announcement Airports Quad (P3Dv3.x) installers - please stop demanding

[John Venema]

In the past eight weeks we've seen a constant stream of posts asking (and in many cases, demanding) to know when Orbx FTX airports will have a quad-installer released which make them natively compatible with Prepar3D v3.x

 

We have about 70 more airports to create Quad installers for, and one person (Ed Correia) is almost exclusively working on this task at the maximum rate of 3-4 airport installers per week. At the same time we have 35 new products being worked on by the rest of the team for release through 2016, all of which require quad installers too.

 

This means that if Ed releases 3-4 new installers every single week we won't be finished until about April/May. I am looking into ways in which we can possibly speed this process up, but the reality is that Orbx has the largest collection of airports in the FS industry and it's just going to take time.

 

One option is to not do any testing of the ports but that may not be the most desirable approach.

 

So unfortunately no amount of forum posts asking "where are they?" is going to speed this process up.

 

By the end of this year Orbx will have around 200 products, and each time LM make a major change in P3D architecture (v4, v5, 64-bit?) we will be faced with the same porting problem all over again. I would personally have this "problem" of continuing platform development by LM, versus a static dead FSX platform, so let's all look to the positive side of this issue.

 

It may lead to us charging for porting if the community is willing to pay to speed the process up.

 

In the mean time, please continue to enjoy what you can in P3Dv3 and then rediscover your 'old toys' again when they become available.

[Metthos]

Dear.

Let me first say that I am not a big customer, I only have four products from you.

I am in the line of business in my profession and really understand you problem and appreciate your effort. 

But to me it seem unrealistic that when we buy a product we have a lifetime guarantee for free updates no matter how the sim platform changes.

Maybe you should state a condition for updates in purchase moment? eg. this is valid for free updates under circumstances...bla bla?

Personally I would not have any problem to pay a small fee for small changes and a new buy for the next generation, if this would drive the development off add on to a higher level.

Just an opinion.

Have a great day.

[dominique]

These requests are the price you have to pay for us liking your products so much, isn't it ? Not entirely a bad thing, I suppose . Your sceneries and P3Dv3 are a match made in Heavens. We all can recognize that you did a huge effort in converting the regions (including Tim & Ken's two packages) quickly and I am thankful for that. 

 

The flow of conversions seems a little bit down though. Targeting April/May is certainly better than August as said in your reply in the other  post. So a a naive question. The layman that I am may be mistaken but the differences between 2.5 and 3 seem minimal for the install of an OrbX scenery. It is not like the conversion from FSX to v2. Can't the customers do themselves the moving from one version to the other with a few tips from your team, as an interim solution waiting for the quad and at the customers own risk, specially if it takes longer than scheduled to convert the whole catalog ? 

[Museumkeeper]

50 minutes ago, John Venema said:

 'please continue to enjoy what you can in P3Dv3 and then rediscover your 'old toys' again when they become available'

This is my way of looking at it. It's like Christmas all over again. I get up in the morning and cannot wait to get my computer switched on to see what has been 'quaded' today. The fact that you do not know what software will be next only increases the excitement.

John, 'Keep calm and carry on'. Your efforts and those of your dedicated team are very much appreciated.

 

Kind regards

 

Ian

[xxd09]

Hi John

I am sure I speak for most in saying how much we all appreciate  Orbx,s great work.

You are giving us "free" P3Dv3 installers.

Most of us porting over to P3Dv3 are still discovering the merits/limitations of this new flight sim

A gradual release of updated products gives us all a measured introduction to P3Dv3

It is like learning to flightsim again only better!

Keep up the good work

xxd09

[Patrick Cox]

_{I for one am happy to wait for the new installers as I am on a fixed income and not in a position to be paying for the updates. Over the years I have quite happily purchased ORBX products but since retiring and going onto the aged pension I have to give a lot of consideration to what I purchase.}

 

_{So for all those impatient people out there stop and think of the consequences your demands are causing the less well off who also support a great company like ORBX. Let things take their course and be released when they are ready.}

 

 

[wedge1047]

100% behind JV and Orbx on this one. Happy to await the release of each updated installer.  Aussiemans post has come up whilst I am typing and I have to agree with his sentiments re folks claiming to be willing to pay to speed up the process. I am fortunate to be in a position to be able to pay such a charge but I am sure there are many Orbx customers out there who are not in that  position, we should salute Orbx for providing this service  and allow them to continue with their endeavours.

 

When we are provided with good service we should be gracious enough to appreciate it!

