alpilotx

Yes, New York for example is almost perfectly "height mapped" already in OSM. I am quite confident, that as soon as Ben found a way to integrate that data (and I don't think there are too big roadblocks on that way) it will definitely improves these cities. And "bad data" in OSM -- god, I have seen a few bad "building heights" indeed. Most common was the error, where people inserted the "house no." into the "height" field .... yielding some 1000m buildings in some rural, low density areas. Or inserting the elevation in the height field (thus giving us some 1700m high riser "huts" in the Alps etc.). A few months ago I did a "half manual" sweep trough the OSM height data (by previously exporting and assessing that data in QGIS) and removed a lot of bad outliers. But I am sure, we will almost never be able to really fix that (humans do make errors) ... only some plausibility checks in the scenery generator might prevent the worst cases (but also might remove some rare, legitimate cases ... if you think about it, you will realize that there is quite likely no perfect solution to this).

Well, Ben Supnik DID hint at the data sources on his own blog about two months ago, when the new autogen updates came out: http://developer.x-plane.com/2016/06/beta-3-in-a-few-days/ So, no, the current default scenery (and neither the HD Mesh, nor UHD Mesh) use OSM based building height data (for the default mesh, which got its OSM data mid 2011, I doubt there would have been enough such info at all!!). And this building height info has to be in the DSF, otherwise the autogen would only guess. And indeed, everywhere else, the autogen is guessing, based on some population density (as far as available - this is a topic on it own ... because this type of data is very complex to get by) data mixed into theurban landclass info. In the future - as Ben already hints - X-Plane will use building height data from OSM (which can be very very good for some cities .... and also has some idiotic errors, which I corrected a few some months ago ... but will always be introduced by OSM users for sure). But this can only come with a new, re-cut DSF (which will likely only happen with XP11) ... Experiments with OSM building height data are underway (at least I have already once sent Ben such an extract).

The problem is still - by far - not completely solved. And if you know the mathematics and geometry behind it, then you will easily understand why its by far not trivial. 10.50 only improves an obvious bug (which even worsened the situation) ... but there are enough other corner cases, which are definitely not easy to solve (at least not if you still want flyable FPS ... which is a factor often overlooked by people not aware of the hard facts of the "reflection problem"). So, yes ... it definitely improved (and especially at the sea, it works) . ... but go to the mountains with many lakes at different altitudes and you will see, that you still get problems (simply because you have a lot of different reflection planes at different altitudes, which its very costly to render all adequately - this is what would completely kill your FPS).

An introduction video showcasing X-Plane 10 UHD Mesh Scenery v1 in the Colorado Mountains. Scenery used (you can get it at www.alpilotx.net for free!): UHD Mesh Scenery v1 (Colorado Mountains) Tree lines and farms v2 (North America) Music from Jason Shaw (freemusicarchive.org) Nice And Easy Thingmajig Wheels One Fine Day Green Leaves

Before starting some conspiracy theories about water reflection, why not read what Ben Supnik wrote about that fix (it improves some things, but can't fix everything!): http://developer.x-plane.com/2016/08/a-few-quick-notes-on-bugs-fixed/

Maybe a "just" a promotion of the new ATC capabilities in XP10.50?

Hi Jose, its very simple with X-Plane, as there is only one folder where all the tiles of the Global Scenery reside. Namely, in the "Global Scenery" folder :smile: (maybe not very surprising). The "original" Global Scenery is put here: /data2/X-Plane_10/Global Scenery/X-Plane 10 Global SceneryBUT ... Lamianr wants to make your life even easier, and they have another - parallel - sub folder which contains the newer updates (and that is the one which you want to bring home!): /data2/X-Plane_10/Global Scenery/Recuts 1030/

Well, on the HD mesh Scenery v3 page, there is a quite extensive list of improvements in brings (compared to default scenery): http://www.alpilotx.net/downloads/x-plane-10-hd-mesh-scenery-v3/#IntroductionAnd it combines quite a few different data sources to get the result you see. Most importantly detailed landclass data (depending on the worlds region, I use different land use / land cover data sources to achieve this) ... which can give you relatively accurate forest positions too (of course, not as precise as with w2xp scenery where you have good OSM source data), as i use - in the meantime - very high resolution satellite measured forest data. To give you a "feeling" about how many different data sources I mix (to get the special sauce), I also have an official data sources acknowledgment list on my page: http://www.alpilotx.net/downloads/x-plane-10-hd-mesh-scenery-v3/#Data-Sources-Acknowledgments

As Tony told you ... disabling the use of extended DSF is the easiest and quickest way to lower your RAM pressure (of course, at the cost, that you loos details in the distance ... but which is less of an issue if you fly low-and-slow). The other - and long term - solution is to go with 32 GB of RAM. Especially as its quite likely, that with future developments the RAM demand might rise further .... (and thats why I recommend 32 GB of RAM on my UHD page :wink: )

Reading is a virtue :wink: : http://www.alpilotx.net/downloads/x-plane-10-uhd-mesh-scenery-v1/#Why-is-region-X-not-covered

Yes ... for every large scale scenery (countries / states ... or simply, anything that would cover at least a 1x1 degree area), you can expect it to be that way. Even though there is also a phototexture-overlay function in X-Plane ... no sane developer would use it for large scale scenery, because for larger areas, that would completely tank performance. This phototexture-overlay function is only meant for small area scenery, like an airport, or maybe a city ... because at that scale, it has no serious performance hit, but frees the developer from the need to create a phototextured mesh for the entire 1x1 area (and above all, this way his large scale scenery works with all other mesh products placed below it ... because it uses phototexture-overlay tech).

I just simply re-quote myself (or you could have simply re-read it above :wink: ): So, not even the priority is happening by magic, but simply by the scenery_packs.ini!

You do not need WED to download any new Laminar Airport. You can easily go to the website of the airport data hub, and get (and search) it there: https://gateway.x-plane.com/

If you want to play it safe, then never even consider jumping on board during betas. Wait at least until the RC (release candidate) phase. Only if you are willing to accept that everything might blow up (or are at least willing to make a copy as suggested above) might you consider using it.

Sorry, but I am absolutely sure, you are NOT looking at default autogen here, but instead at some other add-on scenery (w2xp, osm2xp or hand made). The buildings are too specific (they are models of many of the real world ones) to be autogen :wink:! This how the autogen Chicago looks like (with HD Mesh Scenery v3, but its based on the same autogen artwork as default scenery ... so it should be quite similar): Thats why I always say: before you state something, check your facts :wink: