On-line FS is not for me. Besides flying, my next best amusement with FS is refining the flight characteristics of the models. Some are almost perfect, but some other require extensive work and flight testing in order to get somehow close to the original specs of the airplane.
In doing so I have realized how a powerful tool for teaching flight dynamics, FS can be.
The .air & .cfg files give access to hundreds parameters - some geometric, some dynamic - whose influence over the behavior of the airplane can be then assessed with the simulated flight.
Forty years ago, when I attended the Aeronautical Engineering college, everything had to be figured out with math and formulae, and visualization of the effects of each parameter was a fantasy exercise; today with home simulator every student could quickly realize the consequences of an altered MoI, an offset CoG, or a different inlet area.
What I am saying is that MS instead of shutting down FS development could have considered other ways to use it and sell it (how many Aeronautical Engineering Schools / Students are there in the world?).
It would probably have implied a more realistic utilization of certain paremeters within FS, as well as a (limited) development of an adequate user interface, but in my opinion it could have been worth the effort (and made thousands of simmers happy!).
Ezio
In doing so I have realized how a powerful tool for teaching flight dynamics, FS can be.
The .air & .cfg files give access to hundreds parameters - some geometric, some dynamic - whose influence over the behavior of the airplane can be then assessed with the simulated flight.
Forty years ago, when I attended the Aeronautical Engineering college, everything had to be figured out with math and formulae, and visualization of the effects of each parameter was a fantasy exercise; today with home simulator every student could quickly realize the consequences of an altered MoI, an offset CoG, or a different inlet area.
What I am saying is that MS instead of shutting down FS development could have considered other ways to use it and sell it (how many Aeronautical Engineering Schools / Students are there in the world?).
It would probably have implied a more realistic utilization of certain paremeters within FS, as well as a (limited) development of an adequate user interface, but in my opinion it could have been worth the effort (and made thousands of simmers happy!).
Ezio
)
? Here, for example, you cannot buy the CFS-1. But the CFS 2 and 3, as well as FS2002, are sold for approx. 5$. The rest is priced exactly as everywhere else. Iam sure that in other "some European contries" the pricing is exactly the same. The companies want the players to buy a new hardware, don't they ?