tkyler

I assure you I am fine, but thank you for the thoughts though. No, the best thing is for us to just keep working on the remaining details until our target release feature set is implemented. Yes, I do have a limit, no its not quite here yet but we are working every day on the remaining details (when I'm not sick). Given an anticipated product life span of several years, we do not fret a few more weeks to make sure the product is as solid as we can get in our window of time. -tkyler

Considering the lead programmer on the FMS has been taken with a severe cold, no. Reality slapping me around pretty bad atm. -tkyler

I'll venture a bit of a guess Radek...... Of course this is "entertainment" and what entertains one is certainly diversified amongst simmers. Given the fact that we are generally limited to a chair and a screen, I think it reasonable that the more cognitive stimulation one can get, the better. Further, given that the stimulation is manifested through "on screen interaction", then the more actions one can do in the sim, the more entertaining it CAN be for some. Flight simmers seem to be in a class of people my wife likes to calls, "button pushers". We like gadgets and complexity and flashing light thingys. By adding these other tasks, i.e. "loadmaster or flight dispatcher, to the sim, we essentially increase the amount of cognitive challenges you can engage in. (conveniently through button pushing ) The problem is the aforementioned diversification of simmers...where what is good enough to stimulate one person given the whole of the product isn't good enough to stimulate another. The solution is to "have it all", but in doing so, we run the risk of over complication and when you get cognitive saturation due to complexity.....then that is akin to a stall. So where is the balance? Well...its currently in the IXEG team members comfort zone . We hope enough folks share it to enjoy it. BUT for those wanting more....I will say that the team's comfort zone (and feature set) will expand with time....but we will still ask the question for any given feature, "does Feature X belong in our realm of responsibility to simulate given our target goals with the simulation?" Only time will tell what our answers will be. Though there are many aspects to the simulation of flight and flight operations (a valid hobby X-Plane has the capacity to fill)....OUR product squarely targets 737-300 aircraft operations from the captains perspective at the moment. A more generic "loadmaster / flight dispatch" type of plug-in might be a good product in its own right. -tkyler

Implemented in the future. We have a strong engineering model for implementing an incredibly diverse array of failures and realistic management of such will require a fair amount of effort to be at the level we want. -tkyler

I'm a big fan of providing all of those conveniences Eddie, in their proper order and time. We just want folks to understand that we are drawing a line as to what goes in at the onset due to time constraints. We'll look into such options in due course. -tkyler

PMDG been in business what? 18 years? We've had weather radar since day 1....they just got it into the NGX when? several years after release? Other major manufactures...you can't even "lift" the flap lever out of a gate........Do you really want to have a pissing contest over "feature X" or feature Y"? We'll be here all year. Noted that you like that feature and you want it. -tkyler

And TBH...I'm looking forward to adding more features. It won't end with release, I assure you -tkyler

That is good info Jerry. We'll see about getting it implemented at some point. We have discussed implementing more comprehensive 'options' at some point. The info is not lost on us. Thx. -tkyler

We're not opposed to these types of tools / features or stuff, its just a matter of not knowing if/when we'll get to it. Of course we want it all. And compared to other products, we have a whole lot of essential features they don't have. Between a CG/seat thingamajig and a FMS that doesnt' give me "invalid entry' for every other button press....I'll take the FMS. The CG/seat feature can wait.

we do model the delay of the Gen and XFR relays. lights flash...all that stuff. -tkyler

as you know, we don't give out release dates. It would be a real bummer to give a release date and find a major bug the day before. I would like to believe we are within 4-5 weeks as of today though. All we can do is keep moving quickly..and that I can assure you we are. It certainly gets closer every day though, that I can say. -tkyler

I can't speak for the rest of the team, but I hope to attend this year...mostly as "myself" rather than IXEG though. I probably won't know till the week of. -tk

Hi YD . no to transfer hyd fluid from A to B. We discussed and tabled it to "possible after V1.0". Its a super special technique almost never used (but the speed brake pump trick is a really cool thing we'd like to simulate eventually). We'll see after the fact. (pressure drops with rapid control input IS simulated)...of course this would be tough in reality....but not like joysticks have feedback pressure. . Yes to flap transit speeds affected by hyd pressure (flow rate actually)....and reversers too (shown in one of Jans videos), no to air pressure effects (but now that you mention it, probably easily implemented . Yes to auto-slat extension (and retraction) in high-alpha regime . Yes to different behavior during reversion (controls get sluggish as best we can with a sim) . Unsure on AP autoland...Jan/Nils to answer. . no on abuse simulation for V1.0. We do not intend to abandon development after release and anticipate some type of failure / MTBF / abuse model after the fact. As with many things, time is the great enemy. Once we are rolling, then it is a point of pride to get these more advanced systems working properly. Our generator heating for example...its simple at the moment, but will eventually take into account proper heat transfer with conduction / convection and Q (internal heat generation)....BUT we really do have to cater to the 99% percentile first -tkyler

