posted 04-04- 02:49 PM               

Hate to disagree with ya (OK, don't laugh to hard) .. But how is it you see moderating 24 and (growing still) number of aircraft is "EASIER" than one (granted probmatic) PlanPack?

I think you've finally lost my friend ...

posted 04-04- 02:55 PM               

I don't understand.

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-Sv =FC=

WWI in SDOE!

posted 04-04- 04:25 PM               

The current mismatches are NOT due to problems with the Plane Pack concept. The mismatches are due to lots of individual planes being changed in a short amount of time.

Sound familiar? If all the planes were stored seperately then this would always be the case.

Once the contest is over and those aircraft are included in the plane pack then things will settle down to the point where everyone can count on the plane pack being the real standard for a month or so at a time. One download, (maybe two if WW I gets its own) albeit large, and you're set to play online.

For most people, that's by far the best way to keep up to date. Few people want to keep track of dozens of seperate sites in order to fly for an hour or two online every week or so.

Those that are willing to put in that effort are usually beta testers for the individual aircraft.

posted 04-04- 04:37 PM               

Mighty ... I think you've posted more today than in the past month! Good to see your sparkling fonts!

[Zur realizes he might be rubbing the wrong radish ... so to speak, and slithers off to irritate another] ...

posted 04-04- 05:08 PM               

We'd trust one of our own to rule our virtual world a hell of a lot more than we'd trust Bill Gates!

Onward, ever forward,

posted 04-04- 05:36 PM               

No matter who is in charge they are going to take a lot of heat just because they are in charge. There are always whinners, whether it's Bill Gates or someone else calling the shots.

posted 04-04- 06:12 PM               

My 2 cents, nothing more.

Werner

posted 04-04- 07:04 PM               

I nominate Mk10 for the job, if he'd have it. He's about the most laid-back, rational, even-handed and nice sounding guy in the community. He, in my humble opinion, would be ideal for the post of dictator.

posted 04-04- 08:56 PM               

I certainly wouldn't mind acting as a liason whenever necessary, or to help with administrative balderdash back and forth though.

Hey, I've got it! Maybe we could be another simbiotic entity around here. "Mk10, the Mad Siggi!"

Nah...nobody does it better than Spank and MD.

posted 04-04- 09:58 PM               

God, if it wasn't for my pathetic schedule i'd seriously change my callsign to Che and volunteer myself for the job! (Hell, I suck at building openplane stuff anyhow...)

Way to go Siggi! If you drop me an email I'll tell you a funny story about the triumph of an underdog who sticks to his principles... It's political, and I think you'll enjoy it.

Werner

posted 04-05- 09:52 AM               

The "undercurrent" I see here (and I don't necessarily disagree with it) is that this "Axis Dictator" or whatever he is (and you might wanna think of another catchy nickname soon before this one sticks) is going to, at some point, be sitting in judgement of what projects are deemed "worthy" of being "allowed into the game." Is he then going to whip out his copy of America's Hundred Thousand, or some other partially accurate "bible" of performance and, based on his own personal testing, decide that something doesn't "make the grade" and therefore "isn't suitable" for online play? You want to end the flow of new planes, that's a pretty good way to do it

Maybe I'm dense, but it seems to me that if you build a mission for online use, it's pretty much self-regulating, isn't it? If you include a new plane, you run the risk of version mismatches until some time has passed and most folks have acquired the new version, no matter WHAT you do. If you build missions only containing "standard" planes, then you shouldn't have a problem, right? And if you EVER want to see another new plane, then the LAST thing you should do is start excluding them until they're "perfected" (and whose opinion of "perfect" are we talking about?)

Seems to me that most of this problem can be minimized by mission descriptions that show exactly what plane versions are required, and server descriptions that show exactly what software is being run, i.e. "5.3a World War I, PlanePack 1.0" or whatever.

But where's the call for "standardized mission building guidelines?" Where are they posted? Or will this dictator someday decide what are "acceptable" online missions too? Will he be allowed to use his own personal bias as to which planes are "realistic enough" to be included in them?

As for plane building guidelines, yes, I know where to find some, but, there are some missing links, such as how to build an airfoil, and some questionable links, such as how the values for damage levels of the different planes were derived. I dodged that bullet a bit, by just giving the Corsair all the same damage points as the Mustang. So, even though that's "fair," it doesn't represent the "real" damage model of a Corsair (which would be somewhere along the lines of "P-47 toughness," truth be told), so it wouldn't meet the "requirements" for Plane Pack inclusion, would it?

