FS9 download problem [Archive]

xxmikexx

08-30-2008, 01:41 PM

Folks,

Based on what I'm hearing in this thread, with 99.999% probabililty Adobe Air is the culprit. Ocala has saved a lot of people a lot of potential grief, but we need to spread the word even wider.

Asad,

As is often the case this is a utility you know a lot about. May I suggest that as a public service you do a writeup, post it to your blog and then link to it from each and every forum here at FlightSim.com, explaining to people what will happen to them if they run this utility, with your blog post linking back to this thread.

You might even consider writing a crash emergency feature article for the front page of this site. I will guess that webmaster Nels Anderson would run the piece as soon as he could prep it. Certainly if you agree to do it I'll call his attention to this thread, making him aware that you'll be sending something. And if you were to do an article I'm almost certain that he would have no problem with your repeating it in your blog. Just say something like "This article orginally appeared in slightly different form at FlightSim.com. The article is located here <url> </url>

You might even be a Good Guy and do a post or two over at Avsim and SimFlight if the people at those sites aren't already aware of the issue.

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Folks,

For FS users this is a bigger threat than computer viruses, and it will affect installed freeware and installed payware alike. Until essentially everyone has been educated, large numbers of FS end users are at risk.

We might even consider getting in touch with Abacus and explaining the situation. Maybe they could stunt their code and their installer to default to the .air extension but to provide an option to use some other extension if the user says that he's installing on a machine that's used for Flight Simulator.

Once again, a big round of applause to Ocala for understanding what's going on and surfacing the cause.

Comments? Suggestions?

Asad Khawer

08-30-2008, 01:44 PM

...and it's not going to be easy to cleanup, the registry might still assign .air files to Adobe Air, even if it's been uninstalled. A clean uninstall (such as one done with an uninstaller (http://www.thewritingblog.com/intotheskies/?p=9)) is the only way to go.

What makes the situation worse is that AIR has been incorporated on some big time sites, such as NASDAQ, AOL, Nickolodeon, and such.

A blog writeup should be helpful, I think I'll follow the suggestion. :)

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EDIT :: In conformation with your edited post, I agree with the Frontpage approach, we'll be able to spread the message to a wider audience that way.

I also think I'll e-mail Adobe and explain the situation, and see what they say. No harm in trying, is there?

:) Asad

xxmikexx

08-30-2008, 02:00 PM

Asad,

Please don't be mean re Avsim and SimFlight -- we're all in this together. If you don't want to do it, get set up first and then I'll take care of those sites. Just let me know because I'm email friends with both Tom Allensworth and Francois Dumas. In fact, let's do it that way. They'll appreciate being able to manage the situation for their own sites. So no, don't do anything re Avsim, SimFLight etc. I'll also take care of SimPilotNet.com and SkyBlueRadio.com

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May I ask another favor. You're very knowledgable about web stuff, it may be that getting Adobe to modify their system might not be enough if other people are developing web content that a) uses Adobe Air and therefore b) might also do some kind of clobbering of FS .air files. I'm not saying there's a problem in this area, I'm saying that I don't know enough to do any meaningful research about it in real time. I would have to get educated, you already are.

Once we've got a preliminary game plan here I'm going to call FS product manager Phil Taylor's attention to it in hopes that Microsoft might have some influence with Adobe. (Maybe not if Adobe Air is truly a competitor to .Net, but he could certainly help get the word out by putting something in his blog and maybe even causing a notice to be put on the front page of FSinsider.com)

Asad Khawer

08-30-2008, 02:11 PM

Mike, I meant the 'mean to AVSIM ...' part as a joke!

I've contacted Adobe, but due to the huge amounts of e-mails they receive I doubt we'll receive a response soon.

AIR isn't really a competitor to .NET. .NET is meant for offline use, Adobe AIR is, in layman's terms, an advanced version of Flash, the current king of online media.

As I said before, the popularity of AIR means that visitors to sites such as AOL and NASDAQ will have to download it to experience the sites in their full glory, corrupting all FS9 add-ons in the process.

I'll start work on the planned article after some research (to confirm all the facts listed here), and we can work our way up from there. :)

Asad

xxmikexx

08-30-2008, 02:11 PM

Folks,

Not a lot of people have been affected yet or we'd have heard about it before so we have the opportunity to nip this one in the bud.