 

cheers Reg

[Holy Cheese]

ORBX have graciously given us their products for FSX, FSX Steam, P3Dv1, P3Dv2 and P3Dv3 all for the price of one purchase. It's time for us to be gracious and respect that surely new products have to be a priority for ORBX to continue to generate income. We know that the portovers to quad installers will come in good time. Meanwhile, I have enough products (especially the regions and global products) already ported to keep me flying and still have plenty of places to choose from.

 

Give ORBX a break and let them do what they do best - continue to provide us with outstanding products and service.

 

Cheers

Jack

[VH-KDK]

I thought it was wind up Wednesday today, two demanding "where are they" posts in quick succession.

I wish some folks would just be a little more patient and understanding.

It is a very small minority that are causing the upset and I am sure JV and others in the team have better things to do than have to make posts such as this.

Oh, 35 new products this year, JV can you tell me the exact release date of........

 

 

[dominique]

Nice of you to come to the defence of John who really does not need it  ! Think about what may thinkk the newcomers when they read some holier-than-thou posts. Convinced, they are not, bitter they may leave. Honestly I don't see what's wrong in asking politely (demanding is another story) about conversions. OrbX is not a cumbaya party, it is a business. And a business needs to communicate on sensible matters. These queries are repetitive. They are, then what ? Newbies can have bought, for instance, v3 not ready products during the sale and want to know when they can use them. Isn't that normal, human I might add ? I think its better that they come here to ask and get an informed answer from John like today than roam the big A and fuel some stupid threads there. Jack made a good point about the need to balance cashflow and time spent in freebies, thats the way to go, explaining. BTW, about paying a small premium to significantly accelerate the process, why not ?  Any hard work deserves its reward.

 

 

[Benny]

On 2016-01-20 at 2:57 AM, John Venema said:

and each time LM make a major change in P3D architecture (v4, v5, 64-bit?) we will be faced with the same porting problem all over again.

 

I think that this is scary for a company, I mean it's like a never ending story. ED will get bored.

 

I also think that LM as a real problem by not doing simple upgrade like SP1, 2, 3, 4 that would not affect addon product installation. This is the main reason I'm staying with FSX.

 

Ben

[GregJ]

Personally happy to wait until they are created/tested/approved before I mess them up......I purposefully stayed behind the early adopter phase for 3.1 until a sufficient amount of installers were ready as I knew I would have a lot of tweaking to do - as always when I re-adjust and re-install. I do this as a means to ensuring I have read all I can about said products before I run about and willy nilly apply them before all the kinks are worked out. As a former Executive Chef, there is a term called mise en place - or everything in it's place - this lends true in almost everything we do - Patience.....is a virtue. Be so kind as to have it for the sake of John et al,

[Airwolf]

JV - your team and Ed are doing excellent job.  I am so grateful that you guys got all the main scenery parts done at the start - all the regions, global and vector.  That gets us the sim ready and I am beyond pleased at the level of service provided by you guys. 

 

Ed deserves a promotion!!!  Make him come to the FlightSimCon - I will buy beer for the entire Orbx Team!

[Bruce Hamilton]

53 minutes ago, Benny said:

I also think that LM as a real problem by not doing simple upgrade like SP1, 2, 3, 4 that would not affect addon product installation.

 

That was supposed to be the premise of 3x, that the .1 and .2 updates wouldn't break everything.  Weren't supposed to need another reinstall until 4x.

[John Venema]

3.1 did not break anything (other than ObjectFlow very briefly), nor should 3.2, 3.3 etc

[Penzoil3]

Thanks John! The daily snivel/demand is a P.I.T.A.  I'm certainly tired of it. I'm sure you guys must be. I like the little at a time releases. That way I can back them up on DVD as I go. Before I had gotten behind with P3D 1.4, then 2.0 changed things. I was so far behind, I gave up on backing up, except for an external drive. Now, I save as I go!

 Thanks Sue

[Kilstorm]

I'll agree with Ian S as I check the forums many times a day to see what new gifts (if any) are under the Christmas tree.  I am a seasoned forum reader and leaser of many Orbx products so I know not to ask as they are coming with the general understanding of whats going on behind the scenes as JV pointed out in this post. I am just super happy that not only are the Orbx 100+ products been able to keep getting moved up in the most current sim unlike the days of the past were we had to loose almost all our scenery addons and start over every two years but also they have been made to not show there age and keep getting little face lifts with new flows and tech coding when needed during these updates to keep them as fresh as the day they were released. 

[boleyd]

I am impatient and probably unwelcome here. But, while I really want all the airports I paid for on the P3.1 platform now, I understand that there is a need to primarily focus resources on new (cash flow) products. So I remain impatient only to be reminded by people with different personalities that I should not be.

 

I do have a more interesting concern. Will all of the airports sold without P3d3.1 compatibility be updated or will there be exceptions?

