GaryGB

Thanks Edgar,:-) I'll check that notepad trick out and see if I can open the old projects up again.If not, do I convert copies of the ver 5.4 projects in question back to G2k ver 3.x and then back up to 5.x to clean them up for another attempted load in G2k 5.4?GaryGB

Lucky:...Did you live up your name? :-) I was wondering if you were lucky with your G2K projects after trying the suggestions here, as I too have some old projects I would like to resurrect and modify further. However, I must admit I had not yet tried reinstalling G2k ver5.4, and would welcome feedback from other G2k ver5.4 users on how their projects have gone when they encounter the dreaded "missing lines" problem and then reinstall the same version.How about it everyone? Anymore experiences to share here for a fellow G2k user? Thanks for your input on this, as I'd really like to continue using this program to edit my existing projects (which are in limbo now).:-zhelpGaryGB

Che:Are you saying that you were able to re-open your G2K4 ver 5.4 LWM project files, and resume using them without damage causing them to be unuseable after the G2K4 5.4 re-installs?:-hmmmGaryGB

Hi all!I started a thread on this problem some time ago, and to my knowledge, the user community has not yet heard anthing further on the matter, nor on the future of the program itself, from G2K4 developer Christian Fumey; I haven't written him directly to find out what's going on.I am hopeful that all is well with Christian, and that we may see further updates on G2K4 before FSX. In the mean time, you could read these threads and search the forums for Ground2K4 and/or G2k4 for more answers:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...25148&mode=fulland:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...26060&mode=fullGenerally speaking, it appears that most forum posters uninstalled G2k4 ver5.4 and went back to using ver 5.33 without losing much (if any) functionality with their LWM project files. Also, there has in the mean time been increasing interest in SBuilder by many users; check it out at: http://library.avsim.net/search.php?Search...=root&Go=Search and at:http://www.ptsim.com/forum/forum.asp?FORUM...er=&whichpage=1Good Luck!GaryGB

Art:Thanks for the explanation on the current feasibility of adapting your autogen editor for data tiles; I had seen an older post you responded to elsewhwere indicating that special geo-referenced naming and re-naming would have to be used in order to do this with your program. I am sure it would be a great productivity booster to us data texture scenery tweakers when you get a chance to look into it; I for one would be glad to pay a modest fee for such a tool if it saves me a lot of my limited time.I think we will still be tweaking data tiles when FSX comes out because the default autogen placement may not properly depict areas we are intimately familiar with that we want to be "as real as it gets" without having to create both photoreal scenery tiles and all the custom autogen over same. Certainly if we were all lucky enough to have an excellent quality combined photoreal and autogen scenery like your "Simulating ART's Phoenix Metropolitan Area" at: http://www.flight1.com/esd-products.asp?product=simartphx which covered our own area of interest, we'd be happy campers. But even with the ingenious enhancements of "local landclass and contextually-derived sythesized autogen" offered to data texture users by UT-USA and BEV, sometimes it just doesn't adequately match what we know of a particular scenery area.It sounds like you are about to develop yet another revolutionary program which might solve the very troublesome "misplaced airport" problem many users have probably been agonizing over at great expense of time spent in trial and error. If you solve this, you are likely to be revered for all time in the FS Hall of Fame!:-bigangel Best wishes for a successful outcome on your current projects, and thanks for considering the possible future adaptation of your autogen program.GaryGB

Hi Art!I'm with you on this FSX pre-release disclosure issue; see my "marching in the streets:-walksmile mini-blog post" on this after you raised the issue at:http://www.scenerydesign.org/forum/showthread.php?t=1938By the way Art, did you ever figure out a way to do the re-naming of default/3rd party data texture files inside your program routines so that we could use your astonishing autogen editor utility to put autogen onto our own copies of those types of texture tiles instead of just being able to use it for putting autogen on photoreal tiles? Certainly it is a major breakthrough tool of great advantage for photoreal scenery developers, but do you think it might be adapted to work for those of us freeware guys who still are trying to get the most out of the FS world which is not yet covered by photoreal sceneries?:-zhelpIt would be great to be able to use your utility for adding autogen trees around edges of fields and water bodies, put houses on default streets etc. like those seen in BEV: http://www.flightsim-bevs.com/and in a few tiles from Bill Lyons' "Silver Wings" VFR environment replacement: http://library.avsim.net/search.php?Search...=root&Go=Search. Incidentally, has anyone figured out how Bill got those grassy/grainy textures to appear in the normally magnified/aliased/washed-out ground texture areas we see when flying low and slow at treetop level in FS? I think Bill's apparent "texture within a texture" method shows great promise for developing new ways of enhancing the FS environment. I haven't seen anthing quite like this since Richard Goldstein's "moving grass" airport propwash effect in his outstanding Georender Orcas Island scenery released via FS-Addon at: http://secure.simmarket.com/product_info.p...products_id=737Here's hoping we can maximize our use of FS2004 file formats while we await the new FSX.GaryGB

