I would have thought this is obvious but we need accurate wind currents down to ground level, even at least so that the windsock can render properly.

3 hours ago, Greazer said:

even at least so that the windsock can render properly.

I have a work around for this if anyone wants me to upload it somewhere. Fairly miffed a real fix didnt make it into the update, (the issue is in the calc for the windsock datarefs, using the lower wind layer instead fixes it in most circumstances, but might cause issues for high airports)

Edited June 18, 20214 yr by mSparks

9 minutes ago, mSparks said:

Fairly miffed a real fix didnt make it into the update.

Yeah...this is one of the roughly 10000 bugs still open for X-Plane that no one ever really notices...until someone does, reports about it and then everyone (at least the few dozen folks reading forums) tries it and says "Oh my god, its true! The windsock shows the wind at the aircraft, not on the ground!! How did this ever happen??" 🙂

In other words - 99% of all users out there haven´t seen it and 98% of them wouldn´t care if they did. It is not like the windsock is TOTALLY wrong, it just "overreports" by 30% or so (depending on the height of your aircraft).

Thats why it - unlike a CTD fix - is not important enough to risk including it into an update that is as small as possible in scope for fear of breaking something else...when LR´s attention is focused well ahead 😉

Cheers, Jan

 

Edited June 18, 20214 yr by Janov

1 hour ago, Janov said:

It is not like the windsock is TOTALLY wrong, it just "overreports" by 30% or so (depending on the height of your aircraft).

it always reports zero wind when you are on the ground.

1 hour ago, Janov said:

this is one of the roughly 10000 bugs still open for X-Plane that no one ever really notices.

dont agree with this either. we do a lot of recreate and bug testing, there are a few bugs remaining but none of them flight critical like having a working / not borken windsock, besides the amd vulkan bugs which are all/mostly amds fault, and the disaster that is the default fmc and ssao.

1 hour ago, Janov said:

Thats why it - unlike a CTD fix - is not important enough to risk including it into an update that is as small as possible in scope for fear of breaking something else

except people do and have noticed it, but most people don't know how it works or how to report it, so they imagine it is because XP doesn't have any kind of area weather, rather than just a really simple borken calc on two datarefs.

we are in the realm of fixed now or forever borken, so a good chance XP11 is now left forever unable to simulate windsocks by default.

"XP11 flight model is so advanced it can't even simulate windsocks" 

good luck defending that one.

Edited June 18, 20214 yr by mSparks

14 hours ago, mSparks said:

it always reports zero wind when you are on the ground.

Not on my installation in the default Cessna. It shows the wind pretty much just fine while I sit parked in front of it.

It might be different for an aircraft that has a weird datum point (really close to the ground).

1 hour ago, Janov said:

Not on my installation in the default Cessna. It shows the wind pretty much just fine while I sit parked in front of it.

It might be different for an aircraft that has a weird datum point (really close to the ground).

its both speed and direction that are borken

direction probably more serious implications than speed.

And more to the point, anyone relying on the windsock prior to landing will get a very nasty surprise (potentially fatal...) trying a real world landing with the same windsock. 

Further, pretty sure there is no way you can get the sim certified with a bug like that (hmmmm I wonder if that's why the bug list is such a big secret...).

Edited June 19, 20214 yr by mSparks

Yes, that "whining", virus definitely spreading, please check in before posting.

4 hours ago, mSparks said:

its both speed and direction that are borken

You see this effect often - when scenery designers are using the windsock.obj. They inadvertently "turn" the windsock object when placing it (so it doesn't face "north" anymore) and thereby break the direction functionality.

Its not a bug, just something that some scenery designers don´t know 😉

 

1 hour ago, Janov said:

You see this effect often - when scenery designers are using the windsock.obj. They inadvertently "turn" the windsock object when placing it (so it doesn't face "north" anymore) and thereby break the direction functionality.

Its not a bug, just something that some scenery designers don´t know 😉

 

Well there you go. It should have a little N on the object, better check YSSY. Seems you may be wrong on this, the object that was in YSSY had no direction, replaced it with new one that is set to 0.00 Bearing. I think the older windsocks dont move at all. Think that may have being mentioned years ago from memory

Edited June 19, 20214 yr by mjrhealth

18 minutes ago, mjrhealth said:

I think the older windsocks dont move at all.

