Weather METAR integration

[Steve Waite]

I checked the SDK actually and did not even find the document he was referring to.

I copied and pasted you a section from the SDK Alex!
Steve

[Steve Waite]

Also as I said date and time information is irrellavent when setting metars.
all the best
steve

[Steve Waite]

Hi Alex,
IF is an amazing utility for hand building metars - it is the best by a long way
You edit string 0 and pull down the FSX menu and choose start flight, see the result
then edit string 0 and pull down the FSX menu and choose start flight, see the result
and repeat until perfect - the quickest way
Steve

[Steve Waite]

There is no airport data, that is added by IF so you don't need to, in IF you are at an airport that is used for the metar 0, so it is irellavent to designate an airport. You need no time date since it is the time you are at, and no airport sinnce that's where you are. The language of metars is the same as in FSX. The function works great if I want to hand develop a metar, that's what it's for and others are using it for such work.

regards
Steve

[Axelb9]

I checked the SDK actually and did not even find the document he was referring to.

I copied and pasted you a section from the SDK Alex!
Steve

I wanted to check the SDK to learn the different codes for clouds. Weather is supposed to be in the Environment Kit but there there is only one document about weather systems describing the method for creating thermals. I cannot find the document you referenced.

I used the metars.ini that you supplied with IF and that depicts as a stratus even though it has the BKN055CU designator.

EDIT: I found it. It is in the Simconnect SDK.

[Axelb9]

There is no airport data, that is added by IF so you don't need to, in IF you are at an airport that is used for the metar 0, so it is irellavent to designate an airport. You need no time date since it is the time you are at, and no airport sinnce that's where you are. The language of metars is the same as in FSX. The function works great if I want to hand develop a metar, that's what it's for and others are using it for such work.

regards
Steve

Steve,

This you have said a few times already. It is pretty clear thanks. I assumed this from the outset only asked for confirmation.

Thank you!

[Axelb9]

1/ There's no need for IF to have a new language for programming metars so IF only understands those that exactly match the requirements of FSX metars. IF sends the metars you type in the ini file. These metars are sent to FSX as they are. The SDK gives you the list of metar values you can use for FSX so it is useful. The way to format them is in the SDK. They are the same as regular metars, but there are some extensions to hadle the simulatiomn features.
Steve

All in all I am somewhat surprised. I thought that I could just enter in the metar string a simple downloaded metar without additional formatting and IF would somehow make FSX understand it the right way.

Something like

CYVR 312300Z 00000KT 8SM -RA BKN011 BKN020 OVC033 05/02 A2951 RMK SC5SC2SC2 SLP992

Obviously I would strip the airport and the time and just copy

00000KT 8SM -RA BKN011 BKN020 OVC033 05/02 A2951

and it would work.

I understand now that IF needs to have the strings preformatted in the FSX internal metar format. That's some additional tinkering that I must say is a little contradictory to IF's main purpose namely making flying in FSX easier and more user friendly.
Thanks,

Alex

[Steve Waite]

The metar file is a special function not intended to make things easier for you, but for the purpose as described it is excellent. You have at least got the feature. If you want IF to strip out stuff then that's another feature that could be included later. If you found a feature that needs something for you then you could request it like everyone else on the forum.

Anyway FSX needs extended metar functions because it is a sim. So you will have to find out what they are and type them in if that's what you want to do.

steve

[Steve Waite]

Metars are not preformatted FSX metar strings at all, they are standard metar strings. Anyway a standard metar does not decribe enough to do what the sim can do. Stripping the ICAO and date/time could be useful, but since it's not much trouble it's not been automated so far. Why would it be a fault of IF's design purpose that it does not? Like Fede says, have look at IF and see what it does, then put IF's metar string capability in proper context.

Thanks for your input.
Steve

[Steve Waite]

Hi Alex,

I've tweaked the help file a little:

Use METAR strings from metars.ini file for Ideal Flight Weather: </strong> you supply a list of METAR strings in an .ini file.
There are no ICAO or Times required in the METAR strings, see the strings in the example file. METARs are standard format with the full set of FSX extensions.
Each new METAR string is used after approximately 60Nm of flight or 30 minutes of simulator time.
The Destination entry is a keyword that tells IF that it is the last METAR.
Add the Profile ID and an underscore character to the start of the file name and save it in the profile directory (\Profiles\0_ID\0_Metars.ini).

Steve