked closely with Don Grovestine to ensure compatibility with his amazing new version of CYYJ  just released. The last version of this scenery (vicenh05) was bundled with Aerosoft’s Beaver, and won flugsimulation.com’s award as one of the best Freeware Scenery releases of 2005. (And Vancouver+ won third place in Best Software in all categories of 2005). The last version has more than 13,000 downloads. Here’s a feature summary.

For South-Eastern Vancouver Island and most of the Southern Gulf Islands
o Revised shorelines
o IMPROVED Landclass
o 19m mesh and buffer meshes

For Victoria:
o Boat docks with static boats
o Seaplane docks and terminal buildings for Harbour Air (N48° 25.42’ W123° 22.26’), Hyack Air Terminal (serves Kenmore Air, Pat Bay Air) (N48° 25.57’ W123° 22.27’) and West Coast Air (N48° 25.45’ W123° 22.26’)
o NEW Custom model of the Johnson Street (N48° 25.69’ W123 22.30’) Bridge, and generic model of the Bay Street bridge (N48° 26.06’ W123° 22.70’)
o NEW Custom models for major buildings: Empress Hotel, Legislature buildings, Regent Hotel, Save-On-Foods Memorial Arena and Somerset House
o A number of generic buildings simulating the converted warehouses that front the harbour
o NEW Many generic buildings representing real-world buildings throughout Victoria
o NEW Harbour markers: yellow marker buoys (with 4 second strobe lights) guiding small boat traffic along the south side of the Middle Harbour. White marker buoys guiding kayak and canoe traffic on the north side of the Middle Harbour.

For Ogden Point:
o Piers, buildings, breakwater and other components of the Ogden Point Terminal, Victoria, Canada (N48° 25.0’ W123° 23.3’)
o Dock, service building and pilot boats of the Pacific Pilotage Authority (N48° 24.88’ W123° 23.18’)
o Odgen Point Cafe and Dive Shop (N48° 24.92’ W123° 23.08’)
o Custom seasonal trees and bushes

For the area:
o Marine navigational lights for Victoria Harbour and area, including Esquimalt harbour and Oak Bay
o Antennae location corrections for the area
o Objects: Centre of the Universe observatory (N48° 31.19’ W123° 25.10’), Elk Lake Boathouse (N48° 31.50’ W123° 23.44’), Christ Church Cathedral (N48° 25.33’ W123° 21.56’), NEW CYYJ radar dome on Mt. Newton (N48° 36.73’ W123° 26.68’)
o NEW Buildings and docks of the Patricia Bay Coast Guard and research facility (N48° 39.14’ W123° 26.89’
o NEW Ferry docks for Vancouver Island and Gulf Islands: Long Harbour, Fulford Harbour, Vesuvius, Otter Bay, Crofton, Swartz Bay, Sidney, Mill Bay, Brentwood Bay, Village Bay, Saturna Island, Sturdies Bay

Land-based airports:
o NEW Butler Field, Central Saanich, (Unlisted) N48° 33.6993’ W123° 25.6523’ Elev. 335’ Length 320m (and shrinking!)
o NEW Raven Field, Quamichan Lake, Duncan (CML2), N48° 48.7167′ W123° 39.0415′ Elev. 147.6’ Length 480m
o NEW Whiskey Point, Mill Bay, (Unlisted) N48° 39.8376 W123° 32.5840 Elev. 216’ Length 320m
o NEW Gaines Strip, Saturna Island, (Unlisted) N48° 47.6115 W123° 6.8826 Elev. 85’ Length 150m
o NEW Hastings Strip, North Pender Island, (Unlisted) N48° 46.9418 W123° 17.0467 Elev. 114’ Length 482m
o NEW Thomas Strip, Salt Spring Island, (Unlisted) N48° 51.7962 W123° 31.4594 Alt 106’ Length 530m
o NEW Village Bay, Mayne Island, (Unlisted) N48° 50.3625 W123° 18.4977 Alt 144’ Length 920m

