1 hour ago, March Hare said:

I'll just stop you there and haven't read the remainder of your reply. I was referring to Robert Randazzo, as I thought the person I was replying to was.

Well ok. But my full name is displayed in all my messages.

1 minute ago, robert young said:

Well ok. But my full name is displayed in all my messages.

Yes, I can see your name. I didn't confuse you with Randazzo. I saw the name Robert (no surname given) mentioned in a comment, in relation to lack of communication from Asobo, and the only Robert I knew of complaining about lack of communication from Asobo recently was Randazzo. I had no idea you had been trying to communicate with Asobo. But then again, I have been skimming threads lately, so maybe I missed that statement from you and so assumed the Robert referred to was Randazzo.

6 hours ago, Delta558 said:

I am a 3rd party dev, I work for a couple of companies but my views are entirely my own and I cannot say that they represent any company. They are based on 15 years of working on flight dynamics for simulators and, whilst my views may often appear quite negative with regard to MSFS, I actually like a lot of aspects of it including the interaction with the environment. I strongly disagree, though, that it is a massive step forwards aerodynamically at this point in time. There is a lot of promise, but to go back to that paragraph you reference I am finding that no matter how closely I follow that tutorial or use my experience to build on it, the results are (to me) nowhere near where they should be. 

While assembling a reasonable reply to another poster, I will agree with you that the shape-based algorithm doesn't really add much to clarity in making a flight model from scratch. As I've always said, I don't really care that much about the methodology as long as it is practical, and by that I don't mean one should neglect studying new methods, and I have, but I honestly find better results using anything but the SDK method of entering shape and other data and expecting anything useable to come out the other end. As you say, in practice it is actually quite limiting.

It seems to me that the much maligned table system of past sims has been rather unjustly criticised. Particularly with smaller aircraft the number and scope of individual parameters is to my mind still more powerful. And as I think we might have agreed before, the newer system is much more time-consuming to no particular purpose. I have yet to see or fly any aircraft designed with the new methodology that flies very well. One particular addon, which I cannot name for obvious reasons, was clearly constructed using the new method of entering data and receiving data out. It flies quite badly with numerous faults in every axis. I have tweaked it using fairly crude over-rides it feels a lot better now,

Edited February 27, 20224 yr by robert young

On 2/26/2022 at 7:17 AM, Tom_L said:

There seems to be a selective attention that I can't understand from my consumers perspective: on one hand they were very supportive for groups like Working Title to the point of hiring those guys, others seem to get along okay. And then there are some who are completely ignored despite their expressed willingness to support the platform, like Robert. Jean-Luc ( @RXP ) comes to mind as another prime example.

 

On 2/26/2022 at 8:28 AM, abrams_tank said:

I don't want to relitigate the issue with RXP, but I read it was because of licensing issues for Garmin in MSFS, so they wouldn't even work with RXP because of this.  My understanding is, Microsoft was worried about the licensing issues regarding RXP's Garmin products, because Microsoft already has an existing agreement with Garmin.  In other words, it came down to legal mayhem and legal conflicts.  And I believe RXP claimed to have those licenses, which made it weirder.  For Microsoft to officially work with you, you need to have cleared all the legal hurdles - for this reason, they were very slow to officially recognize the FBW A320 project, and allow the FBW A320 on the MSFS marketplace, because of legal hurdles. Anyways, I don't know the whole story between RXP and Microsoft, just what I have read on the forums.  There may be more to the story so you may want to check up yourself.

PS. Please note that I am not taking sides on RXP vs Microsoft.  But based on what I have read, it wasn't a technical issue.  It was down to legal issues, from what I read. And there may be more to the story.

Edited February 26 by abrams_tank

 

I understand it is confusing, but it is very simple in fact and it is all written here:

https://www.avsim.com/forums/topic/582275-rxp-gtn-750650-and-gns-530430-for-fs2020/?do=findComment&comment=4554785

 

Quote

 

...
Let me set the record straight for the community:

I didn’t know Microsoft cared about RXP’s agreement with Garmin. I would assume they would have asked if this was the case, rather than completely cut me off with no word. If that is the reason of their silence, I would have expected them to ask about this issue, or at the very least tell me the reason for their cut off. This doesn’t show good faith otherwise.