We have no idea really. We are on the final stretch and working very hard. Every FMS page shipping in V1.0 is in place and we are calibrating our VNAV performance calculations. I would remind everyone we are sim consumers ourselves and we make no decisions we ourselves wouldn't be willing to live with as consumers....and we want it as right as we can get it given current constraints. Doing so means years of satisfaction instead of 'days of frustration'. and March is no good for me, I'll be out of savings by then.....earlier actually -tkyler

fully functional. Jan makes use of it one of the YouTube videos. -tkyler

That's up to Jan as to when he feels he has something he wants to show. We are indeed moving at a crazy pace though. Things are shaping up very nicely on the FMS....we have lots of functionality crammed in with a good foundation for adding 'power features' as time goes on. We think most will be happy with the usability, readability, reliability and predictability of the system. I just flew my first "gear up to gear down" LNAV/VNAV flight the other day. I just sat back and watched the plane do its thing for 45 minutes. My favorite part is crossing T/D and watching the throttles chop and this bird fly itself thing through a winding arrival procedure right to the threshold. Soon...soon. -tkyler

here's what's going on. Nobody can tell anybody else what is realistic to them, only what is realistic for themselves. NEXT....we don't all perceive things the same way. NEXT. Some of us have things we like to be more realistic than others. The ideal solution is....OPTIONS / PREFERENCES. But, preferences take time to implement, and you don't work on preferences before you have the base functionality in. I'm not against implementing anything...I am against no adequate Return on Investment....and the effort to implement any particular preference will have to be evaluated at the appointed time. Are we going to put in feature "X"? Maybe. -tk

This from a few days ago: http://forums.x-pilot.com/topic/8581-ixeg-before-christmas/#entry90703

well worded Rodeo...however, some potentially good news.....I've encountered the same XML anomaly in the Aerosoft dataset...but not in the same files as the Navigraph dataset. Seems we can't avoid having to handle this syntax. it'll throw us back a very tiny bit, but what it means is that it should not matter whom your vendor is. fingers crossed this all works -tkyler

I'll clamp this one right now and say NO. I'll be spending time with my family in the coming days and making sure they are happy and have their husband and dad there for them. End of year is just a construct. We are working diligently and it'll be out soon. When that is I don't know for sure. If its on the other side of 2016 by a bit, so be it. We are almost there. -tkyler

I think we will, most certainly, provide datarefs and commands...and even implement new ones as needed for hardware integration. I do anticipate a bit of a 'growing pain' getting the more discriminating hardware owners out there accommodated. We expect to spend the near term after release dealing with bugs and upgrading the things on our "todo" list. I myself will turn my attention to hardware after I feel the product is reasonably stable and feature complete...and you can expect quite a bit of interaction at that time (probably a few months into the release). We will, most likely, start up a forum thread with the best and brightest hardware folks and programmers and knock heads and see about getting everybody accommodated...including the custom guys. -tkyler

Undecided at this point. ...so I'd say "yes" to the chance....but not "yes" to 'for sure'. -tkyler

Hi, being a San Antonio, TX native, I fly Southwest quite often and without a doubt, there are -300s with steam-gauge primary instruments. I can't believe they still fly them Anyhow, we are not modeling these old steam style primary instruments. A bit of clarification is in order and very important to keep in mind when 'guessing' what we will or won't simulate. Our goal was to create a FMS based 737 airliner and an important part of that FMS was a graphical display of the route, hence the EFIS displays. At the time, the x737 project was reasonably mature and so decided to do the 737-300 so as to not clutter the 'market' per se. The end goal was to have a great simulation of a airliner that could be used on VATSIM and for learning how to operate one. Our goal was NOT complete 'accuracy of configuration' or 'accuracy of options'. The more configurations we try and simulate, the bigger the workload and the longer the development time and well...we have to stop somewhere of course. Now that is not to say that we would not wake up one day and say, "hey, lets put in some old steam gauge primary instruments"....but that would definitely comes secondary to this initial offering. We are anxious to get into the virtual skies and fly us some "modern" (go ahead an laugh) airliners! -tkyler

Jan will have to sound off on this one, but I do not believe we provide this, at least not for V1.0. I myself (who programs the target speed and alts) haven't dealt with this function though I know of it. Sending the plane a target speed / alt is trivial, clearly we do that already, but integrating it into modified 3D modeling, display and interaction would take some time. Both of these, being "options" as it were, this falls down the priority list compared to standard, common functionality. We are beginning by ensuring that the most common scenario by the majority of users is implemented, i.e. "normal, predictable, uneventful" routes that can be flown and editing with no issues....then we'll turn our attention to some of the more esoteric functions of the FMS. -tkyler

More like how a goofball like me names the file when I'm writing code to save/load the coroutes. As soon we we're done with this, I'll be the first in line for Jan's training! -tkyler