Re: Weather from ActiveSky

[Peter Dowson]

On 1/6/2006 5:47:23 PM, Ulisses Simionato wrote:
>ActiveSky build a radar image
>to its own radar application

Oh, yes. Is that a better image than SA_WXRs? It would be less overhead in
terms of reads from FS's weather system, obviously. I've never actually tried
it because it's an FS module needing a window on the FS PC, which for me
is a no-no, that's the projected scenery view.

>maybe Damian
>should open the code or send
>the radar data to magenta

Right. That's a nice idea, yes. But it would need to be unbundled from the FS
module, else the graphics image would be coming from the FS PC to both
PFD/ND PCs. At least SA_WXR's image can be built locally.

>Just an idea.... and an answer
>why ActiveSky.

Yes, thanks.

Pete

[Ulisses Simionato]

Hi Peter,

I don't like the activesky radar as a module inside FS as well.
Also, I didn't tried SA_WXR, if it could display a realistic image from
what
activesky is sending to FS, of course it is a nice solution.
Anyway I don't think FS9 has precise output data about what is going on the
sky, I mean, stratus here, cumulus there, thunderstorm in that area....
don't know, you can answer better than me :)

Nice weekend !
Ulisses

> On 1/6/2006 5:47:23 PM, Ulisses Simionato wrote:
> >ActiveSky build a radar image
> >to its own radar application
>
> Oh, yes. Is that a better image than SA_WXRs? It would be less overhead
in
> terms of reads from FS's weather system, obviously. I've never actually
tried
> it because it's an FS module needing a window on the FS PC, which for me
> is a no-no, that's the projected scenery view.
>
> >maybe Damian
> >should open the code or send
> >the radar data to magenta
>
> Right. That's a nice idea, yes. But it would need to be unbundled from
the
FS
> module, else the graphics image would be coming from the FS PC to both
> PFD/ND PCs. At least SA_WXR's image can be built locally.
>
> >Just an idea.... and an answer
> >why ActiveSky.
>
> Yes, thanks.
>
> Pete
>

[Peter Dowson]

On 1/7/2006 5:57:11 AM, Ulisses Simionato wrote:
>Anyway I don't think FS9 has
>precise output data about what
>is going on the
>sky, I mean, stratus here,
>cumulus there, thunderstorm in
>that area....
>don't know, you can answer
>better than me :)

No, the positioning of the clouds is a random sort of thing and it's all in
the graphics rather than weather as far as I can tell. I have asked
Microsoft for the ability to retrieve actual cloud details, at least within a
certain radius of the user. Distant ones can more random as now -- too costly in
performance to give actual coordinates of all clouds.

Let's hope for this in FSX. MS have confirmed that it isn't realy possible to
get this information in FS9.

However, the radar patterns can look reasonably good in areas where there are
many weather stations, as each will have its own cloud settings. It just
looks wrong in areas of sparsely populated stations.

Regards,

Pete