Ocala, where would you like the bronze bust of your likeness sent? :D

Asad Khawer

08-30-2008, 02:14 PM

We can make two if you want, Ocala!

Funny thing is, I already knew about Adobe AIR's extension, having worked with it, but it never struck me that some FS files have the same extension, since I don't delve into the inner workings of FS often. :)

:o Asad

xxmikexx

08-30-2008, 02:16 PM

Three, Asad, if you write an attention getting article that will make ordinary end users (who also don't know about .air files) understand the situation and understand what not to do.

Asad Khawer

08-30-2008, 02:34 PM

Starting work on said attention grabbing article now. I plan to explain...

1 - What Adobe AIR is.
2 - Why and how it will affect Flight Simmers
3 - How to rectify / avoid the problem in future.
4 - Some other little things.

:) Asad

Jhew

08-30-2008, 05:35 PM

First I've heard of this too. Has anyone tried changing the file association through windows before uninstalling everything?
I haven't downloaded the program in question so if I right click on an air file and then click on properties, I see that next to "opens with" is Unknown application. Maybe someone with this issue could try to associate the .air files with FS. I'd try it but, I really don't want to purposely corrupt my installation to try to fix it. Instructions from windows help are below.

To change the program that opens a file
Open My Documents.
If the file you want is not located in My Documents or its subfolders, use Search to find it. To open Search, click Start, and then click Search.
Right-click the file you want to open in a different program, and then click Properties.
On the General tab, click Change.
Click the name of the program in which you want the file to open.
Notes:
To open My Documents, click Start, and then click My Documents.
This change affects all files that have the same file name extension as the file you selected. For example, if you change the program that opens a .jpg file, all .jpg files will open in this program.
You can also change the program that opens a file by right-clicking the file, clicking Open With, and then clicking the program name. If the program you want is not displayed, click Browse.

I know, for example, that If I associate a music or video file type to a specific player, I can still open that file with any other program that has the same function. Perhaps by associating the .air file with FS, Adobe would still use its' air files and not corrupt FS'.

This is admittedly a shot in the dark but, it might be worth a try.

Regards,
Jeff

Asad Khawer

08-31-2008, 04:55 AM

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 05:11 AM

Asad,

In view of the potential for damage here I recommend that a System Restore snapshot be taken before making the file association change and before running the system after that.

Asad Khawer

08-31-2008, 05:57 AM

That'd be a sensible precaution to take. :)

Any headway on that talk with Nels / has he replied yet? :)

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 06:02 AM

No, I've not heard back from Nels. He might actually be taking the rest of the weekend off, I just don't know. After all, he owns an Archer and maybe has gone flying.

Not to worry, he will get back to us, Monday evening your time being the plausible worst case, most likely much sooner.

Tom vd Horst

08-31-2008, 10:57 AM

Thanks for the detection guys, I've posted a general waring on the WOAI news announcements as well.

Tom vd Horst
World-of-AI

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 11:13 AM

And since I haven't heard back from Nels I decided to alert Phil Taylor directly. (Phil is the FS product manager.)

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 01:55 PM

Folks,

I've alerted SimFlight, Avsim, SimPilotNet, SkyBlueRadio, the Pilot Shop, and Phil Taylor of Microsoft, and I've let webmaster Nels Anderson know that I've done this.

Now ... Everybody must do as they please but I'll tell you what I'm about to do next and why I'm going to do it ...

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Having verified that I don't (yet?) have the .air problem I'm accelerating my normal schedule and am going to do a cross-LAN total backup (not my daily incremental) of my C drive using the Acronis utility. Acronis is a backup utility that will snapshot the state not only of the user files but also of the installed software, including the registry. It will allow a restore to take place either to the drive on which the snapshot was taken, or to some other drive as a replacement for my C drive.

After that I will make a synchronized cross-LAN backup of my D drive using Windows Explorer. I'm going to do this even though the complete process for C+D will involve about 45 GB of data and will, therefore, be time consuming. After I get that data moved across the LAN I will, as usual, copy it to a pair of duplicate removable HDDs where it will join all my other recent incremental and total backups.