 

Orbx and Lockheed really keep this hobby alive for many. I do not know how they can make your stuff any bette,r but I bet they will try. So thanks for all you have offered and particularly the outstanding sales.

[DesertPilot]

Dick, see this post from John Venema yesterday here.  They're taking steps to speed up the quad installers.

 

That said, I suspect the few airports that haven't yet been ported to P3Dv2, such as YBBN Brisbane, might take longer.  However, JV did mention that Turbulent Designs has been contracted to take care of those airports. It has been stated that all Orbx products will eventually be ported to P3Dv3.

[John Venema]

The non-P3Dv2 airports are being worked on right now, they will be part of the P3Dv3 quad installers.

 

Expect to see an increase in quad installer releases over the coming weeks, we've put steps in place to speed things up.

 

Thanks again for your patience everyone, we're all in this boat together

[NeilG]

I've not made any demands and are content to wait. I bought products for FSX and that's what I've got. I've been pleasantly surprised at so many developers willingness to update installers without charging (as we all know it is not the case with everyone). Personally, I would be happy to pay an upgrade charge , especially if it's only a few quid. I'm not being sychophantic, work is being done, effort and creativity is expended, I would not shrink from paying. Anyhow, that's my 4 penny worth.

Take care all

Neil

[z06z33]

If I knew anything about coding I'd volunteer(free of charge) to help you port but sadly if I tried I think I'd break more than I'd fix lol

The community appreciates your efforts.

[JasonW]

Hey John,

  Thanks for all of the free updates, they are very much appreciated. I was also wondering if you could comment on whether the North American Landclass is still on schedule?

[seby.h]

I could not be happier with the free updates, even though my favourite airports have not been done yet, I am happy to wait. I totally understood the size of the job ORBX is under taking in testing and creating the Quad installers. Lets not forget that we just had Christmas and New Year, we want every one who can to have time off work to be with loved ones.

 

I think of V3 as a new Simulator and consider my self very lucky to be able to use so many of my old addons in it.

 

I would be happy in future to pay small upgrade charge for future simultors if possible.

 

Cheers

Seb

[Ripcord]

On ‎1‎/‎22‎/‎2016 at 10:30 AM, John Venema said:

The non-P3Dv2 airports are being worked on right now, they will be part of the P3Dv3 quad installers.

 

Expect to see an increase in quad installer releases over the coming weeks, we've put steps in place to speed things up.

 

Thanks again for your patience everyone, we're all in this boat together

 

John, I have noted the uptick in v3 installers, so good on ya.

 

And again, for every demand/snivel, there are a good dozen of us here quietly appreciative of all your efforts.

[Stewart Hobson]

2 hours ago, Ripcord said:

 

John, I have noted the uptick in v3 installers, so good on ya.

 

And again, for every demand/snivel, there are a good dozen of us here quietly appreciative of all your efforts.

+1 and indeed there are.

[rdg]

I was just curious how you choose the order in which the airports are converted? How about in the order they were created?

I would think with that there was some logic applied.

 

Bob

[Alex Goff]

In whatever order the porting developer chooses. Chronological would make no sense, you'd wait a year to get an airport released back in July. 

[Ed Correia]

It's quite technical, it involves a dartboard and a blindfold. 

[rdg]

Hi Alex, I do agree with the folks who paid good money for their airport in July and cannot use it since v3 was released. That is a tough one to swallow. I think I would be a little upset also.  So for the many of us that purchased regions and airports back in 2009-2015, like myself, may have to wait a bit. That's OK with me, and it sounds logical, but my question was relevant and sincere, and not demanding in anyway shape or form I think you will agree, and I am a little disappointed in your reply.  I am trying to tie together and understand both parts of your answer. The 1st part of your reply " In whatever order the porting developer chooses", then came the statement basically stating "First in Last Out", which is what you might do if it were your packages.  So is the first part of your reply correct or the 2nd part or both? 

 

So from what I gathered from your answer sounds like the "other developers" are just that, 3rd party, and are really NOT bound to ORBX, so ORBX really cannot provide any leadership to try and get all the 3rd party developers to agree on some form of release pattern. Is this correct? Again, I truly do not understand the relationship between ORBX and the 3rd party developers, so I feel this is a fair question IMO.

 

First off, I was not being demanding, I was just asking. Your reply did sound a little bit sort of, kind of, well to me, just a tad bit arrogant. I have always Alex enjoyed and respected your replies to many posts over the years,  but to be honest, I really feel like I did not get an answer to the question. 

 

Bob

 

 

[DesertPilot]

Of the 117 Orbx scenery payware products that have been released to date for FSX (excluding ENNO and ESSA), as listed at www.fullterrian.com, 54 products are now available for P3Dv3. We're rapidly approaching the halfway point, that's great.