Since Microsoft never asked RXP about any such licensing or EULA questions, I invite you therefore to prove to the community your claims and tell everyone why are you so certain that RXP is in breach of any Garmin agreement. Making such accusations without proof is a very serious thing I do not consider any lightly.
...

 

 

 

 

You might have missed this as well:

https://www.avsim.com/forums/topic/582275-rxp-gtn-750650-and-gns-530430-for-fs2020/?do=findComment&comment=4636789
 

Quote

Suffice to say to add insult to the injury, or the reverse depending, my account has been forbidden to post new content in their forums for a few days...

 

I also suggest everyone to read this too:

Is there any hope for an individual new developer to get accepted as a "partner" for the Marketplace? - MSFS DevSupport (flightsimulator.com)

 

Quote

 

I'm reviving the topic because as of today it has been nearly 18 months our application is "in process", while we've been in Contact with a Microsoft representative since Dec. 2019 until he stopped (quit?) in March 2020.

 

Here is back when it started:
September 17th, 2020 Development Update - Community / News and Announcements - Microsoft Flight Simulator Forums

It’s only been one short month since we launched the new Microsoft Flight Simulator and we have already received over 900 applications to our Marketplace Partner Program. That’s amazing and we are so excited to see the third party creator community embracing the new platform with such enthusiasm. Last week alone, we launched 10 all-new products and updates to 8 existing ones.

Compare with the the last public report:
February 17th, 2022 Development Update - Community / News and Announcements - Microsoft Flight Simulator Forums

As of 02/11, we have now approved 234 (+4) third parties into the in-sim marketplace and – so far 134 (+0) have released 912 products on PC (+12) and 614 on Xbox (+15). 1,839 products (+18) have already been released in 3rd party stores and the in-sim marketplace. Beyond that, another 529 products (+59) from 3rd party developers are in production (303 announced, 226 unannounced). In total, over 2,368 3rd party products (+77) are either released or are in development.

 

In other words:

- 26% 3rd parties approved in 18 months (234/900), 74% still waiting and some of them without any word at all from Microsoft (this topic).

- 15% have released products in 18 months (132/900)

- 11% of the approved vendors are still developing their 1st product since they have been approved.

- Those approved are selling already 11.7 products on average each over the last 18 months ( (912+614) / 132 )

- In turn, those approved are already selling 1.5 product per months on average.

- But those not approved but who have already built a product can't sell it on the market place though.

- And those not approved don't have any access to direct technical support on the Discord channel.

 

 

Now more specifically about Reality XP, the Garmin, and FS2020:

- We don't have a-priori any intention to sell our Garmin products on the Market Place, or at least if we'd have, and if there is any licensing issue, I'd expect Microsoft to tell us before hand, not to stall our Market Place application nor simply ignoring us despite all the help and support I've shown to the game since its release, and the continuing support I'm providing now with my OpenXR Toolkit involvement.

- Even if we'd been pushing our product to the Market Place, if we'd been approved already, MSFT can still veto any submission.

- We do have many other products than the Garmin we'd like to sell, but we need Market Place application and support

- And regardless of all the above, we've been successfully contributing to this industry for the last 20 years with award winning products and they just ignore completely the expertise and knowledge we're willing to share with them for YOUR benefit.

 

Believe me, it it was just a matter of licensing issue, this would have been solved long time ago already...

Edited March 5, 20224 yr by RXP

I'd also suggest everyone read Virtuali's post here:

If SimConnect is not the Future, what is? - MSFS DevSupport (flightsimulator.com)

Quote

 

I have no problems with WASM but, it seems it has been made *mainly* to cater the needs of some airplane developers that needed to port lots C++/GDI+ code.

Not there's anything wrong with C++/GDI+: this is coming from the guy who wrote the only default airplane included FSX ( the F/A-18 we made for Microsoft ) which was coded entirely in C++/GDI+, and the official GDI+ example which was included with ESP when it was still owned by Microsoft, was a slightly modified version of the code we sold to Microsoft in 2007, before that, most planes still came with 2D panels and rotating needles/bitmaps, dating back to FS95-era...

