Seems there's a bit of controversy with this product at "The Org." Product is No longer for sale here.....

http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?showtopic=79464

 

Controversy at the Org?  Say it aint so lol

 

I'm sure the dev will get it sorted though...

Thanks Longranger for the info. Too bad, I really wanted to buy it, even if it's a bit "heavy" for fps.

Well, I think no one would dare to say that the plane itself is copied. This is obviously not the case (they look different, they fly different and even their handles work different compared to Carenado) , but if you look in some of the lua scripts and the ACF file there are some strong indications that they were originally not written by vFlyteAir, although large parts are anyway so generic that it would be totally inconclusive where they originated.

 

They will have to rewrite these files and probably much more fundamental than it would originally be the case.

 

That's why I wrote totally unnecessary. It only gives vFlyteAir a bad reputation and makes Carenado additional work (cease and decist letter and so on).

Ohhh, Now I get the drama. 

Ouch. That doesn't sound too good. Looks like it's best to see how things develop... I've asked for a refund. However, I'm sure these issues can be resolved, and once that's the case I'll gladly buy the Archer again.

A message from  vFlyteAir to our Customers and X-Plane Developers and Users

 

Most of the X-Plane community is now aware of the issues involving vFlyteAir and certain other companies that offer payware products for the X-Plane community.

 

Firstly, and most importantly, we’d like to share with X-Plane users that we have been in direct contact with the other principals involved in this issue, and we can state, without question, that the other party involved has been nothing short of gracious, charitable and understanding of the issues involved. Their intent is to foster new development, innovation, and growth of the X-Plane community, not to squelch or discourage competition or new innovation.

 

In the same spirit, we are offering this “lessons learned” message in the hopes that it will help other active or would-be developers in the X-Plane community. We sincerely hope that our lessons learned from this experience will help others interested in developing new products for the X-Plane community. We ran afoul of the rules of violating others’ intellectual property, and we’d like to explain how it happened, and help try to help you to avoid the same pitfalls. We made mistakes, and we hope that others in the community can use our experience to avoid the same problems.

 

Lesson Learned #1 – If you see it posted publicly on the Internet, don’t assume that it is okay to use.

Somebody MUST have originally authored the code, method or concept, and it is YOUR responsibility to discover who created it, and why. They may have offered it without condition of use. They may have offered it freely for others to use, but only for Freeware products. It is YOUR responsibility to determine what the author’s permissions are, and how you may legally re-use the information.

Unfortunately, it may also be the case that somebody else re-published the author’s original content without regard to who owns it, and without the permission of the original author. DON’T ASSUME ANYTHING! Always check with whatever sources are available before making use of the technique. Don’t be afraid to check with your competitors – is this their intellectual property? Do they know who might have authored it originally? Make no assumptions – verify, validate, confirm!

 

Lesson Learned #2 – There’s no such thing as “reverse-engineering”. Even though you may grow to understand, through inspection of someone else’s code, how it works and why it works, it is NOT okay to re-code the technique or method to suit your own purposes. It’s not just a line or two of code, or a formula here or there that defines someone else’s intellectual property – it’s the ENTIRE concept, technique or methodology. Make sure that your ideas for creating a new feature are your own UNIQUE invention, and that you have accomplished it in a completely different way than anyone else’s, and without influence from another party’s hard work . Again, don’t be afraid to check with the original author or other knowledgable sources in the X-Plane community. The X-Plane community is not a battle-zone – it is a cooperative community. We are all interested in growing and developing the X-Plane product. I personally believe, after talking with the injured party involved in our mistake, that they are very much interested in encouraging new development, new growth and new innovation. It is the best thing for the entire X-Plane community.

 

Lesson Learned #3 – Don’t be afraid to ask when in doubt. It is always better to clear up a doubt or confusion before proceeding. There’s no harm in asking! Ask the experts, the ones who have been around the X-Plane world the longest. Check with the developers and other commercial companies themselves.

 

Again, we’d like express our appreciation to the other parties involved in this controversy. There is no doubt that they are interested in furthering the growth, popularity and innovation of the X-Plane community and the X-Plane product. They are not afraid of competition; rather, they welcome it, as long as it is done uniquely, originally, and without influence from others’ original work.

 

X-Plane is, in my opinion, the most brilliantly crafted and technologically advanced flight simulation product ever invented, and deserves the attention of developers and users.

 

For our part at vFlyteAir, we intend to help the progress of the X-Plane community, using our own lessons learned, and in a more responsible manner.

 

We apologize to our Customers, Distributors and press reviewers who have been our supporters over the last two years. But especially, we apologize to our competitor who was harmed by our actions. We cannot say enough about their good intentions to better the X-Plane world, and we agree whole-heartedly with their good intentions. So please, take our “Lessons Learned “ to heart – we made mistakes, but we hope we can help others to avoid the pitfalls to which we fell victim.

 

I can say on behalf of vFlyteAir, and the other party(s) involved in this issue:

 

Please, go create! Go innovate! Create great products for the X-Plane world! Be competitive!

But do it responsibly…

Lesson Learned #2 – There’s no such thing as “reverse-engineering”.

 

Well, this is in fact wrong! It more or less depends on where you live and what you want to do with this knowledge.

To insure compatibility this is in many countries legal and even in the US there are some exceptions where reverse engineering is legal..

So does that mean no Piper then? Was really looking forward to this...

Bravo!! It's refreshing to see a individual or developer own up and admit to their mistakes.

So does that mean no Piper then?

I don't think so. The fact that they are talking with "the harmed comnpany" means that the problem is solvable. They have to discuss which parts of the files are so generic that no one claims property rights and which are the functions and handles that they are not allowed to use, so that these parts of the code have to be rewritten.

 

Of course the plane will have to be tested again with the new code. So as long as they haven't lost any interest in publishing planes they should be able to rerelease their planes.

It's really good to see that, instead of turning this into an ugly legal affair, the wronged party is actually working with vFlyte to resolve the issue. This, in my opionion, adds to their reputation and results in a win-win situation for all of us. Well done!

 

 

Lesson Learned #2 – There’s no such thing as “reverse-engineering”.

 

This is definitely wrong. You can't steal someone's code, but under certain circumstances you absolutely can reverse engineer it. Now, in this case that appears to have not been true, but such a broad statement strikes me as them trying to be overly reactionary to their behavior.

Well, this sure gives me hope.

 

Starting my PPL training at the end of the year and the local school has an Arrow I was looking forward to flying in X-Plane.

Ok, they are obviously working on a Rerelease:

https://www.vflyteair.com/

I don't know what piece of code exactly is being talked about in this case, but my guess goes to the "anti-torque" measures using the code initially introduced at a thread in the .ORG forums.

 

So... and since this is a long story of a problem that persists since XP9, and also since Austin apparently decided that the best way to solve it would be to give devs a chance to "inject" sourceless forces / moments through a few new datarefs, it would be great to see someone using it for the first time :-)

 

It's an approach that was used in a famous aerobatic plane available from a french site, under the form of "puffs", but now devs can actually calculate and inject, at each sim iteration a moment / force on each of the roll, yaw, pitch axis.... 

Appears all their planes are going to get a change.