 

And, JV did mention recently (here) that steps have been put into place to accelerate the port of the remaining products to P3Dv3. 

 

Note I didn't include the three Orbx aircraft and the FSX GO tweaker tool in my counts above.

[John Venema]

**10** (read my lips, TEN) new quad installers for older airports were released in the past week (actually, the last eight days), so I think we're now reaching critical mass for the remaining ones to be cranked out in good time.

 

We've used similar comparisons before, but bear with me: let's assume you bought a game for the PS4 (aka FSX or P3D2) and then Sony (LM) releases the PS5 (P3Dv3). Would you expect EA, Ubisoft, or other game developers to give you a FREE copy of your PS4 game for the PS5? No, I didn't think so. 

 

But that is precisely what Orbx is doing; giving you a free copy of the product for an entirely new platform whilst preserving backward compatibility with three other older sims. In a lot of cases we're adding new content and slight enhancements. Let's see - how many publishers in the FS community have released as many PD3v3 installers for older products? Oh, that would be none of them, not even close to the 54 we've done so far.

 

By the same token the majority of purchases of our products happened before LM released P3Dv3, and nobody asked for a guarantee they would work or be supported for possible future platforms. So arguments being presented to us are simply unreasonable.

 

For those who willingly purchased non-P3Dv3 compatible Orbx products during the December sale and are counting on them to be ported soon, I publicly stated back in November that doing so was a sound and logical purchase strategy because all product would be ported in a reasonable time.

 

So please, once again I must ask you to be patient and wait for the remaineder to be ported, they will be available sooner than you think.

[rdg]

Well, then there should be some form of order. (I am assuming). I think someone stated on average 3-4 per week. I am assuming that is per developer. We should be able to, with that info, determine a time frame.

Any guesses?

 

Bob

[John Venema]

Just now, rdg said:

Well, then there should be some form of order. (I am assuming). I think someone stated on average 3-4 per week. I am assuming that is per developer. We should be able to with that info determine a time frame.

Any guesses?

 

Bob

 

Bob, enough!

 

Read my post above; 10 installers in the past week alone, and the order is not relevant. We're working through them as fast as we can and that's the end of the discussion. Stop complaining, we're getting fed up with it.

[Alex Goff]

Arrogance not intended, I try and answer with brevity in mind. If I typed out a detailed set of thoughts on every post I respond to, some days I'd be here for hours 

 

For myself, and many other developers I have noticed there is no particular order. My second statement was just the explanation of why using chronological order doesn't work best. For myself it's mostly a mix of ease (airports that ported simply to V2 move easily to V3), popularity (the more popular the more likely folks want it now), whether it needs other work, and a bit of leaning on release order.

 

For example I have been in the practice of doing W52 first because it is very old and simple. But then I ported PAHO and PAYA because they are my most popular and both native V2, followed by KWYS because it is very popular but more complicated. Tim and I have the go-ahead for 2W3 now that we're not working on Meigs since it is also old and easy. After that should be 65S for my last port to handle because it is less popular, required a good amount of work to get to V2, and so I anticipate it is the most work.

 

For developers no longer with Orbx, other developers port their work. For example I ported almost all of the NZ airports, many NA, and some EU to V2. In that case it was a few most popular first, then alphabetical down the folders of source files from there.

[rdg]

John, clearly what I said had zero complaint content. Although some complaining is good, as it calms the nerves!

Most of the folks here love ORBX, that is why they are excited to get back what they have already experienced, and they miss it. I wish I had a company where people where climbing the walls wondering when something was coming out or being released. I would be one happy guy for sure.

 

Anyway if I had been complaining John, I would have said "When the hell are you guys going to get off your butts and get this done!". 

 

With all due respect

Bob

 

 

[chrishunt]

9 hours ago, Ed Correia said:

It's quite technical, it involves a dartboard and a blindfold. 

 

If I was the dartboard I would want the blindfold!  Seriously though - any update to quad installers, particularly freebies, has to be very welcomed and with all due patience.  We are more than a little fortunate that we get the updates at all!

[rdg]

Thanks Alex, I now know a little more info on what goes into the decision process. I did not realize that a dev might want to make a few improvements, or the popularity of the add-on itself having an order influence. Understanding the process does help to calm the nerves. This is what is needed for a community that sits on the edge of their chairs.

 

Regards

Bob

[azkid]

JV and all developers; I say you guys are doing a great job...........THANK YOU!

[jcrouse55]

I came here tonight to find out when some of my airports were even going to compatible with p3dv3, I had zero expectations that they would and I am very grateful to find you guys working very hard to make them all compatible! I don't care how long it takes as long as are even willing to do so.

 

A HUGE Thank you!!