Floatplane facilities:
o NEW Bedwell Harbour, South Pender Island (CAB3), N48° 45.2130′ W123° 14.5053′
o NEW Victoria International Seaplane Base (CAP5) (N48° 39.28’ W123° 27.31’)
o NEW Port Washington, North Pender Island (CAP8) N48° 48.7749′ W123° 19.3460′
o NEW Mayne Island (CAW7) N48° 51.2179′ W123° 18.0950′
o NEW Ganges Harbour, Salt Spring Island (CAX6) N48° 51.2130′ W123° 29.5054′
o NEW Maple Bay, Duncan (CMAP (not an official ICAO code)) N48° 49.0167′ W123° 36.0000′
o NEW Shawnigan Lake (CAV8) N48° 37.9227′ W123° 38.2333′ Elev. 388.0’
o Victoria Harbour (CYWH) seaplane base (N48° 25.5’ W123° 25.3’)

Heliports
o NEW Ganges Hospital (CAL7) N48° 51.7520′ W123° 30.5193′ Elev. 158’
o NEW Mayne Island Medical (CBF5) N48° 50.7946′ W123° 17.0472′ Elev. 193’
o Camel Point Public Heliport (CBF7) (N48° 25.1’ W123° 23.3’) Elev. 8’
o NEW Jubilee Hospital (CBK8) N48° 26.0591′ W123° 19.5094′ Elev. 64’
o NEW Victoria General Hospital (CBW7) N48° 28.0841′ W123° 25.9676′ Elev. 65’
o NEW Madrona Bay, Salt Spring Island (CBW9) N48° 51.3402′ W123° 29.1375′ Elev. 6.6’
o NEW Shoal Point, Victoria (CBZ7) N48° 25.3846′ W123° 23.2465′ Elev. 8.2’
o NEW Mount Belcher, Salt Spring Island (CMBH) N48° 50.0001′ W123° 30.2700′ Elev. 1032’

AFCADs for the ship and boat traffic (SEA1, VIC1, VIC2, VIC3)

AI craft models and repaints (Cruise ships are repaints of Asuka model by Mitsuya Hamaguchi)
o Ship: MS Amsterdam of the Holland America Line travelling from Victoria to Vancouver
o Ship: MS Summit of the Celebrity Cruise Line travelling from Seattle to Victoria
o Helicopter: S-61 Sea-King in Helijet colours
o Boat: Pacific Pilot custom vessel working from the Pilot dock
o Pleasure boats: 22, 30 and 40 foot vessels plying the harbour and nearby Straight of Juan de Fuca
o Note: users of Misty Fjords and Vancouver+ will also get additional cruise ship traffic: the Island Princess and the Volendam alternating with the Amsterdam and Summit
o NEW For Vancouver+ users (which has the AI DHC-2 beaver model): floatplane traffic for Harbour Air and Pat Bay Air. Vancouver+ also has flightplans which will populate the VictoriaPlus area with lots of traffic
o NEW For Vancouver+ users (which has the Bell 206L model): Canada Coast Guard helicopter flying from CBZ7 (Shoal Point) and BC Ambulance helicopter flying from CMBH (Mount Belcher, Salt Spring Island)

Other components:
o Effects files for lights, water, smoke effects
o Several Flight
o Custom tree library

New version of CYYJ released

Don Grovestine, author of the definitive CYYJ (Victoria International Airport) provides this:

CYYJ (2007) has been released as a no-cost download for users of FS2004 (FS9). It is available at ViVa and on AVSIM  and Vancouver Landings [link not yet active]. For additional information, please visit the CYYJ (2007) support website. “

This version has over 60 detailed buildings and a very accurate AFCAD.  It has day textures only, night textures will follow in a couple of months.  It is fully compatible with Victoria+, which release is impending.

Congratulations, Don!

Victoria+ update

We’re in the last phase of testing Victoria+: shaking out the configurator/installer.  Ken’s done a great job on that.  And we’re fixing some other minor issues.

FSX SDK SP1 released…

For purchasers of the Deluxe Edition of FSX, this service pack for the Software Development Kit includes the gmax export tools missing from the RTM release, as well as many other improvements.  There’s a summary in the FSX Developer’s Corner.  I’ve been part of the team beta testing this service pack for the last couple of months, and MS has worked hard to address issues.

