How did all my FSDT sceneries install into P3dV4

[kihew]

Ok I am very confused and I shouldn't as I can't blame my age (yet).

I got P3Dv4 and installed GSX. Today I realized that I also had the familiar Flightbeam San Francisco and all my FSDT collection installed into V4 and I didn't do that. How did this happen?

Each scenery has a separate entry in the documents folder for V4, each with its addon xml file...

I do have FSX and that's where all those sceneries were installed into.

What am I missing? Did GSX, when installed, link my FSX sceneries to my V4?

Thanks Just trying to make sense of this because I spent the last hours trying to figure out why I had no cloud shadows at KSFO that I thought was now p3D default and after all is likely an incompatible scenery addon that I did not install

Cheers

[virtuali]

installing GSX or any other FSDT or Flightbeam scenery (except KMSP), using the new installers, will "migrate" all the existing FSDT and Flightbeam products (except KMSP) which were installed inside the main folder of the sim using the old installers, to the folder that has been chosen by the user when installing. By default, this is C:\program files (x86)\Addon Manager, but can be any other folder.

This will result in the following advantages:

- If these products were installed in multiple simultators (FSX, P3D V3 and P3D V4, for example), they would take 3x the amount of disk space, because there was a duplicate copy of each scenery installed in each simulator. A waste of space. The new installer will have only a single shared folder.

- Under P3D V3.4 and V4, it would be possible to completely uninstall the sim, without having to reinstall the addons that were installed using the new method.

- Under P3D V3.4 and V4, the new installers don't touch the core scenery.cfg, the core dll/xml files or the core Fsx.cfg and simobjects.cfg anymore, so this will reduce the chance of conflict caused by other addons messing with these files.

- The sceneries can now be installed everywhere, instead of being forced to install into the sim. Before, if you had the sim on a small SSD with not much space available, you couldn't install the sceneries without being forced to uninstall the sim and reinstall it into a different drive. Now, you can keep the sim installed on a small drive, and install all the sceneries elsewhere.

[kihew]

Thank you for clearing / confirming that and for the explanation on the advantages of this kind of install - soon long will be gone the days of FS clean and long re-installs.

One question, though - I had those sceneries installed into FSX only - I suppose the versions I am seeing in V4 now are linked to those FSX versions, correct? Don't they need updating to be used in V4?

The reason I ask is that Flightbeam's KSFO (which were included with FSDT) ground poly wasn't showing cloud shadows in V4.

Alex

[virtuali]

One question, though - I had those sceneries installed into FSX only - I suppose the versions I am seeing in V4 now are linked to those FSX versions, correct? Don't they need updating to be used in V4?

Our sceneries, thanks to the usage of the Couatl scripting engine, behave differently and display different objects (IF needed) depending on the simulator they are running under so, even if they are in a shared folder now, they will work properly and differently, if the sim is FSX or P3D, when this is required.

The reason I ask is that Flightbeam's KSFO (which were included with FSDT) ground poly wasn't showing cloud shadows in V4.

You should probably enable the Receive shadows for Simobjects in the P3D graphic settings. However, cloud shadows might not always work, depending how a scenery is made.

[Speedbird ATC]

installing GSX or any other FSDT or Flightbeam scenery (except KMSP), using the new installers, will "migrate" all the existing FSDT and Flightbeam products (except KMSP) which were installed inside the main folder of the sim using the old installers, to the folder that has been chosen by the user when installing. By default, this is C:\program files (x86)\Addon Manager, but can be any other folder.

This will result in the following advantages:

- If these products were installed in multiple simultators (FSX, P3D V3 and P3D V4, for example), they would take 3x the amount of disk space, because there was a duplicate copy of each scenery installed in each simulator. A waste of space. The new installer will have only a single shared folder.

- Under P3D V3.4 and V4, it would be possible to completely uninstall the sim, without having to reinstall the addons that were installed using the new method.

- Under P3D V3.4 and V4, the new installers don't touch the core scenery.cfg, the core dll/xml files or the core Fsx.cfg and simobjects.cfg anymore, so this will reduce the chance of conflict caused by other addons messing with these files.

- The sceneries can now be installed everywhere, instead of being forced to install into the sim. Before, if you had the sim on a small SSD with not much space available, you couldn't install the sceneries without being forced to uninstall the sim and reinstall it into a different drive. Now, you can keep the sim installed on a small drive, and install all the sceneries elsewhere.

Sorry for practicing necromnancy, but is there a way to migrate old scenery to V4 WITHOUT using a new installer?

[aceridgey]

Hello,

Is there an easy way to move the default install location from C/Program files, to D P3d Addons?

Alex

[Dave_YVR]

Is there an easy way to move the default install location from C/Program files, to D P3d Addons?

 Easier than reinstalling them? That is the easy way. Install the Addon Manager where you want your scenery to go.

[virtuali]

If you Uninstall ALL FSDT (and Flightbeam's) sceneries, and reply YES to the question "Do you want to remove the Addon Manager?", the next installation will allow you to choose another path, even on a different drive, which will then used by all other installations.