I'm doing all this work today rather than two weeks from now because I'm totally paranoid when it comes to matters of system integrity and potential data loss. Before running the backups I'm going to scan for spyware using updated SpyBot, and then I'm going to do a virus scan of my C: drive using updated AVG 7.5. Not until I've scrubbed the C drive will I make the total backup -- I don't want a dirty system to go into the backup database (which I maintain by hand).

So I may be off the air till the C drive backup completes about eight hours from the time of this post.

I hope this post helps people be able to recover from potential pending trouble,

Tom vd Horst

08-31-2008, 02:16 PM

Be advised that Adobe Air is also part of the new version of Adobe reader Version 9.
It includes Acrobat.com which itself contains Adobe Air.
So it might be wise to wait a little longer to migrate from version 8 to version 9 on Adobe reader.

Tom van der Horst
World-of-AI
www.world-of-ai.com

Asad Khawer

08-31-2008, 02:26 PM

This is more urgent than I thought, then. I did confirm that it's not automatically downloaded, but, Reader, being so popular, really puts this issue into another perspective. I've notified SimFlight, Avsim, SimPilotNet, SkyBlueRadio, the Pilot Shop, and Phil Taylor of Microsoft, Nels Anderson, and Mike McCarthy via e-mail.

Folks, this issue is more urgent than we initally might have thought. :(

psionmark

08-31-2008, 02:53 PM

Good work on all the investigation, folks.

I've posted a link to this to FlightSimX.

Cheers,

Mark

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 05:24 PM

psionmark,

Thanks for helping to get the word out.

Folks,

I'm back for a couple of hours while my pre-backup AVG scan is running. Now ...

I heard back from Phil Taylor who feels it is more up to us than Microsoft to get in touch with Adobe. Accordingly I suggest we in this thread consider ourselves a working group whose goal is to develop the technical case to take to Adobe, including at least one proposed solution so they'll see that we're not simply playing "Ain't It Awful."

Unless somebody has a better idea I'm appointing myself spokesman for the FS community on this issue in terms of communicating with Adobe and Microsoft, and with the major FS related websites like FlightSim.com, Avsim and SimFLight. It's important that we speak with a single voice so I would like to be the single point of contact with the major outside parties.

Also, as an experienced technical development manager I'm going to make some suggestions regarding what needs to be done. Here we go ...

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First, I will volunteer to be a guinea pig for the .air file association experiment, but see next paragraph. I'm the ideal person for this because by tomorrow I will have backed myself up completely. Thus if every .air file on my development system gets corrupted or deleted then a) I should be able to recover via Acronis (good excuse to see whether it will restore my system as advertised), and b) I can always transfer my developmental test flying load to my flight computer, which I won't modify in any way.

Second, I ask that you, Asad, gather as much information as you can about the actual failure mechanism so we'll know what to look for when I deliberately wreck my development machine. (Because we know that the .air file association strategy isn't going to work, we just need to rule it out so that no further time will be wasted on it.) Also, try to learn as much as you can about third party software that will install AIR, or that may try to.

Third, I will ask those of you with contacts at websites that have not been mentioned in any of the posts above to get the word out to the owners, sysops, webmasters, as the case may be. Kindly give them a link to this thread so they'll know exactly what's on our minds.

Fourth, we need someone to work with Asad to test out his propsed replacement for Acrobat Reader. We need this validation ASAP because even if Adobe were to do something to help us out (and they may very well not do anything), time is of the essence and we need to get a workaround in place ASAP.

FIfth, if anybody beyond Asad has information to contribute, or has experienced the problem, please put it all in a post to this thread so everybody can see it. If we need to move this thread or any other parts of this conversation to the PC Software Tech forum then fine, let's do that. But in the meantime let's plan to work right here.

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I'm sure I'm overlooking stuff, or maybe have had some ideas here that need corrections, improvement, changes, whatever. Therefore, all people reading this thread, if you think you can contribute to the planning and/or action plans that will be emerging from these discussions, please jump right in because good ideas can come from anybody and we don't want to miss them just because somebody might be shy about coming forward. (If you're terminally shy, send an email to mike@pcgamecontrols.com and I'll keep your name out of it and make in unnecessary for you to post.)

