"Stop visibility going below" - question

[afterburner]

Hello Pete Dowson and other FSUIPC-users,

the "Stop visibility going below (1/100th mile)" - button should do what it is called, not to let visibility going below the entered value.

But at my FS, it does only work if I enable the checkbox "Allow changes to FS own weather" in the technical section. I thought this should be the other way around (when this checkbox is disabled)...

When I disable this checkbox, I can set visibilities that are lower than I´ve entered in the FS weather menu, and FSUIPC won´t make any corrections...

Is such a behaviour purposed, is it a failure of my system or of FSUIPC itself?

Furthermore I would like to ask following: The lowest visibility limitation does apply only to global weather. Is it technically impossible to apply this function to local weather (it would surprise me as long as the maximum visibility limitation works for all weather), or isn´t there a need of this function for local weather?

The sense of this would be preventing some unrealistic weather conditions with clear skies, but a low visibility below 5 miles with the grey sky I got sometimes before...

Just a question...

Thank you for replies!

Afterburner

[Pete Dowson]

the "Stop visibility going below (1/100th mile)" - button should do what it is called, not to let visibility going below the entered value.

It does, for weather injected into FS from external programs via FSUIPC's weather interface.

But at my FS, it does only work if I enable the checkbox "Allow changes to FS own weather" in the technical section. I thought this should be the other way around (when this checkbox is disabled)...

Surely it would be wrong to mess with FS's weather if the option to do so is disabled? I don't understand your logic.

When I disable this checkbox, I can set visibilities that are lower than I´ve entered in the FS weather menu,

Where do you set them if not in the FS weather menu? Sorry, you've lost me somewhere?

The lowest visibility limitation does apply only to global weather. Is it technically impossible to apply this function to local weather

It applies to ALL weather supplied by external programs because I can influence the values as they are being set. Very little of FSUIPC's weather functions can be applied to FS2004's own local weather because not enough is known of the grid structures used. It took many many hours of difficult hacking through complex code even to do what has been done. I nearly gave up.

it would surprise me as long as the maximum visibility limitation works for all weather

But that fiddles the visibility at the aircraft in a totally different way. It isn't really doing any weather manipulation. I can only apply an upper limit.

Regards

Pete

[afterburner]

OK, since you´ve said the visibility limiter works for external weather programs, it´s all clear now.

Earlier, I´ve thought this way:

"Allow changes to FS own weather" button on -> make no visibility corrections on FS by FSUIPC. What has been set in FS weather menu, it does apply

"Allow changes to FS own weather" button off -> enable the FSUIPC visibility limiter to work, FSUIPC has the priority over FS own weather...

[Pete Dowson]

Earlier, I´ve thought this way:

"Allow changes to FS own weather" button on -> make no visibility corrections on FS by FSUIPC. What has been set in FS weather menu, it does apply

"Allow changes to FS own weather" button off -> enable the FSUIPC visibility limiter to work, FSUIPC has the priority over FS own weather...

Sorry. It never occurred to me that was so ambiguous. When it says "allow changes to FS own weather" that is referring to FSUIPC making changes to weather set in or downloaded by FS. It's turned out to be mostly a waste of time (and code) even trying to do that, because, having failed to find the correct place to modify local weather 'on the fly', I only implemented it for global weather. And, as it then turned out, in FS2004 no weather stays 'global' for long. Each weather station which isn't explicitly set with weather will initially be populated with the global weather, but it remains dynamic and within minutes (typically 20-30) it is local weather and again not changed 'on the fly'.

The weather setting facilities implemented for external programs actually set complete weather at specified weather stations, but this isn't suitable for gradual changes 'on the fly', as it would cause noticeable hesitations (stutters) even for minor incremental changes.

I hope to be able to do a lot better in future versions of FS. As it is, with FS2004, it is best to leave that option unchecked. For complete control of weather use an external weather program.

Regards,

Pete

[Pete Dowson]

I would like to ask following: The lowest visibility limitation does apply only to global weather. Is it technically impossible to apply this function to local weather

I investigated this a bit further. When I first wrote the code for FS2004 weather control I knew less about it than I do now. I have found a way to apply the minimum to FS's own weather, both local and global, so I have included it in version 3.51, due out this coming weekend.

