Problems with terrascene packs

[Guest]

I am relatively new to Fly II (@1month). I have been using MS Flight Sims for about three years. I am interested in Fly II because of the detailed Ohio Terrascene packs by Randall Rocke. I live in Ohio and my parents live in Marblehead, one of the areas that are modeled. So, I have downloaded all of the Ohio scenery and Terrascene 2.1. However, when I tried to "render" the Marblehead scenery w/Terrascene 2.1, it gave me an error message saying it was unable to download (from some internet site - I am at work right now and don't have the actual error message in front of me). My problem is that I do not have an internet connection at home. Does the render process require an internet connection with these sceneries?Sorry for the long-winded message and also sorry if in advance if I should have posted in another message board, but any help would be appreciated.ThanksScott Smith

[RandallR 444]

Scott,When you start a scenery area from scratch, TerraScene is set up to go online and download the USGS data for the scenery area you designate when rendering scenery within the U.S. Now, my scenery packs contain every one of these files (I downloaded them for you). Along with the complete USGS geodata for the region, I added some updates, low-resolution Canadian data, and edited the water - on the surface, you shouldn't even need to be online. Everything is included in the pack - TerraScene should say "downloading" at the start of the render, but it should find every file already in place and start the render process instead.There are some possibilities for your situation.1) Todd may have designed TS to initiate or check on an Internet connection being available, even if it's not necessary. I really doubt that - I believe it prepares for that but will not attempt to go online unless it finds data missing for the region.2) This is the more likely scenario...there have been rare occassions where TerraScene refused to begin a render until it attempted a download because it thought some data was missing. My scenery packs are not missing any files, but there have been some occasions on border or ocean shore areas, where the USGS simply didn't have any data for an item that TS expected. Basically, TS doesn't believe this and goes online to find the "missing item". When your computer has Internet access, TS goes to the USGS site, finds that the data is indeed missing, and continues normally with the render process.If this is your situation (and it may be) it is the first that I've heard of for the Ohio Project. It could be that all of the other end-users had an Internet connection available, so the render proceeded normally after TS made contact. Have you rendered any of the other Ohio global tiles? Did you have similar problems or is Marblehead the only one so far?Your only remedy for this scenery may be to render it on a "connected" computer. I'll try to reach Todd over the next few days and see if there is a "switch" we can throw to prevent it. Other scenery areas that have this problem are in the Carolinas Project on the coast: Brunswick, Wilmington, etc. I have noted that an Internet connection may be required on the startup of those projects.

[Guest]

Randall:Thank you for the quick response. I have not tried to render any of the other Ohio sceneries. I haven't had a chance but I'll try tonight. If it appears that the only way I can do it is online, then I can probably do it from my work computer where I do have internet access. But thank you for all your help (and your wonderful scenery - although I don't have it running yet at home the screenshots look great and it looks like your modeling of the area is leaps and bounds above what FS2002 does for it. Thanks for all your efforts).Scott Smith

[RandallR 444]

Scott,Watch out for the scenery sizes - if you need to transport a finished scenery from your work computer, please note the pod files will average about 390MB for each global tile. If you have a burner at each end, CD-RWs would be a good way to go.Also, when generating the Marblehead scenery, be sure to install the two island airports - it's fairly easy with the DexImport program. These are unfinished airports (just the runways), but Paul "Bart" Simpson should eventually upload some 3D scenery for each and taxiways for each.

[RandallR 444]

Scott,There is no need for your system to go online to render the Marblehead Project Pack. I ran a test with the pack a few minutes ago after unplugging my modem and the rendering began almost immediately, so this is not one of those areas where TerraScene is looking for what it believes to be missing data.The only thing I can think of is some of the data was not transferred into TS before you began the render process. Did you copy all the files and folders from the pack into TerraScene? The manually-added folder and the usgs folder and all of their subfolders and contents should have been copied into the data-files folder of TerraScene. Likewise with the projects, textures, and output folders. That should have given TerraScene everything it needed.An easy way to do this is to select all of the TS project folders (data-files, output, projects, and textures) from the project pack, then copy and paste them into the root directory of TerraScene. You will get a warning about over-writing folders, which, of course, is no problem - go ahead. This way, the entire pack installation into TS can be done in one step.If you are still having problems, did you know there is a completely rendered version of the Marblehead global tile posted in the file library? It's not small (139MB), but I uploaded it in finished form for those who wanted to download and not have to render. As the average finished global tile is around 390MB, this is one of those rare areas (because of the amount of water) where the files could be compressed enough to be hosted on Avsim. The file is mrblhd.zip.

[Guest Bart]

Where abouts you live in Ohio Scott?c ya :-waveBart flyhelp@zoomtown.comhttp://bartsflyplace.tripod.com/bart_logo3.jpg

[Guest]

Thanks again for the info Randall. I realized last night when I took a careful look again at your instructions that the problem I was having was that typical male problem of refusing to look carefully at the instructions for anything! I had not copied the info from the Marblehead pack into the Terrascene 2.1 corresponding files. Sorry! Should have double checked this before I posted the message. I didn't have a chance to try the render process again last night but will give it a go tonight.To Bart:I live in the Columbus area, grew up in Northeast Ohio and spent most of my summers as a kid in the Marblehead area. Scott Smith

[Guest Bart]

HEY!!, drinking partner Randy!!! we can all meet up at JP's!I live in Shandon, Ohio...about 25 miles west of Cincinnati by I67. The wife, me, and the house apes are heading for Port Clinton/Kelly's Island in about three weeks for vacation...love it up there. If the weather is to crappy in Gatlinburg this Sunday probably be flying up to Put-In-Bay for the day...always gotta have a plan-B :)c ya :-waveBart flyhelp@zoomtown.comhttp://bartsflyplace.tripod.com/bart_logo3.jpg

[Guest]

Bart:My mom lives in Lakeside on the Marblehead peninsula, across the lake from Kelleys and Put-in-Bay (about a 3 minute bike ride to the Kelley's Island Ferry). My family and I will probably be up their on the 4th of July - I love that area to. My family had a sailboat up there for years while I was growing up - lots of good times there. Marblehead/Lake Erie seemed like a well kept secret at the time. When I was a kid, people couldn't believe we spent weekends up there in the summer - all they knew about Lake Erie was the fire on the Cuyahoga river. Now everybody seems to know about the area. By the way, back (sort-of) on topic, growing up, there used to be a Ford Tri-Motor operating between Port Clinton and Put-in-Bay (Island Airlines). I rode in it once as a kid. I think it operated through the '70s until it crashed and was too costly to rebuild. The pilot who crashed it is my mom's next door neighbor. Very nice guy but probably not the thing he wants to be remembered by. But, I can't wait to try some accurate scenery for the area. It would be great to have a tri-motor in Fly II. If I had any idea how to do it (or the time to figure it out), I'd give it a try. Maybe someday. Anyhow, always nice to meet someone who has a connection to the Lake!Scott

[RandallR 444]

Hey Bart! Just saw this message for the first time - ever since the forums were re-established with a new domain, I have lost e-mail notification! I'm getting nada from any of the threads I've subscribed to, so I have to look through the threads when it looks like there have been new posts.Just keep me informed - we'll get together yet!

[Guest Bart]

Going on vacation end of July, lets try for the first part of August, 15th or 16th?c ya :-waveBart flyhelp@zoomtown.comhttp://bartsflyplace.tripod.com/bart_logo3.jpg

[RandallR 444]

Should work - I'll be on vacation from the last week of July thru the first week of August. I should be back home in early August.