Hi Peter,On your specified webpage, you could zoom in your target image window to a decent level of detail, then right click the resulting image and choose "Save Image As" in FireFox or "Save Picture As" in Internet Explorer to save the jpeg to disk. Remember to either set your bitmap editor to non-compressed and/or non-lossy jpeg format, or export a copy to another format (ex. BMP or TIF) to avoid degradation of the jpeg due to losses each time you save your downloaded original and work files.I have spent vast amounts of time struggling to paste photos together with variable results until I read about a fabulous freeware program called "USAPhotoMaps"; it allows downloading and exporting pre-assembled and geo-referenced big jpeg files. (I have no affiliation, just an appreciative user)."USAPhotoMaps" is available at jdmcox.com, and will allow downloading B&W and color images, elevation overlay info, national landmarks, and "go to populated place by state" info etc. from terraserver and other US governmental public domain servers which have some (but not complete) coverage of the US.The color photo databases USAPhotoMaps is accessing do not seem to have as extensive of a coverage as that from digital globe/keyhole a.k.a. "GoogleEarth", but seems to zoom in to 0.25 pixel/meter resolution in the color photos of areas I have queried with this program; I believe these are higher resolution than most if not all of those I have seen using GoogleEarth, although the latter is a truly awesome way of viewing areas we might wish to see in various ways when making scenery or taking a different kind of "simulated flight".Depending on the area you are interested in, properly tweaked GoogleEarth images may look sharpest at 1300 feet or 2600 feet elevation, and when viewed full frame using the "F-11" key, they may be saved to a jpeg via the File>Save Image pull-down menu. These bigger jpegs would probably require only a modest amount of work assembling an airport sized area; probably a lot of work would be involved in putting together a large photorealistic region from arbitrarily named bitmap files though!. Unfortunately, there are no color photos yet available via the USAPhotoMaps databases accessed for the Johnson County, KS Industrial Airport you appear to be interested in; the quality of the images on that server appear promising though! Please note that my test showed a somewhat lower resolution jpeg written during the download from that site than the one I got from saving a zoomed-in GoogleEarth full frame "F-11" window saved jpeg file.I share your concerns about having to laboriously paste together color screen grabs from GoogleEarth or AirPhotoUSA windows in order to get coverage of areas not available (yet) in USAPhotoMaps, and would welcome additional ideas from other users on how to do this easier (only for un-distributed non-commercial reference use on one's own machine of course!). I hope that there may be a program out there which can do this assembly semi-automatically or even automatically if you save your jpeg images downloaded with programs other than USAPhotoMaps with specific sequential and/or georeferenced filenames; ...anybody know of such a freeware program program, or of such a feature in an "affordable" mainstream commercial graphics program?.Last but not least, remember that any images you use must preferably be "orthorectified" (...not a medical procedure!:-lol) originals (ex: DOQQ), and must then be re-projected to the WGS84 datum specified in Microsoft's Terrain Tools SDK for the "UTM zone number" on the globe that your area of interest is located in if you were considering using them for FS2002/2004 as either a bitmap background template for default data/texture-based scenery making, or perhaps as a "personal use only" photorealistic tile array scenery.There are many links I have seen in the AVSIM forums which explain how to use free programs to re-project and otherwise use photos in the FS scenery making process. I would particularly search for those posts by Dick Ludowise ("Rhumbaflappy"), Bob Bernstein, Holger Sandmann, Jim Keir, "LuisFelizTirado", "LuisSa" and "Slacktide" to name just a few of the many generous forum participants as rather well-experienced gurus for FS terrain and scenery imagery processing.Here's a couple of especially informative related links for starters:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...23433&mode=fullhttp://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...ing_type=searchGood Luck!GaryGB

Hi Matthew,Here's a link to the thread I originated some time ago regarding this strange, progressively self-disabling behavior of Ground2K4 v5.4:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...25148&mode=fullI have not written to Christian Fumey on this, but I understand from replies to the above thread that someone else has, that Christian is aware of the problem, and one can only hope that he will find a way to fix it.As for my recent project created with Ground2K4 v5.4, I now cannot open it in the re-loaded prior version V5.33 and cannot finish my project!I noticed that Christian Fumey posted a reply to the release of a bogus v6.35 "so-called new version of Ground2K4 that was recently placed in the AvSim library by Guillaume O

