Curious about the alpha process

[Dominique_K 10,133]

Have the testers had the same build from the start or do they download from time to time a new build ?

And, in the first scenario, how long would it reasonably last ? After several weeks, hasn’t Asobo collected everything they needed in terms of remarks ?

 

[andyjohnston.net 617]

They can't answer.

[Chock 17,769]

Not being privvy to their process, I couldn't say I know how they are going about it. But what I do know is that with testing, sometimes a test build will purposely only include elements on which testing is needed, and if that is done then testing can be pretty rapidly accomplished.

NDAs being what they are, testers might not even be at liberty to even disclose that.

[Dominique_K 10,133]

I suspect that NDA may prevent tester to comment but there are people around here familiar how an alpha goes in a large game software house.

[nickhod 425]

I believe there have been at least 2, possibly 3 alpha versions released so far. (Based on the stuff we've see on development roadmaps and some Googling).

Each alpha release seemed to be about 2 months apart. They might be releasing regular builds between those major versions though.
None of us "outsiders" know for sure, and none of the testers can say.

Based on the pace of alpha (no talk of beta yet) builds and the stuff on the recent wishlist, I'd guess it's a late Q4 release, if they're still targeting 2020.

 

[ca_metal 2,015]

54 minutes ago, domkle said:

I suspect that NDA may prevent tester to comment but there are people around here familiar how an alpha goes in a large game software house.

I would say they are on the second version of the alpha, based on the public info we had so far. The second wave for the Alpha 2 brought probably the second version of the Alpha Build. Their instructions by then were to uninstall the alpha build and reinstall the new one. 

But that's just for the Insider Alpha Program, I believe internally they have multiple alpha versions being tested all the time, and from those they must be selecting the most stable ones to share with the Insiders.

[swiesma 625]

If you google for Flight Sim 2020 NDA you get the NDAs...

https://www.flightsimulator.com/guidelines-nda/

Edited March 2, 2020 by swiesma

[GlideBy 324]

We do know they have updated the build for the latest group.  https://www.flightsimulator.com/january-23rd-2020-development-update/

But we don't know how often, or if they have updated after that.

Why ask?  I assume they update when they need new information.  And they probably have an internal build that the testers don't see.  That build has more updates in it.

[Amon1973 1,421]

9 hours ago, nickhod said:

I believe there have been at least 2, possibly 3 alpha versions released so far. (Based on the stuff we've see on development roadmaps and some Googling).

Each alpha release seemed to be about 2 months apart. They might be releasing regular builds between those major versions though.
None of us "outsiders" know for sure, and none of the testers can say.

Based on the pace of alpha (no talk of beta yet) builds and the stuff on the recent wishlist, I'd guess it's a late Q4 release, if they're still targeting 2020.

 

Q4 release is what I was told from some well known devs at Cosford, so I've just always assumed that they would know. If we get MSFS earlier well, we all win.