The BETA phase where a handful of users send vital crash logs, try every single GSX option in game, perform dozens of flights, was unfortunately skipped and released to the public as a “complete & ready” add on for MSFS.
That's only your assumption. We obvious had a Beta phase. No, we had TWO Beta phases, one with about 25 longtime forum users, with daily updates, and at the end of it, we sent the Beta to several reviewers.
How do you think FS Elite manage to do an extremely nice video *before* release day, if their Beta didn't work.
No, the problem is, no matter how many tests you do, nothing can prepare with a real release with thousands of users downloading at the same time, which seemed to have caused issue even to the Cloudflare replication method, which apparently is not really capable to handle a product made of 25000 files to be spread over 260 servers without delays.
The testers and reviewers were just not enough to cause any server disruptions.
And, of course, when you get in the real world, users have a vastly different amount of configuration, that you can't anticipate those until it gets real. The two most annoying issues were:
- Users with corrupted scenery files didn't see any scenery, because the airport scanning aborted instead of continuing to the next area and skipping the corrupted one. This has been fixed.
- Users who switched versions from MS Store to Steam and vice-versa and had an orphaned empty setting folder could see any airport either, because the program assumed the sim wasn't installed correctly. Now it searches the other version as well. This was clearly a bug, and we fixed it, it's just that none of the testers was in that situation
- User who keep the Community folder in an USB drive formatted as exFat cannot have the program linked, because exFat filesystem doesn't support Symbolic links, only NTFS does. We'll look if we can improve this, but in general is best to use an NTFS drive for MSFS, and I think the Addon linker might work as alternative to create the links.
Your attitude is questionable at times when responding to your customers “beta testers” reporting vital issues & bugs, “NO it must be their fault, their hardware! Not the FSDT Installer or GSX Pro!” I have provided a list below of my personal suggestions & bugs that I have encountered.
Nowhere I ever replied like this on any report about MSFS issues so far. Not in a single reply of mine you can find any reference to something like "it is your hardware". The one and only replies I ever made on MSFS issues, is "it's your local cloudflare node", that doesn't obviously mean "blaming users", it's clearly not user's fault if his local node got delayed, and I'm don't think I should even need to explain this, it should be implied.
- FSDT Installer getting “stuck” when launching/closes itself
I can't replicate this and I don't see many reports of this, maybe there are others, but it shouldn't be something very common. Please open a separate thread with a specific title for this issue, which we can troubleshoot.
FSDT installer changing installation path (reverting back to my previous installation path) not being able to change it back
I'm not following you here.
You can't and are supposed to change the installation path. If with "my previous installation path" you mean a previous GSX install in FSX or P3D, the installer won't even let you choose a different installation path, it's greyed out, because the path is taken from a key in the registry that has been saved the first time you ran the FSDT Installer (or even a previous FSDT installer, they all share the same key), and that key will never change and all FSDT installs must and will all end up there.
- FSDT Installer giving false readings about a “new update”
That's not a "bug", and has been explained several times. If you see the Update button clickable, it doesn't mean there's a "new update", it only means you are ALLOWED to click it to *check* if there's an update. Assume the button is called "Update check", and it will be immediately more clear. It simply didn't fit the button...
The Installer doesn't do any automatic check of your installed products when it starts, so it doesn't "know" if there's an update, until you click the button because, to be *SURE* you need an update, each of your local files should be checked and that takes time, so no checks are made until you click the Update button.
- FSDT Installer automatically “updating”
That's not a bug either, it's a feature to have the installer being able to update itself, without any need for you to *redownload* it and *reinstall* it.
- Option to edit Jetways (replace default/3rd-Party airports using the “parking editor” if I’m not mistaken P3D has this option
I think there must be some misunderstanding about how differently jetway replacement work in MSFS, see this post:
http://www.fsdreamteam.com/forum/index.php/topic,26495.msg175054.html#msg175054New interface for FSDT Application with a new simple/modern interface
Please be more specific. Are you referring to the 2d editing windows, or the 3d interface in the editor ?
The 2d windows work. If you find a problem with some option, please report it as a specific bug. They won't work any better and/or give you any extra value if they had a more "modern" interface, doing that will only result in taking away development time to add actual features.
The 3d interface is severely limited by what the SDK allows (and prevent us) to do, like not being able to intercept keys completely (without the sim getting the event) or not being able to use the mouse, like we could in P3D, where you could click on objects to move them and rotate them with the mouse wheel.
Be sure we'll use whatever new feature the SDK will allow in the future, if that can improve the interface.
- Option to change GSX Pro Installation path
If you mean changing *just* the GSX Pro installation path, than no, it's not possible and not planned, because all our products are designed to STAY TOGETHER. If you mean "moving the FSDT folder", then yes, it IS a planned feature.
Option to completely uninstall GSX Pro from computer. When uninstalling GSX Pro using the FSDT Application, after “uninstalling” the disk space remained the same hence the files still taking up space somewhere…
It's not possible the disk space left remained the same because, surely, after an uninstall (not just unlink, that's the whole point of the unlink question), both gsx packages in the Addon Manager folder will be removed, and they total about 8GB so, at the very least, you reclaim 8GB of space.
However, the Addon Manager folder content won't be removed, because you might have other FSDT products installed.
So yes, I guess we might add an option that, if after uninstalling the last product, a question might popup about removing even the installer and all its content.
GSX Pro is the cause of CTD’s at least for me. I’ve been running MSFS on the same computer, same profile, same platform - Steam, since 08-28-2020 to be exact and have never experienced a single CTD when flying, only once when plugging in a piece of hardware in the main menu. After installing GSX Pro, within 1 hour I unfortunately experienced two crashes, one when requesting catering service and one when moving my in-game camera while GSX services were active. I went to the extent of completely deleting my profile and obviously making a new one, reinstalling all of my 3rd party add ons except for GSX Pro & FSDT installer and the sim now runs like butter once again
I'm sorry, but I can't compromise on this one. It has been fully proven by now, GSX is NOT the cause of all crashes users have been having these days, there's a big thread on Microsoft forum about this, and most users there never had GSX before, and Microsoft has even confirmed the crashes started basically the same day as GSX came out.
See this post here:
http://www.fsdreamteam.com/forum/index.php/topic,26580.msg175490.html#msg175490The issue is, crashes are completely random so, your having "fixed" the crash by uninstalling GSX, has mislead you thinking it was GSX, but it was just a coincidence, until Microsoft fixes the issue with their server, you WILL eventually get a CTD, even without GSX, like most users have.
Fact is seems to be completely solved by disabling online data services, seems to indicate it couldn't possibly be GSX, which will happily work with no crashes, once you are no longer connected to the MSFS servers.