Team, let's get a workaround in place ASAP, and then let's develop as much information as we can to help Adobe understand the situation and develop a fix. If they won't help us then that's life, but we need to try and we need to do it with all our proverbial ducks lined up in the proverbial row.

But above all we need to be able to state to the FS community exactly what the problem is, what the additional threats are, and exactly what a viable workaround is. We have work to do, let's get to work.

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Comments? Suggestions? Please don't hold back -- we need to get it right and we need to do it ASAP. Whenever you think I'm wrong, just speak up. All I care about is our collectively getting things right.

Jhew

08-31-2008, 05:54 PM

Jeff,

I am quite sure the above approach will not work, even though it is worth a try.

This is because I think that when you would next run Air, it would take over all the files again, since .AIR is the DEFAULT, PROPRIETARY extension of Adobe Air. The aforementioned music / video players have no default extension, since they just play everything.

However, this could be worth a try. For example, for HTML files, you can set them to open automatically with NotePad, instead of a browser.

So, anyone with Adobe AIR, do give it a try.

On the bottom of the "open with" box, there is a checkbox to always use the selected program to open this type of file. I can't think of any reputable program that would just automatically override your system settings without your permission though, I'm sure the update is structured in such a way as to gain your permission. You'll notice that in explorer, under folder options:file types, AIR isn't even listed. You would have to add it. This, of course, is prior to having downloaded the offending Adobe program. Adobe must certainly add it on installation.
Anyhow, it was just a suggestion. I will certainly follow this thread for an eventual resolution. I'm holding off any further updates of Adobe products until one is found.

Mike,
"(Because we know that the .air file association strategy isn't going to work, we just need to rule it out so that no further time will be wasted on it.)"

I offered this approach for the very reason you suggested, to rule it out. I have a large number of 3rd party software, both FS related and not, and have no other air files except for FS'. I apologize if I offended your 45 years of experience.

Regards,
Jeff

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 06:37 PM

Asad,

I just heard from Nels. He said, and I quote, "If there's an article waiting for me tomorrow, I'll be sure and get it online..." So kindly don't wait for me, just send it to him. We can always replace the article if need be even if it's been posted.

I say don't wait for me because I'm going off the air now per my post #28 below.

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 06:39 PM

Jeff,

Why would I be offended? My 45 years of experience has taught me to try to pull together teams of people who know much more than I do, and to be a good listener. My real skill is as an organizer so please keep the ideas and comments coming -- especially with respect to what tests we will want me to run tomorrow and what things we will want to look for as a result of those tests.

P.S. I'm going off the air in 20 minutes, at 5PM Mountain time. I expect to be off the air for about twelve hours, till the cross-LAN phase of my total backup has completed.

Jhew

08-31-2008, 06:41 PM

"My real skill is as an organizer"
As is mine, in many ventures.

For the record, according to one AVSIM member, associating the AIR file with notepad after uninstalling Adobe Air fixed the corruption. As Asad said though, this may not work with it still installed.
http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=263&topic_id=50831&mesg_id=50831&page= Fifth post down.

Jeff

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 07:04 PM

Asad,

Please follow up on Jeff's link and, if necessary, tweak the article. Kindly send the article to nels@flightsim.com. We want to post the best information available but it is more important to post some kind of early caution and warning. We can always follow up with a second article as more is learned.

Asad and Jeff,

Color me gone till sometime on Monday morning. (USA morning.)

xxmikexx

08-31-2008, 07:12 PM

Jeff,

You're an entrepreneur, how about you run the show while I'm gone. My backup may take considerably longer than I had planned -- I have to create some maneuvering room for Acronis to work in, and this is going to require moving even more data across my LAN before I can get Aronis up and running.

Now I really am gone.

Hicks

08-31-2008, 09:16 PM

In the mean time wouldn't it be rather easy to do a search for all *.air files then burn them to a CD as buckup.

Hicks

Jhew

08-31-2008, 09:38 PM

In the mean time wouldn't it be rather easy to do a search for all *.air files then burn them to a CD as buckup.

