I still think the most promising solution to the seasons issue is (was?) John Maxx's but recently he doesn't seem too keen to confirm its status (hint, hint John if you're reading...)

 

http://forums.x-pilot.com/topic/7315-so-ermseasons/

Which maybe confirms the little known fact, that working with textures (especially with a lot of textures ... and yes, there are a lot in X-Plane) is far from a trivial task! Especially if one wants to do it - halfway - right (quality etc.) ... Thats why even Albert (the original texture dev from X-Plane and the creator of "Winter_Package") only cared to create a winter version ...

 

 

Which maybe confirms the little known fact, that working with textures (especially with a lot of textures ... and yes, there are a lot in X-Plane) is far from a trivial task!

 

Texturing is indeed nasty. I've learned lots and lots about using Blender to create nice animated 3D models, even down to creating a human head (Useless for X-Plane), but I just can't get texturing right. Texturing is so incredibly time consuming, and finding and getting good material to use is just one part of the puzzle, actually getting it to look right is another story entirely. I'd say 90% of the time made up creating 3D models is creating textures and UV mapping

That's unfortunate, as it excludes Mac and Linux users which make a good portion of X-Plane users.

 

7-zip and other programs can sometimes open .exe self-extracting archives. This would work on any OS since it's treated as a data file rather than an executable. This is probably what I would do on a Windows PC too, because running executables downloaded from a Russian site doesn't seem very safe to me (no offense to any Russians on here).

 

You could also run the files on a Windows PC and then transfer the extracted contents.

 

As for seasons in X-Plane, they are *simulated*. Things like dew point, temperature, pressure etc. does affect the flight model and instruments. It's only the seasonal textures themselves that are missing.

I think, in the interests of safety, I'll pass on trying to install such software.  I do use 7-zip and I'm running a PC, not Linux or Mac.  I am setting FSX back up on my new build, so I can find textures there if I feel I can't live without them.  Too much risk to jeopardize a perfectly working sim...  I'll wait for a commercial version.