The Name Game

[LuisFelizTirado 33]

As Jeff Shylock (just kidding, Jeff!) knows all too well, there are few things worse than seeing your name written incorrectly in some glowing review of your wonderful work.Jim Keir (not Kier) is a long time member of the Avsim forum who has made numerous contributions to the community, too many to count. Mr. Keir, not Kier, is a great guy and an excellent developer of tools who has given us a lot, and the least that he could expect is that his name is written correctly.Perhaps those corrections could be made in the article concerning Jim Keir's splendid Mission development tool.Best regards.Luis

[Guest jshyluk]

As Jeff Shylock (just kidding, Jeff!) knows all too well, there are few things worse than seeing your name written incorrectly in some glowing review of your wonderful work.Jim Keir (not Kier) is a long time member of the Avsim forum who has made numerous contributions to the community, too many to count. Mr. Keir, not Kier, is a great guy and an excellent developer of tools who has given us a lot, and the least that he could expect is that his name is written correctly.Perhaps those corrections could be made in the article concerning Jim Keir's splendid Mission development tool.Best regards.Luis

Thanks for the catch! I would never have fixed that on my own. And I am terrible about getting names right in print - it's not the first time I've made that mistake. I owe you a beer! Jeff Shyluk - not the Shakespeare kindSenior Staff ReviewerAVSIM

[basys 4]

Hi FolksJeff -Cheers for the FSXME review.Great to hear of a novice's experience with mission creation.

MSI Creator can possibly corrupt FSX, making it unusable (this is not a bug, but a dangerous feature if used incorrectly)

When you've got time,could you please expand on the above comment. PSOn the AVSIM home page article,could you possibly correct the mis-naming FSAddon's FSX Mission Maker to Editor.Many ThanksATBPaul Donnelly

[Guest jshyluk]

Hi FolksJeff -Cheers for the FSXME review.Great to hear of a novice's experience with mission creation.When you've got time,could you please expand on the above comment. PSOn the AVSIM home page article,could you possibly correct the mis-naming FSAddon's FSX Mission Maker to Editor.Many ThanksATBPaul Donnelly

You want me to write some more? Sure thing! I love seeing my stuff in print!Although, this is pretty technical, and I am taking Jim Keir at his word that using the MSI incorrectly can corrupt FSX, as I did not test this out for myself. I hope I can express this clearly.When you save a Mission, FSXME locates the XML files automatically where FSX can find it, which is more than the OPT or the SDK will do. If you want to share a Mission, it's best to save it as an MSI file. An MSI gets read by FSX the same way as an XML Mission. The biggest difference is that the MSI is easy to transfer from computer to computer. Using the MSI Creator without calling on any advanced commands should be safe. I think it would be hard to use the MSI wrong, as long as you follow the logic of the interface, which is easy. After all, if I can do it, etc. Advanced Missions, using custom models and effects, can be created with the MSI. Maybe you want a pink Learjet that has heart-shaped contrails for Valentine's day. If you have those models, you can make sure they are distributable by including them in the MSI. That way, the end-user does not have to download extra models and effects to make the Mission work. You can add these after the fact, as the MSI allows you to create incremental patches to your Mission. So, you have your Mission "The Rescue Of ApeStar One", and then you decide to make a Valentine's Day patch, and you add the custom models as mentioned before. Just throw them into the MSI, and the new content will be added automatically, saving the end-user from having to do manual patches.I digress a little. The problem comes into play if you call upon default FSX resources as custom elements. Anything that is installed into the MSI will be deleted when you delete that MSI. In this way you can corrupt your installation of FSX beyond repair. I can't think of an immediate good reason why you would want to call on default files in the MSI, as FSX should handle those Mission elements automatically without the need for custom programming. Maybe if you wanted to include content from a more recent version of FSX that was to be given to an end-user with an older version of FSX -- although I don't know if that's actually possible, and it may go against the EULA anyways. I'll quote the manual, as Jim Keir's explanation seems straigtforward:"The simple, default behaviour of the MSI creator can be changed. You canchoose both the source and destination folders so, if you have other files to copysuch as effects or models, you can include those. Be careful though, becauseany file that you install will be removed when the MSI is uninstalled! This meansthat if you copy a new version of

[basys 4]

Hi Folks

The problem comes into play if you call upon default FSX resources as custom elements. Anything that is installed into the MSI will be deleted when you delete that MSI. In this way you can corrupt your installation of FSX beyond repair.

Cheers JeffUnderstood.Thought it might have been something new that I wasn't aware of.Not sure that it would be "beyond repair".Just to clarify.The MSI is the installation package only, (FSX doesn't read this).An SPB is the compiled version of the mission XML, (FSX reads this faster than XML)PSLook forward to release of "The Rescue Of ApeStar One". :( Many thanksATBPaul