Nah, the "old" windsock look and work fine, just like the object-based windsocks. The one difference is that the "old" windsocks are stored in the apt.dat file for the airport, while the object based ones are stored in the .dsf file (like all objects).

The benefit of the old ones is that you can´t mess up the "direction" - while the benefit of the object ones is that you can change their height above ground (like mSparks did in his helicopter scenery to make it sit "on top" of the hangar).

Messing up the direction is common, because scenery designers can see the windsock on the sat picture (if it is detailed enough) and are used to placing objects so they align with what they see on the sat picture. So it is natural to make the windsock.obj align in direction with the windsock you see on your picture...which makes it not work right, unless the wind was blowing from true north when the picture was taken 😉

 

Edited June 19, 20214 yr by Janov

1 hour ago, Janov said:

Nah, the "old" windsock look and work fine, just like the object-based windsocks. The one difference is that the "old" windsocks are stored in the apt.dat file for the airport, while the object based ones are stored in the .dsf file (like all objects).

The benefit of the old ones is that you can´t mess up the "direction" - while the benefit of the object ones is that you can change their height above ground (like mSparks did in his helicopter scenery to make it sit "on top" of the hangar).

Messing up the direction is common, because scenery designers can see the windsock on the sat picture (if it is detailed enough) and are used to placing objects so they align with what they see on the sat picture. So it is natural to make the windsock.obj align in direction with the windsock you see on your picture...which makes it not work right, unless the wind was blowing from true north when the picture was taken 😉

 

There are two default windsocks

Resources/default scenery/sim objects/landscape/windsock.obj

and

Resources/default scenery/sim objects/landscape/windsock_lit.obj

Both use the datarefs

sim/graphics/animation/windsock_the

and

sim/graphics/animation/windsock_psi

which depend on the aircraft altitude

2 hours ago, Janov said:

They inadvertently "turn" the windsock

That windsock is moving solely because I am moving the aircraft altitude slider - that is how the windsocks change depending on aircraft altitude (depending on the weather ofc).

Edited June 19, 20214 yr by mSparks

1 hour ago, Janov said:

Nah, the "old" windsock look and work fine, just like the object-based windsocks. The one difference is that the "old" windsocks are stored in the apt.dat file for the airport, while the object based ones are stored in the .dsf file (like all objects).

The benefit of the old ones is that you can´t mess up the "direction" - while the benefit of the object ones is that you can change their height above ground (like mSparks did in his helicopter scenery to make it sit "on top" of the hangar).

Messing up the direction is common, because scenery designers can see the windsock on the sat picture (if it is detailed enough) and are used to placing objects so they align with what they see on the sat picture. So it is natural to make the windsock.obj align in direction with the windsock you see on your picture...which makes it not work right, unless the wind was blowing from true north when the picture was taken 😉

 

I just put them in the right place never though to rotate them.. So YSSY is all 0.00 just to be sure. IE all N - S

27 minutes ago, mSparks said:

That windsock is moving solely because I am moving the aircraft altitude slider

With "rotating" I mean they "rotate" the object while placing it in the scenery. Every object placed with WED can have a different direction - so you can place houses, cars, benches etc. accurately. The windsock objects are not different - but they are animated (naturally) in a relative way. The instruction from code just says "turn left XX degrees" - and if the initial heading was wrong (because the designer placed the windsock not facing north) then the resultant pointing direction will be wrong as well.

 

12 minutes ago, Janov said:

The instruction from code just says "turn left XX degrees"

 

the instruction being the dataref sim/graphics/animation/windsock_psi 

which depends on the altitude of the aircraft.

12 minutes ago, Janov said:

(because the designer placed the windsock not facing north) then the resultant pointing direction will be wrong as well.

For example if the designer didn't have his aircraft at exactly the same altitude as the windsock and noticed it was pointing about 45 degrees in the wrong direction.

As a personal anecdote, a few years ago I placed several windsocks on top of each other at different heights to see how xplane was changing wind speed and direction with altitude and incorrectly concluded it didn't - I understand now why.

Edited June 19, 20214 yr by mSparks