Hi Luis - and thank you again for your follow-up on this.I did refresh the Ground2K4 "D:FS2004" path under General Parameters as you instructed, and verified that the path did read correctly in the Ground2K4.ini file as "DirFS=D:FS2004" both before and after the refresh procedure.Unfortunately, for me it does not bring back the normal sample display and interactive features of the Lines Tab pick lists for line textures. Thankfully, though, for my completion of my current project I was able to still get the "anticipated" use of my most recently used white sand with surf shoreline into my compiled scenery.It would be interesting to find out what went wrong with FS2004 and/or G2K4 that resulted in this malfunction in G2K4's Lines Tab so that we can see if there is a vulnerbility in the current coding of Ground2K4 version 5.40. Perhaps G2K4 can then be improved or recoded to be able to keep functioning at least as long as FS2004 is also able to keep functioning as it currently is on my system: I have no known problem with FS2004, and it does display all terrain.cfg related objects and textures with autogen as far as I have tested it.In other words, I think we should evaluate this as if it were comparable to a G2K4 bug, since you had a somewhat comparable problem which I assume suddenly just "appeared out of the blue" (although fortunately for you it was sucessfully resolved on your system --unlike on mine!). I did find Christian's E-Mail address in the original G2K4_v5.zip ReadMe.Txt file, and I am considering forwarding to him a quoted "fair use" text copy of our messages (excluding forum web page content), along with a link to this thread.I am prepared to do the dreaded complex re-install of my FS2004, but as I have said, I am unaware of it having any problem, and it would certainly be possible that the re-appearance of the sample picture of my last-used line texture next to the pick list on the G2K4 Lines Tab after running Norton Disk Doctor was a coincidence as much as it was sign of some hidden problem with my FS2004 running on that D: drive.I will ponder the situation further this weekend, and will post a message after I decide what to do: re-install FS2004, or wait for reply from Christian (if one might be so bold as to anticipate he would have the time and inclination to look into this malfunction).Thanks again for responding; any further input from other G2K4 users (attention lurkers... speak up!) as to whether they have had this problem would be helpful in exploring whether this might be a bug or vulnerability in Ground2K4 version 5.40 worthy of Christian's further generous efforts in making Ground2K4 an even better scenery program.GaryGB:-wave

Luis, I forgot to mention also that when I tinkered with the Ground2K path re-definition procedure you recommended, upon changing the path from its prior D:FS2004 to D: (only) I got the following message box on screen:Erreur!! (in titlebar)/! (icon) (634)...FS9Terrain.cfg not found (message)[OK] (button)When I went back and re-inserted the correct path D:FS2004, Ground 2K returned normally to its workspace and prior (dys)function.What I thought was intriguing was that a pointer to my D:FS2004Terrain.cfg was involved in the function of Ground2K. Inspection of Terrain.cfg with a file viewer revealed listings of VTP2 Line textures, landclass textures, autogen objects and various related parameters for same. I wonder if something were wrong with my terrain.cfg or its inter-related files, not bad enough to prevent FS2004 from functioning and displaying the above textures, that it could stiil be enough to induce the problems I am having with Ground2K4.Maybe I am just taking the "scenic route" through the stages of the grieving process associated with the ominous prospect of re-installing FS2004, since my re-install of Ground2K4 did not resolve the problem.Again, any further help would be appreciated.Thank You,GaryGB:-doh

