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FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

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FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby FighterAce » Mon Oct 09, 2017 2:09 pm

I was browsing the web, and I stumbled upon this page:https://flyawaysimulation.com/news/4571/, which happened to be a review of FlightGear. I scrolled dow a few times, and came to this line: "Aircraft can be imported from Microsoft Flight Simulator by utilizing the 3-D Convert program which converts the MSFS 3-D model to the FlightGear system. Although the models can be imported, the flight dynamics cannot-- they must be created from scratch for FlightGear." Is this really possible? Thanks!,

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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby StuartC » Mon Oct 09, 2017 2:27 pm

yes and its a pain in the arse to do. We have done it a few times and its never easy.
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby Hooray » Mon Oct 09, 2017 9:07 pm

Besides, it's usually not just not feasible due to technical/conversion issues, but also for legal ones.
Speaking in general, even under "perfect circumstances", you will usually only be able to end up with a severely crippled version of the original 3D model, often lacking features/details found in the original model - and none of the effects/shader or animation stuff maps nicely to the way FlightGear needs things done (FDM specifics, Nasal scripting, the property tree, fgcommands etc).
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby Richard » Mon Oct 09, 2017 9:15 pm

FighterAce wrote in Mon Oct 09, 2017 2:09 pm:... 3-D Convert program which converts the MSFS 3-D model to the FlightGear system.


I don't know of the 3-D convert that they speak of.

However if there was actually a decent supply of genuinely free[1] FSX models I'm fairly sure that I could write a complete converter[2] based on what I've seen in terms of documentation of the formats involved, including the FDM[3], animations etc.

However there isn't a enough models that allow this to make the investment in time worthwhile.

[1] most of the freeware ones have terms that explicitly deny reuse, especially under any sort of sensible GPL/CC licence.
[2] ideally the source files, but nobody ever publishes these so almost certainly it would have to use the run time models.
[3] Probably would still have poor flying qualities.
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby Hooray » Mon Oct 09, 2017 9:21 pm

I think Melchior Franz (former FG core dev and major fgdata/Nasal contributor) actually once came up with some kind of modified Blender export plugin (using Python IIRC) applying his intimate knowledge of Nasal/FlightGear internals to make things work - still, it's a huge undertaking and not to be underestimated - i.e. there is usually no 1:1 mapping, just like code generation by a compiler is not a 1:1 process either.

Besides, more and more of our workflows and processes are becoming pretty FlightGear specific - especially in the MFD/Canvas department (think cockpit/avionics) - the kind of APIs we have evolved over the last couple of years have no clear mapping outside fgfs, e.g. imagine finding a cockpit with a G1000-equivalent device, we cannot simply "map" such stuff to an existing API or subsystem - just like it's not feasible to "run" fgfs aircraft outside the fgfs environment - or even just "fgtape" files.

YMMV obviously, but usually this sort of thing makes little sense (if any at all)
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby FighterAce » Mon Oct 09, 2017 9:44 pm

OK, thanks for all the info!
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby StuartC » Mon Oct 09, 2017 10:32 pm

you can use modelconverter-x to convert the 3d model to something you can work with but expect things to be displaced or lost and it can be a lot of work just to get a useable model. Everything else though, you need to start from scratch using FG native stuff.
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby Octal450 » Mon Oct 09, 2017 11:20 pm

You would have to rewrite the FDM, Sounds, Instruments, and all Systems.

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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby japanair772 » Tue Oct 10, 2017 3:07 am

StuartC wrote in Mon Oct 09, 2017 2:27 pm:yes and its a pain in the arse to do. We have done it a few times and it's never easy.

What aircraft he you did it with?
Thanks!
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby StuartC » Tue Oct 10, 2017 8:48 am

The Merlin is conversion. Got a couple of others in the works as well.
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby CaptB » Tue Oct 10, 2017 9:37 am

Instead of converting aircraft, it's better to try and convince the author to release an .ac of the original model under GPL, essentially having a dual license scenario and rework it from there.
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Re: FSX Aircraft Convented to FlightGear?

Postby StuartC » Tue Oct 10, 2017 11:09 am

I have no issues releasing it under CC if that's whats required.
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