We moved away from airplane/gauges in the meantime, and are more focused to stand-alone modules that provides global services to the sim, and there are several things that are a bit unclear about the whole SDK situation:

- Right now, a stand-alone WASM doesn't have much to do OTHER than using Simconnect! It can't call the Windows API, it can't read outside it's own package, it can't link to any 3rd party libraries, it doesn't have a clear interaction with the HTML/JS sub-system, it doesn't have ANY kind of GUI-related function ( why can't we just get an handle to ImGUI, so we could display some stuff using the framework the simulator has already loaded with Dev Mode ? )., it can't do anything with graphic, because those APIs are used only in WASM-based gauge so, it's anybody able to tell me what are we supposed to DO with a Stand-alone WASM module, other than calling Simconnect ?

And what people have been using Stand-alone WASM modules for ? Mostly ONE thing: to act as a server to provide access to out-of-process clients, for the one and only reason to get access to the Gauges API calls, so they could read/write L: variables and all the other variables not accessible from Simconnect directly. There are already an half-dozen of modules all doing this exact thing, so if there was any performance concerns about too much Simconnect (identical) traffic, it has already blown out of proportions and it will only get worse, and the client data area functions are so flexible that you can't be sure some guy hasn't already made a module that is pushing 1K of data over Named Pipes every frame...

Why people do that ? To interface with custom hardware, special joysticks, arduino boards, Streamdecks, moving map apps running on iPads, Yoke/Throttles with lights or even screens, but even apps like Navigraph moving maps, that use their own out of process client. Everything, basically, that MUST be running out-of process to use the real Windows API and interface with USB/hardware, but MUST also get data from the sim. And that's only possible with a Stand-Alone WASM module using Simconnect to connect to an out of process Simconnect client.

Sure, lots of this MIGHT be also possible with JS+HTML but, the irony is, that "legacy" Simconnect is at least DOCUMENTED, while the whole JS+HTML framework has exactly...ZERO documentation so, is the only officially documented API that has stood the test of time, is being talked of being phased out, and to be replaced by.... nothing ? A "To Do" empty doc ?

I really wanted to hear something like this:

"Simconnect will eventually go away in the LONG term but, we are designing a brand new API, more modern, more performing, with more access to the complete set of features of the sim, that will do much more than Simconnect ever did, and we ARE keeping Simconnect in "maintenance mode" only, meaning only bug fixes and keep compatibility with updates"

That would sound like a reasonable approach, and developers that are making add-ons sold on the Marketplace, who are contributing to make the sim sustainable on the long term, need to make plans, because some time it might take years to make a complex add-on, when the novelty of the extremely good graphic in MSFS will wear off, users will start asking for more involved stuff, and Xbox beginners will either turn into serious simmers, or they'll just move one and play with something else, there's no middle ground.

 

 

 

 

 

I believe the solution designed by ASOBO has most probably to do with Optimization.

I remember that AeroflyFS also has a rather "closed" SDK in terms of gauge / systems design, and it was until MFS for sure one of the smoother flight simulators I ever tried, and I didn't even try VR because I do not own the required equipment... 

Developers were also complaining about how complex it was to create sophisticated systems because the available Libraries are rather limited.

Might ASOBO / MS decision have been based on this same principle, making sure that any add-on aircraft will, irrespective of how complex it is, not impact the simulation engine that much ?

Might it be because pone day MS / ASOBO intend to place the code of the simulation objects 100% in the cloud ?

This IMO doesn't justify the kind of treatment received by Jean-Luc or any other seasoned / respected developers, specially those that have helped MS get to the level of success it got with all previous tittles.

On the opposite side of the spectrum there's X-Plane which provides a totally open environment / SDK to developers looking into the programming of sophisticated systems. OFC there are consequences, specially when some solutions based on scripting are hammered to build all of the stuff a complex aircraft is made of using it... instead of coding in C++...

Edited March 5, 20224 yr by jcomm