Working with BGLC -help-

[Guest jzax]

I am working with my first scenery design for *personal use*, and I intend to use the new xml format, and follow the instructions given by MS in their bglcomp-sdk. I think the times of using SCASM are really fading away.My project is first to delete a whole stock airport (all visuals and all facility data -names, navaids, etc- have to disappear, ground can of course remain), in order to be replaced with a new one which in reality is placed somewhere else.To save myself some experimenting, I would like to ask the knowledgeable users of this forum about the following:1) Which program or utility is best when writing a file that contains xml code to be later compiled by BGLC?? Notepad is enough?2) My intention (for the stock airport to disappear and the creation of the new airport), if possible, is not to touch the original MS files, but overriding them (layering?) or excluding them. Will just an "exclude-all-objects command do this? or do I need to use *in addition* commands like "delete aiport" and the like??The objective is first that the stock airport completely disappears, both visually (no scenery seen at the place) and facility (disappear from the go-to-airport menu, map view, etc.), and to do this, if possible, without touching or disabling the MS stock files where this airport is included. Although I already have an idea of how stock files are hex-coded, and could even be modified by an hex-editor, in the end I think it is very messy to use this approach.I know AFCAD2, in its latest version, allows the user to modify existing airports and navaids. But I still see some limitations like not being able to delete stock ILSs, markers, and the like.Could someone shed any light on this?Thankyou in advance.Joaquin

[arno 1]

Hi,I assume you mean BGLComp when you write BGLC? BGLC is another scenery compiler (like SCASM) that can produce the Fs2002 style BGL files for you.In theory every text editor is enough for working with the XML code. If you want to work a lot with it you might want to find one that has some special functions, like synthax highlighting, etc, but notepad can also do the job for you.With the exlude command that is part of the XML code and the delete commands to remove ILS informatin for example you should be able to get rid of the entire airport. This is certainly a better approach then hex-editing anything.

[Guest sapper42]

Hi JoaquinI have been using the XML format to remove the ( Del commands ) to remove a default airport information and ATC info but have found that all the taxiway signs, buildings and airport ground polygon remain. As yet ive not worried to much about the remaining objects but a series or XML excludes will remove the taxiway signs etc however i have no idea about the default ground polygon.The default ground polygon tho can be over written with a VTP2 texture with not to much difficulty and there is plenty of ref material aswell as help here in the forum on way to do this.Notepad is sufficient and to help with your compile debuging, copy the file called CMD.EXE from your system32 folder ( i think ) and place this in the same folder as your BGLC.exe .when you want to compile your XML code, click on the CMD.EXE and it will open a DOS style window, then enter your commandseg: C:BGLCOMP MYTEST.XML and hit enter, if there are errors, it will list within the DOS window and you will be able to scroll and find the offending lines and allso clues as to where your errors are.best of luck. Jeff

[arno 1]

If with the default ground polygons you mean the grass polygon etc, these are VTP polygons and need to be exclude with a VTP exclude. As far as I know the XML code can not make that and you will need to use a tool like DefArea for that.I don't think there is any need to copy the CMD.EXE file. If you just open a command window and go to the folder where you have BGLComp and the source files it will work the same.I have added the SDK folder to my DOS path and that way I can call BGLComp from any folder without problems. So I can just compile a XML source from any folder by typing: bglcomp source.xml

[Guest jzax]

Thankyou for your commentsI started experimenting, and these are my conclusions:The exclude command in XML, only excludes visual secenery (buildings, etc, probably not the taxisigns -I did not notice-). The format is somewhat different from the one shown in the MS doc. I had to close the attributes line with /> for it to compile.The deleteairport command excludes the runway, etc, etc, depending on your selection, but I could not find any way of excluding the navaids or deleting default navaids, as already mentioned in the AFCAD documentation.Using both commands, I ended up with a disappeared airport (except for the ground texture of where it was), but the ILS is still there and working, and the menu in "go to airport" is still the default region, state, city etc. Since now I have no runways, it places you just facing north in the reference point of the disappeared airport.So, I see no option but to dig into the default navaids file, and start hex-editing if you want to get rid of a default navaid, too much work...

[arno 1]

For the ILS I know that they are moved when you define a new one with the same frequency. The default one of MS is then moved to the new location.I am not sure if the same works for VOR and NDB, but I guess it will.But there is no real way as far as I know to get completely rid of them.

[Guest jzax]

Geee, when I was just going to give up, this wonderful utility comes out, BGLXML.exe from Mr. Alessandro Antonioni. As far as I know this is the first disassembler available for the new format BGLs of FS2004.I've been already experimenting with it, and it still has pending issues, for example, it does not decode at all the taxiway information, the runway start positions, or some objects, but generally speaking it works very well!I got rid of unwanted stock markers and ILSs in one go!Great!! Thankyou Alessandro!!You made my day!