Hicks

Hi Hicks,
Yes, that is certainly a good idea though, backing up the .air files wont do anything to protect against any registry changes that may be made as a result of the Adobe program being installed. I'm certain that once Mike gets his backup done, this issue will get resolved rather quickly. Acronis takes a little time to get set up properly but, it's the best system protection going.
Best Regards,
Jeff

Jhew

08-31-2008, 09:46 PM

Mike,

We likely wont hear from Asad until late tonight (early tomorrow) given his location but, I have posted some updates on other forums and asked that people post their insights on this thread so that we might have a central collection point. I have also advised that you are dealing with Phil and Adobe, and that you're already working on a fix.

Regards,
Jeff

BTW, the Acronis program with its' sector by sector restore is a life saver. It will take up some space over time though. I wouldn't have a system without it now.

Jhew

08-31-2008, 10:36 PM

Some Additional comments from Asad:

�After some research and personal testing I have identifed that, contrary to what I thought prior to this, Adobe AIR is not automatically added in Adobe updates.
However, it remains a huge cause of concern, because it is being used on major online websites such as NASDAQ, Nickolodeon, and AOL, and many users may unwittingly download Adobe AIR, hence corrupting almost all freeware and payware FS addons��.

Jeff

JSkorna

09-01-2008, 12:40 AM

I took the challenge:

Downloaded and installed Air from the Adobe site.
Ran FS04, planes loaded just fine.
Downloaded and installed an Air program.
Ran the program great!(Earth Browser)
Ran FS04, planes loaded just fine. Yes, my .air files in FS are now associated with Adobe Air, but they loaded just fine.

I did not:
Backup my entire hard drive.
Make multiple restore points. (didn't even make one)
Burn my entire FS installation to DVDs.
Run multiple defragments of my hard drive.
Run 8 spyware programs.

Anyone else?

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 02:48 AM

JSkorna,

There is somebody else -- me.

Thank you for running the test you did run. I hope that many more people will report on their experiences.

That said, fortunately for you, you were not one of the people who encountered the problem. Therefore your statement about what you did and what the results were provides some information but does not cure cancer. A problem is not understood till it can be recreated at will -- as any customer support person ought to know. (You did know that, didn't you?)

I'm tooling up for mine to be the system on which we will get this problem a) understood and b) reliably worked around. It would be madness for me to volunteer my equipment for this without properly backing up my system, which is host to stuff the value of which you are absolutely clueless about, and it is irresponsible of you to suggest to the community that they should not bother to back up before running tests.

Yours must be a simple system with little of value on it to safeguard or you would not have played Russian Roulette with it without properly backing it up first. It doesn't follow that other people should play that game along with you. I have an extreme approach to backups. I also never repeat never lose anything of importance. Even a fire can't do anything more than inconvenience me.

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Folks,

It's all a question of how much time (and therefore data) you're willing to lose. Even though it takes time for me to stay continually backed up, I'm not willing to lose anything, and I strongly suspect that the rest of the FS community is not going to be willing to risk losing their .air files simply because Jim Skorna said that he personally took the challenge, did not have a problem, and snickered about making backups.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 02:59 AM

Folks,

I'm back in a limited way -- forum access yes, email access no. I'm able to read and write posts now only because my wife, who recently has been working nights, agreed to surrender to the cause the machine on which she has been studying and taking tests during the day over this long holiday weekend.

These are tests that are intended to make sure she has enough knowledge of intensive care unit medicine to be allowed to continue to take care of critically ill MICU patients. She has been doing the studying, and taking the tests, and working the MICU, throughout all of this holiday weekend -- because she doesn't get weekends and holidays and summers off the way teachers do.

She has agreed to postpone the remainder of her studies and tests till Thursday even though this will increase the pressure on her to have passed all of the tests by two days later. On that Thursday she will repossess the machine I'm on now regardless of the state of the team's efforts. (And if this means that I have to buy another computer, that's what I'll do. I've been needing an additional one anyway -- precisely for destructive testing.)

My wife has been involved with computers almost as long as I have. She was a software development group manager for many years, she recognizes the importance of what we're doing, and she understands that she and I are in a better position than anybody else to make the necessary equipment and operator available to the team. That's why she agreed to let me take over her computer for as long as she possibly can, which is till Thursday.

