Bjoern

Releasing on a Friday or the Weekend is suicide. IIRC, Laminar learned this the hard way during one XP11 beta update.

Waiting for 12.1:

I think that initial load times aren't that good of an indicator. Testing complex ground scenery like X-America/Europe with default mesh while loading a tile in-flight should be much more indicative as too little scenery workers mean longer DSF load times and thus framerate drops and some stuttering. Can't think of a use case for limiting scenery workers either. File read sequencing is managed by the HDD/SDD controller, while clock speed and thus thermal management is completely up to the CPU. If anything, one would exchange maybe slightly higher framerates (due to less communication between processes) for less smoothness (longer scenery loads and thus the aforementioned stutters). And as far as I know Autoortho has its own tile downloader workers. At least there should (still) be a config entry to manage their amount.

Same. The -300 is X-Plane 12 default and going only for a -200 doesn't make much sense. Or maybe they'll go for the entire line up after all.

Vertical FOV can be set manually when the corresponding override checkbox is active.

Doesn't "num_workers" only specify the maximum number of threads for scenery loading?

That would surely make those dull night flights more interesting.

This is great quality, considering the author is running with very little autogen and that XP 12.09's terrain shading applies uniform specularity on orthos (making them look "flat" at lower sun angles).

I'd say years of refinement, good source data and willingness to compensate for simulator limitations. Great video, my appreciation for the A321 has increased quite a bit.

Devising a release schedule, seeing to it that it is adhered to and keeping the programmers in line to prevent them from running off to pursue some shiny new feature. Kind of like a kindergardener for software developers.

Another recruit from a third party project. Nice, looks like Laminar is putting the XP12 revenue to good use.

"Private testing" in January, "private testing" in February, "private testing" in March, then a "private alpha". This is dragging out like a meeting before lunch!

No. That's not really an issue. Interests shift, life away from the screeen gets busier and whatever present or past creations fall to the wayside. Continued work on any products, even in absentia, can always be ensured by applying a corresponding license to have others carry on, but most authors don't do that. But these are luxury complaints. There's always some other toy to play with in X-Plane.

Still miffed because he took my flight model improvements that brought both variants of the aircraft up to performance specifications per the POH and manufacturer as a personal insult. Hangared the model out of protest afterward.

The X-CSL models are what you need.

I know for one that VSKYLABS' main developer has yoke time in the real thing, so that should be a bit of an advantage in terms of getting the handling close.

Goi to Youtube and search "DC-3 takeoff" or "C-47 takeoff", then watch hours of videos. I see no evidence of low directional stability that can not be attributed to wind or pilot experience/skill.

That was about the DC-2. "Hold brakes left" and "Hold brakes right" work for replicating what one would to with the toe brakes. Asymmetric thrust helps as well, but is not mandatory as the direction changes are mostly performed with brakes and rudder anyway. I have no issues with the VSKYLABS C-47, although I sometimes still get bitten by it on the ground when not careful enough. The AWX one looks nice, but could do with a few bugfixes. And it's oddly light on the controls compared to the VSKYLABS one.

Any raster looks good if it's fine enough, however fine rasters usually draw complaints from those trying to run maximum eye candy in VR on a 486DX.

"Raster" is still fairly negatively connotated in my book because of acute "Falcon terrain" trauma. (Not my screenshots.)

Operating an aerial work platform: "Okay, we need to go here and here and do this and that, oh, let me get there as well." Riding along on an aerial work platform: "I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die..."

Well, I prefer two actual shots of tequila instead. 😉

Didn't get excited over bloom effects in 2003, won't get excited over bloom effects now. Maybe it's the trauma from back then...

Ah, X-Plane's single most useless feature. Next to the "sunglasses".

Too bad they didn't flesh out the ATC bugfixes and improvements a bit. Anyway, looking forward to 12.1.0, although I guess that all CPU performance improvements will be eaten up by the improved shadows and anti-aliasing.