New Scenery.cfg conventions?

[TonyD 132]

I have to say a big thank you to Umberto for this.  

I would have continued to ignore the addon.xml approach if I had not been forced into it by the latest FSDT updates.

So instead of being upset I did some reading, tried to interpret the less than totally helpful PDK (a few more examples might have helped)

I frequently re-install the base P3Dv3 sim, and this makes it so much quicker.

I have created addon-xml folders for:
 
 - FSX default aircraft that I use in P3D - Trike, DC-3, Beaver
 - AI Global Shipping
 - UK2000 Scenery
 - RealAir Aircraft
 - Flight1 BN-2 Islander (works in v4 but not gps or switch sounds)

Also remember once an addon is installed it can be disabled from inside the simulator

Top Menu Bar > Options > Addons - just untick (useful for disabling scenery)

 

Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks 

[FalconAF 213]

12 hours ago, virtuali said:

But this doesn't have anything to do to your rant because, according to your own description of your rearranging habits, your needs WAY exceed what was always been possible with the normal UI offered by the sim, so you MUST use an external utility to do what said you need to do, because the normal UI won't cut it anyway. And in fact, this is exactly what you said yourself, you DO use a 3rd party scenery customization editor.

What???

I could (and have numerous times in the past) do EXACTLY everything I said in the past using ONLY the default GUI.  I wouldn't need to use a third-party editor if it wasn't convenient.  In case you are confused, here's how it's done.

1.  Load the sim.  Use the "Add Area" button to add a scenery from wherever it may be on the computer.  During the "Add" process, you could name the "Scenery Area Title"...what showed in the Scenery Library list in the sim...to WHATEVER you wanted to call it.  You never needed a third-party editor to do that. 

2.  After adding the scenery to the Scenery Library list, you could THEN use the "Move Up" or "Move Down" buttons to move the Scenery Area Title up or down the list, thus changing the priority of the scenery.

3.  You could ALWAYS use the GUI "EDIT" button to change the entry in the Scenery Libray list after that.

4.  AND...if a third-party scenery installer installed the scenery product to the sim and listed the entry for it in the Scenery Library, AFTER that I could do ALL of the same things above with that entry (in the past) using ONLY the sim's internal Scenery Library GUI.  The problem NOW is after the installer installs the entry into the Scenery Library, you can't do ANY of them anymore.

Your accusation I'm "ranting" and MUST use an external utility is remarkably naïve and simply erroneous in fact.  I could (and have in the past) do EVERYTHING I listed in my posts using ONLY the default sim's GUI in the past.

The "utilities" you describe (and I use) do allow you to do all of that too.  But their PRIMARY use is so a user can create, save, and load DIFFERENT scenery.cfg files for different flying scenarios.

What the heck are YOU describing?  Your accusation that I "have to" use an external utility to do what I described is totally incorrect.

[tremor595 20]

Tried to follow the whole thread and think I got it (nearly). I think I will get used to the new system quickly and soon we will even have tools to prevent us from manually writing xmls or rearranging priorities, folders etc. 

But I still don't understand if I for example still have some addon sceneries listed in the scenery.cfg, so installed them the old way, and now also some installed with the XML way but want for example(and for whatever reason) have one "XML addon's" priority layer sitting between two addons from the scenery.cfg, how should the order look like? Because I think there must be consecutive numbers in the scenery.cfg, how could I place one xml's priority in between?

(sorry for my English. Non-native speaking)

[virtuali 4,421]

2 hours ago, FalconAF said:

What the heck are YOU describing?  Your accusation that I "have to" use an external utility to do what I described is totally incorrect.

You still don't get the point. What part of THIS sentence of mine you don't understand ?

Quote

As I've clearly explained, I don't question the need to have the ability to rearrange the Scenery Library, which is why I said it would be nice if P3D V4 allowed to do it even for sceneries added with the new add-on.xml method. And I also asked LM in their developers forum, if there were any special reason why it cannot be done from the UI, and if they might consider adding the ability in the future.

But you are missing the moon for the tree, because you are contesting the whole concept of this vastly superior system, because a limitation of the current P3D UI, which might eventually be gone, or eventually replaced by dedicated utilities.

[virtuali 4,421]

57 minutes ago, tremor595 said:

Tried to follow the whole thread and think I got it (nearly). I think I will get used to the new system quickly and soon we will even have tools to prevent us from manually writing xmls or rearranging priorities, folders etc. 

But I still don't understand if I for example still have some addon sceneries listed in the scenery.cfg, so installed them the old way, and now also some installed with the XML way but want for example(and for whatever reason) have one "XML addon's" priority layer sitting between two addons from the scenery.cfg, how should the order look like? Because I think there must be consecutive numbers in the scenery.cfg, how could I place one xml's priority in between?

(sorry for my English. Non-native speaking)

You can, by adding a <Layer>XXX</Layer> line in the add-on.xml file for the scenery you want to move. For example, if you set <Layer>109</Layer>, it will go just before the first area of the default Cities.

If you want to rearrange the priority between two sceneries both added with  the add-on.xml method, you should instead act on the ordering of the add-ons.cfg file in the %PROGRAMDATA% or %APPDATA%, depending how that package was added.

 

Yes, it's not very user-friendly, and I guess some smart developer might take this as an opportunity to make an utility that would do all of that automatically, assuming that LM wouldn't come up with a better solution. 

[TonyD 132]

It orders individual add-on.xml based on the order in which the scenaries are listed.  

Useful if you need to put a Landclass or Library folder at a lower priority to the main scenery, just list it first.

 

[jason99vmi 157]

Yeah a nice freeware addon that organizes this process would quell many of the freak-outs happening on here.  lol. 

[Finn 1]

I found this Utility, in addition to reorganizing the scenery.cfg,  it allows me to reorganize the scenery listed in the Add-ons.cfg. Scroll about halfway down the page to find the listing. Try it you might like it.

FREE: Lorby Prepar3D V4 Addon Organizer - https://lorby-si.weebly.com/downloads.html

This app will help you manage your external addons to the Prepar3D V4 sim by using the recommended XML files. You can add, delete, reorder, activate and deactivate all types of addons
!Frequent backups of your config files are recommended!