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I'm going to stay out of the technical discussions because I really don't know enough to contribute to them other than to say that I smell wholesale corruption/deletion of .air files by some agent that is actively searching the entire drive. I want to be our point of contact with Adobe, Microsoft and the managment of the major FS-related websites, but I'm really not qualified to assess all the implications of the disabled users we currently know about, and I'm reluctant to talk to the SMEs (subject matter experts) on other sites.

So, Jeff, please continue doing what you've been doing. Now that I'm back in a limited way, how about you drive the technical data gathering and so on while Asad continues to work on his article. I'll try to provide some inspirational guidance, and some team motivation, and I'll continue to encourage anybody and everybody to jump in and help us out here, but please continue to look to anyone but me :) for technical stuff. That said, I'll try to cover for you when you're not here.

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What i CAN do is run tests -- and by twelve hours from now, when my ridiculous backup procedures are complete, it won't matter to me how risky or outrageous those tests are.

I will ask you folks to put your heads together and come up with a testing plan -- to decide what tests I should run.

Remember ...

Our mission must be to BREAK MY SYSTEM, and then to make it work again, and not to simply walk away from it because a given test revealed no problems.

Until we can break it and fix it at will, and learn to keep it out of coffin corner to begin with, we will not have accomplished our mission of being able to state what the failure mode(s) is and therefore what the initial tested workaround(s) should be. We cannot even begin to think about approaching Adobe until we first know how to take care of ourselves.

Holger Sandmann

09-01-2008, 03:49 AM

Hi guys,

maybe I missed this in all the back and forth but it seems to me that no one has asked those with the .air file troubles the obvious: what exactly was the error message and when did it occur?

Perhaps my screenshot shows that message?

How did I get this? By double-clicking on an FS .air file that has Adobe Air as a file association. That means that Adobe Air tries to load that file, which it can't because it's not an Adobe Air file. In other words the "error" is a false positive because the message is from Adobe not from FS. There's no evidence that any of the FS .air files were changed by Adobe and I can easily revert the file association if need be.

While it may not be "clean" coding it's not that uncommon that file extensions get "hijacked" by a particular application. But that doesn't mean that the files themselves were altered. If you don't want to edit your .air files you don't need to do anything because FS doesn't care about Windows' file associations. If you are in the business of editing FS .air files and want to load an .air file into the editor by double-clicking on it then all you need to do is right-click on one of the .air files, choose Properties, and change the association to your .air file editor (that's in Vista; in XP you'd do that through the folder options menu, if I remember correctly).

Obviosuly, it's always better to apply the precautionary principle but it looks to me as if there's nothing to worry about here.

Cheers, Holger

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 04:21 AM

Holger,

Thanks for jointing in. Please read post #1 to this thread. The OP is saying that FS was broken, not that Adobe was broken, or so it seemed to me.

alastairmonk

09-01-2008, 04:51 AM

Hi guys,

I think Holger may have a point. Especially with graphics files the file associations can easily be reassigned to a different piece of software. When a new WinXP PC is first delivered I think the likes of BMPs and JPGs will default to MS Paint, but install something like Paint Shop Pro and it "takes ownership" of all your graphics file types.

So to echo Holger:

1. When do you see this error message ? On running FS2004 or only when trying to edit the AIR files ?
2. If you manually reassign the AIR file type back to the original (e.g. AirEd etc.) do you still get the problem ?
3. Without opening the AIR files to edit, does FS2004 run normally ?

Alastair

Jhew

09-01-2008, 05:12 AM

Well Mike, all I did was pass some info around and as a result, two very respected and successful FS developers offered their opinion on the issue. Now, Jims a big boy and hardly needs me to defend him but, sounds to me like he and Holger are on the right track. I agree that in the interest of making sure the issue is resolved, if there is indeed one, it's of benefit to everyone concerned to apply a systemic approach to finding that resolution. In that, I am happy to forward any further info that may come my way. I'm also grateful that you have offered to assist the community by subjecting your system to potential problems. That is something many wouldn't offer so, props to you for that. I look forward to your resolution of the issue.
That said, I offered a similar opinion and possible solution yesterday that you summarily dismissed without any testing so, I doubt I have anything more of value to offer on the technical issues. Jim and Holger have likely forgotten more about this stuff than I will ever learn, and they were kind enough to offer their assistance. They are probably your best resource at this point, any burnt bridges notwithstanding.
Asad seems to be working on it from his end, and you are just about to start testing so, I really don't see what there is to "drive". It's my experience that folks with problems are pretty well motivated already.
Please understand that while I do spend a considerable amount of time to help folks who come upon issues with FS, I'm afraid that my professional obligations preclude my monitoring of the various flight sim sites to the extent necessary to guarantee consistent participation. I'm sure you understand. Best of luck.
Regards,
Jeff

