[Flightgear-scenery] Scenery Creation and Hosting

[J. Holden]

I have a lot of shapefiles from the Western United States just waiting to be turned into FlightGear scenery but have a couple questions.

a) What is the best place to host these files once they become scenery? I do not have that much bandwidth.
b) If I create the scenery using vmap0 and not OSM data, what is the likelihood it can become part of the "official" package? I think having a base vmap0 worldwide layer along with another layer of higher-quality scenery is a good idea going forward. A lot of potential FlightGear users may not be able to get a good frame rate with higher-resolution scenery
c) What's the proper way to get these shapefiles distributed so anyone can use them to create scenery?
d) Also have some scenery from up north - does anyone remember what elevation data we use for higher than 60° North?
e) Does anyone have any answers to these questions or is FlightGear scenery currently going through the "dark ages"?

Cheers
John

[Geoff McLane]

Post by J. Holden
I have a lot of shapefiles from the Western United States just waiting to be turned into FlightGear scenery but have a couple questions.
a) What is the best place to host these files once they become scenery? I do not have that much bandwidth.
b) If I create the scenery using vmap0 and not OSM data, what is the likelihood it can become part of the "official" package? I think having a base vmap0 worldwide layer along with another layer of higher-quality scenery is a good idea going forward. A lot of potential FlightGear users may not be able to get a good frame rate with higher-resolution scenery
c) What's the proper way to get these shapefiles distributed so anyone can use them to create scenery?
d) Also have some scenery from up north - does anyone remember what elevation data we use for higher than 60° North?
e) Does anyone have any answers to these questions or is FlightGear scenery currently going through the "dark ages"?
Cheers
John

Hi John,

Sorry do not have any real answers, but do have a strong
feeling about b) vmap0 versus OSM data.

I would DEFINITELY like the 'official' scenery to also
be generated using vmap0...

While I have no knowledge about OSM roads in Western US,
as far as Eastern Australia is concerned, vmap0 is FAR
BETTER than OSM for roads, at least in the country side...

Now maybe OSM has more 'city' streets, but these seem not
so important for flightgear scenery... of course they are
good eye-candy at the cost of many more 'tris' to be
rendered...

But as I am sure you understand, flying VFR in the country
side depends a lot on roads. And for some reason not exactly
understood, OSM simply misses a lot of important secondary
roads, even though the data and information IS available.

Now maybe in Western US people have taken the time to
add all or most of the major secondary country roads, so
there may be no problem using OSM there...

But until that same effort is applied to OSM Eastern
Australia, I would certainly opt for using vmap0...

Is this the reason you are also considering using vmap0
for western US, or is there some other reason?

Regards,
Geoff.

[J. Holden]

- The files should already be on sphere, in one of my folders. I uploaded all of them as a backup before going on a business trip. I cannot seem to log in to sphere - lost password. I've generated another couple square degrees of scenery as well since then which are not on the server.
- I could very well use OSM data, it's not too bad for the United States, but am somewhat concerned about doing so. It's accurate data, but it is not necessarily great quality data.
- Thanks for the DEM data links. I may try and compile Iceland here shortly. I fixed all of the improperly-coded golf courses in the CORINE data.

Cheers
John