Hi Luis, I tried the path re-definition procedure you recommended but on my system it did not seem to correct the problem.I then ran Norton Disk Doctor on my D: drive where both FS2004 and Ground2K are installed, and it reported errors when processing these directories:Rwy12 Object PlacerRwy12: Invalid entries found; CorrectedRwy12 Object PlacerRwy12img: Invalid entries found; CorrectedRwy12 Object PlacerRwy12imgTrees - Seev Kahn: Invalid entries found; CorrectedRwy12 Object PlacerTutoriasimg: Invalid entries found; CorrectedI also ran Norton Disk Doctor on my C: drive and it reported errors when processing these directories:...Flight Simulator 9Addon SceneryStatic ObjectsLibrarytexture:Invalid entries found; CorrectedSingle errors were also found on 2 other unrelated logical drive partitions, which it also fixed. Since Norton did not write out any messages to screen or files in the root of those drives, I must assume that it did not find or delete any crosslinked files which would have explained loss or alteration of a file on the D: drive or the C: drive, where as you may know there other important entries related to FS2004. I cannot speak for the (unspeakable) things that scandisk may have done prior to running Norton; I guess I should activate the Norton System Works option to substitute Disk Doctor for scandisk so I can track the errors and changes made in greater detail.After the Norton Disk Doctor session was done, I tried Ground2K again and the problem of grayed-out, pick list entries for LWM polys with VTP2 shoreline creation was still evident for my new projects, but now (!) I am able to see a single picture of the last landclass texture I used for shorelines on my orginal island project (the one which seems fully intact and functional with normal interactive VTP2 pick lists and pictures of the textures). So after Norton at least this one change has occurred in the VTP2 Lines tab for new projects. And throughout, just to clarify, when creating VTP2 polys without shore, the landclass textures pick list on the VTP2 tab are functioning normally for these new projects; the problem is just (at least on my system) with the Lines Tab.Just out of curiosity, I tried making some LWM polys with VTP2 shorelines in my new projects files with the dysfunctional pick lists, and even though I could not click the actual grayed out entries, since the last line texture picture was now showing as an apparent "saved" setting somewhere in Ground2K, I went ahead and compiled the BGLs.When I added the new projects scenery (which are other nearby islands near my orginal island scenery) and took my FS2004 inspection flight, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the same shoreline texture I had been using for the original island project was rendered properly for the new islands projects. This was what I had hoped for: by assuming that with the picture of the texture now showing on the Lines Tab in association with the dysfunctional pick list, creating the LWM poly with shoreline anyway might then result in it still being used successfully for the new island projects- and it worked, albeit via this strange route).Whew! Well, at least I am able to do some work on these islands to finish my immediate scenery project. However, sadly, I will apparently not be able to choose any different shoreline textures for this or any other projects until this Ground2K4 Lines Tab pick list problem is solved. By the way, I did see differences in the Ground2K INI files written in my D:Ground2K4resource directory after loading different projects which can be inspected using quickview, notepad or better yet a file comparison utility, but I do not know what is the function of the listed items, which are also partially in French.Any additional help would be greatly appreciated; does anyone know how to get in touch with Christian Fumey to bring this strange Version 5.40 malfunction (at least in my particular installation of same) to his attention? Again, my humble apologies for the lengthy post, but I thought it might shed some light on the circumstances around this apparent Ground2K4 malfunction since you had described somewhat similar pick list symptoms on your own installation of same, so I thought we had turned up a bug worthy of attention and resolution on behalf of other G2K4 users.GaryGB:-hmmm

Hi Luis, and thank you for your reply.I checked the General Parameters setting in G2K4 which does show the correct install path "D:FS2004" for all of my projects. I am wondering if this might be a damaged registry error, or an error due to some obscure damaged file in FS2004, since it occurred after a strange system crash when the machine had been sitting idle (I run it 24 hours a day without any sleep or slumber mode settings) which required a reset button press, followed of course by the automatic post-reset scandisk startup routine.The strange part is that the original project still seems fine, and my island scenery displays all textures properly in a FS2004 flight, leading me to doubt that any texture files were deleted due to scandisk's indiscriminate "hurry up and boot windows" treatment of damaged and crosslinked files. I hope I'm not headed for a FS2004 reload, or worse yet a WIN98SE reload. I guess I had better run Norton disk doctor to look for some other file/folder drive problems not reported by scandisk.Any additional ideas on solving this short of the dreaded re-installs?Thank You again for your help.GaryGB

Newbie needing some help here!I recently began using Ground2K4 (G2K4)and created an island project which I can save and re-open showing no apparent problems with accessing the VTP2 Line/Shore pick list for creating/editing LWM polys with shore and their accompanying shore lines.The problem I have now is that when I create a new project which involves a LWM poly with shore, the VTP2 Line/Shore pick list is either grayed out and non-responsive to clicks etc., or the pick list entries are missing entirely; in both of these cases, the pictures of the textures associated with the pick list items do not show.When I exit the new project and open my orginal island project, everything seems to be as it was, and the VTP2 Line/Shore pick list is behaving normally: the entries are all present along with their associated pictures. I have exited G2K4 and restarted it, tried creating several new projects, rebooted WIN98SE, ran scandisc, reduced display color depth to 256 colors, reloaded G2K4 from original install ZIP files from AVSIM including all known updates:ground2k_v4_0.zip, ground2k_v40_dll.zip, ground2k4_v5.zip, ground2k4_v51.zip, ground2k4_patchv5_30.zip, ground2k4_patchv5_32.zip, ground2k4_patchv5_33.zip, ground2k4_v540.zip.Even after all this, I still have the same problem with newly created projects.I am baffled as to what may be causing this. I have 768 MB system RAM, a Radeon 8500 with 128 MB video RAM and current ATI drivers, an AMD Athlon 1400 MHz on an ASUS A7A266 Mobo with current BIOS and chipset drivers, over 1 GB free on the G2K4 install drive, and over 33 GB free on the WIN98SE virtual memory swap drive which also contains the redirected TEMP and TMP workspaces.I'm baffled! Can someone help me fix this? Sorry for the long post.:-rollThanksGaryGB