I just installed V1.6 and cannot get winds aloft to download. I get either a "timeout" or "bad aloft data/timeout" message. I tried this at SAN, LAX, and SFO.I went to the aviationweather.gov web site and was able to download the winds aloft for the entire pacific coast without any problems or delays.The metar data is getting downloaded fine, as is TAF data.The Winds Aloft portion of the display reads:Winds Aloft Initializing ...Any ideas that I might try.-michael

Hi,This has been reported quite a bit today. I think the winds aloft source (different from avaiationweather.gov) is a little bogged down today. I will investigate further. Let me know if this clears up. Thanks!-Damian[table border=0" cellspacing="30" cellpadding="0][tr][td align = "left"]Damian ClarkHiFi Simulation SoftwareDeveloper of ActiveSkyThe next-generation weather environment simulation for FS2002!http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky[/td][td]http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg][/td][/tr][/table://http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/ima...][/tr][/table

Hi Damian,Just a suggestion for the next ActiveSky integer release. Please, consider the possibility of changing weather data source from public and spreaded servers/sites to something like a private server of Hifi.com, which would have updated weather data from servers you may choose and change. That way you have much more control on what source to make available to ActiveSky users. I know it will probably make ActiveSky more expensive for new/upgrade users, but I think saving, would say, $5-10 doesn't justify having intermitent problems regarding to unavailable/old aloft data, timeouts, etc. Best regards,Jalok

Hi Jalok,I'm working on that.. private weather servers for wxRE. The cost is the most important thing - and trying to keep it in that $10 more per copy range is proving to be challenging but certainly do-able with effort. Subscription plans are also being considered (optional, public servers would still be available).Until we go that route, I am trying to isolate the causes of invalid downloads and how to better handle them. I have already made quite a bit a progress and during this current period of internet instability I have achieved 98% success rate vs 66% from stock 1.6. A little more fine tuning, completion of offline aloft download capability and some testing and 1.7 will be released... Thanks for your feedback!-Damian[table border=0" cellspacing="30" cellpadding="0][tr][td align = "left"]Damian ClarkHiFi Simulation SoftwareDeveloper of ActiveSkyThe next-generation weather environment simulation for FS2002!http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky[/td][td]http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg][/td][/tr][/table://http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/ima...][/tr][/table

I really appreciate your consideration in making a v1.7 for us "modem" offline users.Dropping winds aloft for v1.6 was a "shock", but it's even more of a shock that you would swiftly work on a correction of the situation.Thanks for the quick customer support concerning customer needs.Glenn D. Willmot

Thanks Glenn,It was a shock to me to learn that simulated winds aloft in offline mode was not acceptable - I didn't take into account that users were using LATEST online info but flying offline.. in other words, you still maintain real-world current-time planning capability but are flying offline to avoid keeping the connection open. So having your winds mimick online mode is more realistic.This is a huge bit of work to implement. It was easy with pre v1.6 because wxRE could simply download the latest raw text for all FD stations. This is not possible anymore. Now we have to use an alternative source to query for all valid reports world-wide (which is almost impossible due to the nature of the WMO winds and internet comms) then fetch those reports somehow. We're talking HUGE amounts of data here and large server loads with multiple processes and error checking/handling the entire way. This is just to download the data in the first place. Then we need processing routines to fetch this offline data and somehow mimick online mode. This will be the most challenging thing I have ever attempted to do... I am guessing that less than 5% of wxRE users are affected by this capability (or lack thereof). But in effort to try and satisfy all users, I will continue to work full time on this and try to get it done sometime before FS9 releases ;) Actually it looks like 2-3 weeks at this point.-Damian[table border=0" cellspacing="30" cellpadding="0][tr][td align = "left"]Damian ClarkHiFi Simulation SoftwareDeveloper of ActiveSkyThe next-generation weather environment simulation for FS2002!http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky[/td][td]http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg][/td][/tr][/table://http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/ima...][/tr][/table

>But in effort to try >and satisfy all users, I will continue to work full time on >this and try to get it done sometime before FS9 releases ;) >Actually it looks like 2-3 weeks at this point. >Damien,I really appreciate your willingness to resolve this and your dedication to your customers! Thanks a bunch.In my case, I used to fly and maintain the online connection. With the release of WxRE and its 'weather engine' and TAF processing, there was no need for me to remain on line and tie up the line.Unfortunately, I'm one of those that has been unsuccessful in getting winds aloft to download using V1.6. I am now back to using V1.15 and it is not an inconvenience for me. Whenever you get the winds aloft processing and server issues fixed - I'll be ready to move back up to the latest version.Thanks again.-michael

Yes MIchael, that's one thing I don't quite understand yet myself. While using v1.15, I had no problem getting the upper weather winds in off-line mode. Then it was back to the future with v1.6 since they suddenly disappeared.I too will probably go back to v1.15 until the issue is resolved.By the way...how did you go about it?Did you have to remove v1.6 and reinstall v1.0 then upgrade to v1.15, or could you load v1.15 OVER v1.6?Now, even I'm confused!Glenn D. Willmot

Glenn,I played it safe. I removed ActiveSky entirely. Then I loaded V1.0 followed by the upgrade directly to V1.15.-michael

I am now getting this winds aloft problem every damn day now. All day today. over the southeast US and mid-atlantic. The "Bad Aloft Data/Retry on next interval update"? This is while flying over various parts of the US. Never had it before v 1.6. I hope a solution is near for this annoying problem.

As a US user, I concur that 1.15 wasn't broken and 1.6 is a "downgrade". It seems like a switch could be provided to allow use of the old 1.1 code for the winds aloft processing. I realize international users were clambering for winds aloft data and it was a major objective to provide that capability.Put me down in the category of those who wish to download the current data set and go offline to fly.scott s..

Greetings,downgrade eh? Well I guess that's what 3 months of full time hard work brings, including international winds aloft, voice flightwatch, many fixes and other enhancements. Its too bad that for some users all my hard work seems like all for nothing. I really should have not even done the update?Old winds aloft and new are simply not compatible. If it was possible I would have included both but it is not. An entirely different system.Sorry you are dissapointed. I am too. The last thing I wanted to do was provide a "downgrade". I continue to work hard on implementing offline winds aloft download capability... Thanks for your patience.-Damian[table border=0" cellspacing="30" cellpadding="0][tr][td align = "left"]Damian ClarkHiFi Simulation SoftwareDeveloper of ActiveSkyThe next-generation weather environment simulation for FS2002!http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky[/td][td]http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg][/td][/tr][/table://http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/ima...][/tr][/table

Not really disappointed, since I find Ver 1.0 works very nicely for me, and I would recommend it to anyone. It just is kind of frustrating to have a set up which is working OK, but after the update now seems to have problem downloading and using the basic functionality. I appreciate you were working hard to get the international winds aloft working. So I will continue on and await developments. For me, at least, it is not an urgent matter since as I said at the outset, ver 1.0 works fine. I might not have even posted about it, but I did post several days ago and the thread disappeared, so I wanted to make sure my *vote* for the old-style functionality was tallied.scott s..

Scott,We are testing a new wxRE.exe that hopes to solve the downloading problem and still continue to have real time international winds aloft. If you would like to try it, please drop me an e-mail.Hope this helps,JimActiveSky Support