Hi
This is a general post to the past comments. (Hopefully my last one!)
We do understand these concerns, and I personally try to put myself in your seat. But I must say again, we do have a mass form of communication, it is called e-mail. As I outlined it is the chosen one for us. But this frorm has a good role to play, I just think energy is wasted bashing us on it. There are actually people who prefer e-mail to forums and vice versa. All updated areas or changes to the software are indicated in the changes.txt and any major news event is usually posted on the website under news. Recently though nothing posted because we are dealing with details not "news events" as such, and mostly we are dealing with details now. What we do not want is to add another level to this because you will be surprised at how much more that adds to the workloads. The whole idea is to streamline as much as possible to allow us time for development not admin. This has worked, we don't want to turn the problem around again. The past few months have been I must say much more busy than any others but it does not mean anything other than people are working, for every major software change a lot of planning (sometimes) and research has to be made. It is also not just limited to us internally.
A change in the software like, adding dual QNH to the MCP may seem very small to those using it on a day to day basis, but actually (just this one example) was a lot of work and adding all the other things that go with this, independent FD's - dual true mode AP's - it goes on and on, in many different areas. Just an example below:
MCP 413
- when no modes are active and F/D or A/P is switched on -> HDG and V/S active
- mode reversions from APP/VORLOC
- HDG SEL when VORLOC armed re-activated
- SINGLE CH operation down to 1500 ft
- changes to approach mode handling, both NAVs need to be tuned to ILS for 2 channel APP mode
- second A/P is kicked out when NAV1 <> NAV2 in APP mode or APP is deselected
- PFC glareshield sixpack correction
- new DLL, some CPFlight Changes
MCP 412
- added option to INI file to disable autobrakes below 80 knots
MCP 410
- release
MCP 409
- separared CMD A and B for VOR/LOC and QNH and ILS handling
- changed TOGA and GA handling (not yet for engine out situations)
- added MachAltitude INI file settings, will automatically switch to MACH/IAS when that altitude is passed and > 20000 ft
So, the infomation is there and is always there. If there is something you are really worried about just e-mail. Of course as soon as you add new features, the new features that have been requested, the complexity level goes up, and some bugs jump in. That is a fact of life, nothing we can do about it. If you want more, then there will be a price to pay ironing out the issues and likely it will take time. I/we understand 100% what people say about the route line generation as being a basic fundemental thing that should work - and I 100% agree with them. The reason why it stopped working as well as it did are complex. One reason is that it is all in an effort to make things work better in the long run. A lot of re-writing in the way the CDU handles things. And this work must continue. Before we had Navigraph there were more problems the problems were elsewhere, usually a route disappeared due to a network error or something, now it is more to do with converting the data (still our problem) we have started to change the way this in the CDU are computed from the old way to a much more in-line way as to how the a/c does it - but doing this really is complex - in the end it will be better. Hopefully in the meantime, we can fix this current issue of lines dissappearing which are worse or better depending on which navdata cycle you actually use and so on...
It is a myth that all full motion simulators work like clockwork, that is in the minds of people not the reality. As Matt pointed out already. I have been in a 737NG simulator with the route line disappearing before, I have been in a 747-400 with the IRS not ever able to be aligned losing 4hrs of time - and we are talking a team of four engineers running around 24hrs a day. And I know of countless other problems I have heard of, they are always in and out of service, they are always being checked every 3months and defect lists produced to be corrected in a time frame. I have done sim details with a defect list in my hand, "no LNAV today". In full motion sims it comes down to legal factors, if you fly a detail with no LNAV (just extreme example), then the detail must be arranged so that later down the line the pilot who failed his check can't blame it on the simulator. It is all a legal thing. I know this, been there done it - it is different to the hobby world and the expectation of the hobby world. The fact is, simulators and software are complex things. We are still adding layers to ours, as such if you want to get into that at this price point then sometimes there will be problems. If you want to spend 1.5m on the actual a/c software you could, but you will still have problems one way or another.
On the navigraph problem, it is already being looked into by Enrico and Richard.
Hopefully this is the last of my novels and you are so bored by now you don't want anymore!
Regards
Jonathan Richardson