The Secrets

Yes, there’s more than one. 

Recently I’ve reconnected to variations on what some call the Law of Attraction, as espoused in the book and movie, “The Secret” and Lynn Grabhorn’s, “Excuse Me … Your Life is Waiting,” and many other writings in what many would call a New Age philosophy.   In summary the theory is that we attract what we feel and think: if we feel abundant and healthy, we attract abundance and good health; if we feel the world is unjust and we are sick, we will attract unjustice and illness in our lives, and perceive more of it in the world.  Many years ago, I embraced this concept, and although I appreciated its validity in many ways, I found that for many people, including myself, when unexpected events occured, it was too easy to fall into self-blame and potentially subsequent shame.  I suspect there are a lot of jaded ex-New Agers out there.

However I still believe that we have a lot of control over our what happens in our lives.  For “The Secret” to be more effective, I add a couple of bits and pieces. 

1. Forgive yourself.  Balance the Law of Attraction philosophy with the reality that many (if not most) people’s behaviour is influenced by patterns created in childhood.  These patterns served to protect the child from harm, like not speaking up and telling what they felt as they would be shamed or invalidated if they did that.  That child deserves appreciation and respect for finding strategies to protect themselves.  But those patterns rarely serve us as we grow into adulthood.  Some call them shadows, or familiars.  Whatever the label, when the temptation to blame and shame arises because I believe I am not attracting what I deserve, I can instead go to a place of appreciation and gratitude for those old patterns, then let them (and the shame and blame) go.  And as Grabhorn points out, it’s not about being perfect and thinking pure thoughts all the time.  Just turn them positive.  And once in a while it’s quite fine to decide to feel completely miserable/angry/frustrated.  Go through it, then move on.

2. Ask for help in self-understanding.  For some folks it does have value to understand how these behaviour patterns were created, and so some kind of therapeutic work has value.  Ruling this out and focusing just on the Law of Attraction may create internal turmoil that won’t help flow those positive vibes.  For some, in addition to this better self-understanding, many benefit from going through a grief process to let go of the past.

3. Acknowledge the role of Mystery.  Whether to you that be God, a Higher Power, karma, the Tao of Pooh, or whatever, I believe that there is much that we (certainly I) don’t understand about life.  However the more I trust the process, the more I trust that if I think, feel and behave positively (regardless of apparent outcome), the more positive I become, and the more likely that events will flow as I would like.  The reason the Law of Attraction works may be that if I feel good about my myself, and behave and feel that way, people may pick that up just from communication queues (tone of voice, body language) and want to work/be/play with me.  It doesn’t really matter how it works. 

4. In that same line of thought: discard the pieces that don’t work for you.  For example all of the Law of Attraction descriptions I’ve seen explain the theory in terms of “magnetism” and “vibration”, stating that the “law of the universe” is that like attracts like.  Well, it ain’t.  In magnetism, opposites attract.  Electricity flows from positive to negative.  So I just put aside all this explanation as well-meant and unnecessary justification.  Because some of the theory is (to me) contrived mumbo-jumbo doesn’t mean there isn’t validity in the essential message.  If you don’t believe (as I don’t) we are to all ascend in 2012 with the guidance of the Pleiadians, then put that bit aside.

5. Complement this philosophy with more traditional methods in whatever way works for you.  For example, on health issues, I think that rejecting Western medicine for a combination of Eastern medicine and positive feelings is throwing out a lot of really good stuff.   Use the Law of Attraction, see your Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner and see your doctor.

EDIT: someone dear to me said that the term, “Law of Attraction” can be a turnoff itself to some.  She calls it “manifesting”.

FSX Patch

Paul Lange brings the hints together in this post to state we will see an FSX Service Pack 1 (=patch) prior to the Vista/DX10 version next year.  MS of course is being tight-lipped about what the patch will address, but as the #1 issue is performance I would expect to see that at least partially addressed.  I understand the architecture constrains the ability of the team to optimize dual/multi-core support in the near term, but it would be great to see them pull a rabbit out of the hat on that one.