There is one oddity though. If the specified minimum is being imposed on FS’s own weather the current visibility will not be reported correctly in weather reports such as those read by external programs and ATIS in FS. This is because the only way of imposing the visibility minimum is by changing the effect at the end stage, the rendering at the aircraft, and not in the weather system as such.

BTW, you also said:

The sense of this would be preventing some unrealistic weather conditions with clear skies, but a low visibility below 5 miles with the grey sky I got sometimes before...

The limit before you got the grey skies (even de-texturing the clouds above) was around 4 nm in FS2002, but it was raised to 10 nm in FS2004, so in fact FS2004 is a lot worse in this respect -- almost any misty conditions gives you a grey bland sky. You would need to set the minimum to 10.5 nm (1050 as the value in FSUIPC's dialogue) in order to prevent it altogether in FS2004, which is a shame as this also eliminates all reasonable misty conditions. I am one who'd prefer no minimum so that I get the weather pretty much as it really should be, ognoring the grey skies and hoping that I clear the murk quickly after takeoff! ;-)

Regards,

Pete

[afterburner]

Hello Pete Dowson,

as I´ve noticed, you´ve already implemented a lowest visibility limitation for both global and local FS weather in your new FSUIPC version 3.51.

I´ve read your last post within this thread after I installed the new version.

This implementation is great and I want to thank you for your fantastic support.

You wrote:

"There is one oddity though. If the specified minimum is being imposed on FS’s own weather the current visibility will not be reported correctly in weather reports such as those read by external programs and ATIS in FS. This is because the only way of imposing the visibility minimum is by changing the effect at the end stage, the rendering at the aircraft, and not in the weather system as such."

That doesn´t matter in my mind, the same did and does apply to maximum visibility, however. I´m happy with how it works now. 8)

You also wrote:

"The limit before you got the grey skies (even de-texturing the clouds above) was around 4 nm in FS2002, but it was raised to 10 nm in FS2004, so in fact FS2004 is a lot worse in this respect -- almost any misty conditions gives you a grey bland sky. You would need to set the minimum to 10.5 nm (1050 as the value in FSUIPC's dialogue) in order to prevent it altogether in FS2004, which is a shame as this also eliminates all reasonable misty conditions. I am one who'd prefer no minimum so that I get the weather pretty much as it really should be, ognoring the grey skies and hoping that I clear the murk quickly after takeoff! "

Earlier, when I didn´t use FSUIPC or FSInterrogate, the fact that one got blue sky not until a visibility of 20 miles, set at the low-resolution visibility slider inside FS´own weather has bugged me much, because that was unrealistic.

Later, when I found out that the real grey sky limit was at 10,1 miles, I felt better. At least I could correct the 10 miles value, set in weather menu, manually by FSInterrogate. Now that it does automatically, thanks to FSUIPC and your lowest visibility limit implementation.

I agree that the FS2004´ grey sky limit of 10 miles is a lot worse than the 4 miles in the previous version.

In exchange for that, if a visibility of, let´s say, 5 miles is reported together with overcast skies at the weather station, in FS2002 you saw a "blue" fog and could hardly see the grey sky color that should be caused by overcast sky condition. In FS2004, weather in such cases is displayed much better in my mind.

And in FS2002 you couldn´t see the fog layer from upper altutides, which was also very unrealistic.

I think both FS2002 and 2004 have their pro´s and contras, but a satisfactorily creation of misty conditions is not developed perfectly at both. (Another brutal solution might be placing a stratus cloud layer at the ground in FS2004 for creating misty conditions)...

Again, thank you for implementing lower visit limitation applying to FS´own local weather! 8)

Reagards Konstantin

[Pete Dowson]

I think both FS2002 and 2004 have their pro´s and contras, but a satisfactorily creation of misty conditions is not developed perfectly at both.

Agreed. In fact, in my opinion, the rendition of mist and fog was actually better in FS2000 than in either of its successors.

Regards,

Pete