Again, where are these mythical "standards?" If there was a well-publicized website or document explaining how to set up my damage model to be "equivalent" to the other plane pack planes, of course I'd do it. There may even BE such a thing, but damned if I can find it by browsing HERE. Having to hunt for a website for an hour or more just to learn what the requirements are is not a good recipe for "standardized" planes IMO.

So, do we need a "dictator," or do we just need a well-defined, well-documented "standards page for builders" (both of planes AND missions)? Generally, when you ask a specific question around here, you get an answer EVENTUALLY (although I'm still waiting for "how to build an airfoil") but wouldn't it be better if I already HAD the basic framework of what standard I was supposed to be building toward BEFORE I asked the question?

Maybe a little less criticizing and doomsaying, and a little more organizing and publicizing of available information is in order here?

posted 04-05- 10:22 AM               

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posted 04-05- 10:50 AM               

jedi: Maybe something we can do right now is start regulating OURSELVES. I don't think we get as much frustration from an FM that might need a little tweaking as we do from incompatibility.

Here's an idea: How about if plane builders had a standardized way of naming their plane files? Last night I downloaded what I thought may have been an updated P-47. The original I have is "thunderbolt.zip." The one I downloaded was "P47d28ra.zip." Both readme's say "March 20," and both files are exactly 1125kb.

I even ran this by an extremely esteemed member of our community, and he too was rather perplexed. And he's no dummy like me.

For instance: If everyone who built planes put the date after their plane name, i.e., "thunderbolt040400.zip" or "P47d28ra040400.zip," then it really even wouldn't matter what the main body of the file name was called. If you knew it was a P-47, as a downloader and online player, if you got a mismatch, you could ask folks, "Hey, what version of the '47 are you guys using?" "Oh, we're using the '0404' version." "Darn, I've got the '0329'. Since I know exactly where to go to get the 'latest' version, you guys fly this one without me, and I'll be back in about 7 minutes with the '0404' version!"

Again, it wouldn't matter what the main body of the file name was. You could call it "jugsalot040400.zip," or "bitchenkeenbigfatplane040400." The date would tell you if you were current with everyone else, and additionally, if the site you visited didn't have the date that was given to you by the guys online, (sigh), you'd just jet over somewhere else until you found the "0404" version.

It's confusion, mayhem, frustration, and wasted valuable "Personal Time" that twists most people tits around here...I don't think we necessarily need a heavy-handed all-powerful judge of "good" or "bad" around at all.

That and the fact that all my incoherent babbling around here the last few days is for one reason, and one reason only: I want to fly these MF's online. It's not really that much fun to fly them online all by myself, and it's gotten so confusing that even the wise sages are staying away from a lot of these aircraft because of the confusion.

I'm sure these newly-designed aircraft provided joy and release and satisfaction and all that crap to the people who designed'em. That's great. But I'm sitting here with sweaty palms, wanting to get these beautiful babies in the air, clawing upwards in zoom climbs, diving down on bandits, feeling the power of machine gun and cannon as I rip into another beautiful airplane, all flown by another human pilot half-way around the world.

I guess you could describe me as a selfish bastard.

If the people who made all these new aircraft knew how much pleasure they were bringing to reprabates like me, they'd REALLY freak. This is the way we can TRULY thank these people. By using them online. By figuring out a way to incorporate them a little easier into the game, and making them an integral part of our online world.

Just an idea. Sorry, the Prozac still hasn't worn off.

posted 04-05- 01:07 PM               

Again, this stuff would be a lot easier to get right if we devoted one of these forums to it, i.e. down there by the Bibliography and Downloads forums, we should put a "Builders' Standards" forum and populate it with the information a new builder needs to build an "online-able" plane. If no one even cares enough to do THAT much, then folks deserve what they get I reckon

posted 04-05- 05:15 PM            

I guess it'll sound like I'm defending the jug here, since I'm part of that team, but the problem goes beyond that.

Your thoughts about filenames falls short for the simple reason that us plane developers do not, and cannot control them.

posted 04-05- 07:43 PM               

Yeah, I thought it was something like that. And really, maybe I'm just too gosh-darn optimistic, but I think if it was conventional wisdom that creators would prefer if their filenames weren't change, really...I think people would respect that.

I don't think the majority of us are sneering juvenile delinquents in leather jackets. I think if everyone got the word not to mess with the names they wouldn't, and would lessen the confusion around here.

Again, thanks for some brilliant work.

posted 04-05- 08:13 PM               

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posted 04-05- 08:59 PM               

No more vegemite for you, mate.

Mk10=225th=