ActiveSky FS Released

[ryanbatc 13,028]

45 minutes ago, madman320 said:

 

I repeat again: METAR deciption will NEVER be more accurate than Meteoblue.

I 100% disagree.  I'm an ATC and previously worked at two towers for over a decade.  I was a certified weather observer with the NWS, and used that certification daily in the tower.  One tower I worked at had an ASOS and then we augmented that occasionally with NWS employees as well.  All that was broadcast over ATIS.  The other tower did not have NWS employees but instead we augmented the ASOS directly, and accurately.

Part of my simming fun includes shooting IAP's at airports with specific weather (most of this poor wx was found looking at METARs).  Where I worked (midwest of the USA), the metar and associated SPECI, are VERY accurate.  If the field was OVC002 - pilots weren't breaking out till right at minimums.  PIREPs were frequently agreeing with the ATIS ceiling and visibility readout.

I do agree if you find yourself at a tiny field with an AWOS machine, it may only update once per hour and in that case, yes the weather could be quite different.  But at large facilities (where most simmers tend to fly - big class B airports in the US or large airports elsewhere in the world), the weather reporting systems are very accurate, and a speci can be issued every 5 min - and will be reflected on the ATIS.

My experience with meteoblue is that it's mediocre...  it can be good for predicting large weather patterns/systems, but at least in the USA, can be quite out of date... sometimes I've watched a system on nexrad and compare to the sim...  4 hours+ old at times...  That annoys me big time!  

I will agree though that popping weather in and out is a big killer of immersion.  I hope that FS 2024 can address this and include both systems,

Also... let's get some cirrus clouds please!

[vgbaron 3,714]

47 minutes ago, fppilot said:

Quite the set of conclusive statements.   And your credentials, please?  (and any affiliations pertinent to this discussion)

with 7 posts to his name, I suspect a hidden agenda.

 

[verbal 106]

16 minutes ago, Damian Clark said:

We reduced the price intentionally for launch, our way of saying thanks to all previous customers, supporters and fans - but also not leaving out new customers, so this is a promotion for them too.  Price is subject to change.  Thanks!

Sounds great, you can expect another (returning) customer a few hours from now.

Cheers 🍻 

[vgbaron 3,714]

43 minutes ago, MrSpeaker said:

Installed it, all it says is waiting for simulator, it prompted me for the connector already. Nothing written to my exe.xml file. Is there supposed to be something in the community folder? My msfs is on my D drive, I installed AS on C

Try uninstalling the AS connector module and reinstalling - see if that helps.

[vgbaron 3,714]

32 minutes ago, cavaricooper said:

Can it be installed on a networked machine like prior versions?

Not at this time but it is being worked on.

[KERNEL32 510]

1 minute ago, Stearmandriver said:

This is a completely bizarre statement.  You're suggesting that pilots should be flying from and to airports without any observations of current weather conditions?  They should instead just be relying on forecasts that were issued hours ago?

In my world, no current destination METAR = no dispatch.  It would be rather inconvenient if they were just to "die off"...

I didn't say they needed to die off IRL (and even if I did say that, who cares? like the FAA would listen to me LOL) I only asked for us to have a possible option to turn them off in Active Sky. That's all. OPTION to turn off, you can still have your METARS in FS - I just want to turn it off. I never requested Asobo to put them in MSFS and completely screw up the weather system (turn it into never ending cumulus puffs and METAR circles). I'd rather do without and enjoy the live weather as is was in MSFS at launch; a natural flowing weather biome with fronts and realistic wx features. I do not care if it is accurate outside my window to the sim - as long as it is plausible and has natural weather systems like it had at launch, then I'm a happy sim pilot. I will add though that I get your point and MSFS always lacked a good way to know what the weather would be when enroute or at destination so they would need to fix that - it's 2024 surely there's ways... but perhaps a detailed weather map we could view and observe in game such as a windy.com map. Just dreaming -

Anyway - this is another discussion topic, but with all the tablets and weather data out there that most pilots use - ARE real world METARS really that usable anymore?

[ryanbatc 13,028]

27 minutes ago, KERNEL32 said:

 

METARS are like dinosaurs, or in aviation - VOR's. They just need to die off. Usually out of date and I don't give a rats word not allowed about VATSIM/.

You're joking right?  METAR is typically a very reliable snapshot of the weather where you'll depart or land...  you know... those important phases of flight..  or where you have to divert because a speci just came out and now your destination is below minimums.

[Bobsk8 12,853]

4 minutes ago, ryanbatc said:

You're joking right?  METAR is typically a very reliable snapshot of the weather where you'll depart or land...  you know... those important phases of flight..  or where you have to divert because a speci just came out and now your destination is below minimums.

Any real pilot that doesn't check Metars  before he takes off in my opinion, is an accident going someplace to happen. 

[Jetman67 517]

Brought this to support Damiens efforts, will be interesting to play around with and see what value it adds

[MrBitstFlyer 3,896]

13 minutes ago, ryanbatc said:

I 100% disagree.

Yes, so do I!

I use ForeFlight as my EFB and have the radar overlay turned on.  The radar showed the rain over the field but the clearance was just west of the field by a few miles.  Loaded REX Weatherforce and Rain over the field.  Took off and almost exactly where ForeFlight showed the rain stopping in real world, it stopped in the sim!

[LRBS 948]

This software has a feature that is missing in MSFS2020, and it is definitely something that should be mentioned. Under custom WX "surface visibility" can be set manually, unfortunately, RVR is missing as a value that can be set. Hopefully next update? 

[Adamski_NZ 967]

53 minutes ago, Soulflight said:

I got REX and stopped using it, mostly because it fails to accurrately inject surface wind at the beginning of a flight before taking off and therefore messing up active runways. AS doesnt have this issue as far as I can tell. Apart from that, the AS weather engine should be naturally superior in covering areas without a METAR provided nearby, where REX fails to do so. REX feels a bit abandoned by the devs now imho.

Many thanks!

[Bdub22 1,622]

50 minutes ago, KERNEL32 said:

METARS are like dinosaurs, or in aviation - VOR's.

…one of the strangest comments I’ve read on any aviation related forum in a long, long time. You couldn’t be further from the truth if you tried. I mean…what!?

[Bobsk8 12,853]

As for the YouTube weather experts that did a live review without bothering to read any of the documentation on this program , it is 82 pages long and very detailed. 

[edu2703 281]

Here is the only place where I found fair and balanced opinions about Active Sky FS. On Reddit, on YT and even on MSFS forum, people are working harder to try to frame it as 'cash grab' or unnecessary, basing their opinions on uneducated guesses (Weather API is closed, so it's definitely rubbish), bad experience with other addons like REX or even on a single streamer who couldn't get Active Sky to work, uninstalled and called it a trash.