*EDIT* Mike this is from another user at AVSIM.
"Hi,
I too upgraded to Adobe 9, several weeks ago, and was dismayed to see it had "taken over" all my .Air files. After starting fs9, and getting the corrupted air file message...I associated the .Air files back to notepad, and fs9 has run as normal ever since. In fact, I'd forgotten Adobe air was still installed till I saw this post.

Russell."

opaplano

09-01-2008, 06:28 AM

Jhew

09-01-2008, 07:01 AM

I am confused........... why would you associate .air files with Notepad?

You cannot read them in Notepad. Would it not make better sense to associate them with AirEd - the program specifically designed to read/edit them?

Yeah, I'd agree with that Opa, I know you can open it but, like you said, you can't read it. Holger mentioned the air ed too. I'm making a wild guess here but, if I open the air file properties and click on the change button, my system offers notepad as the recommended application. Not sure why or if that would be the case with everyone though. Mine says it opens with "unknown application". That's how it's always been for me. I guess "whatever works", huh? :) I just posted it here for Mikes information. I guess I should have thought about that part before I pasted it in.

Best Regards,
Jeff

opaplano

09-01-2008, 07:10 AM

Yeah, I'd agree with that Opa, I know you can open it but, like you said, you can't read it. Holger mentioned the air ed too. I'm making a wild guess here but, if I open the air file properties and click on the change button, my system offers notepad as the recommended application. Not sure why or if that would be the case with everyone though. Mine says it opens with "unknown application". That's how it's always been for me. I guess "whatever works", huh? :) I just posted it here for Mikes information. I guess I should have thought about that part before I pasted it in.

Best Regards,
Jeff

Re-reading the entire thread I come to the conclusion that the error message originally reported is coming from Adobe Air and NOT from FS - so perhaps we all have been worried for naught. Hope that is indeed the case.

jvile

09-01-2008, 07:45 AM

You can corrupt any .air file with all existing programs such as notepad on your computer. Associating the .air file to any program or utility that cannot read the FS9/FSX .air will corrupt it if you open the file such as with Notepad and then SAVE it as a notepad.txt type file.

This is the same thing that can occur with any version of Adobe. The point is if you try and open the .air file or associate it with any other type Program/utility and open it then save it, it is now a corrupt .air and cannot be processed as a readable.air to the sim1.dll.

If you want to associate the .air to a Utility then associate to a Utility that can read it and save it as a FS.air such as Aired. That way if you ever double click on it, it will by default open with Aired and if you save it the .air is still read properly by the sim1.dll.

Some here have gone into a panic mode without studing what actually will cause a .air to be corrupt. It does not matter if Adobe Air is using a air extension and then finds all the FS9/FSX .air files and associates to it.

Holger says

How did I get this? By double-clicking on an FS .air file that has Adobe Air as a file association. That means that Adobe Air tries to load that file, which it can't because it's not an Adobe Air file. In other words the "error" is a false positive because the message is from Adobe not from FS. There's no evidence that any of the FS .air files were changed by Adobe and I can easily revert the file association if need be.

Which is 100 percent true. Only if the user forces Adobe Air to open the FS.air and then saves the .air it corrupts and it only corrupts the .air for that particular type airplane and not all airplanes. FS will still load just fine if the .air file is corrupt for lets say the Cess 172 but your default flight loads the B737.

It is not a good idea to right click the properties window and choose any program that windows offers to associate the .air file to except a program that can truly open it and not damage it such as Aired. That way if someone accidently double clicks on the .air and saves it FS9/FSX continues to run normally.

You can associate the .air to notepad, adobe, a hexeditor, wordpad, a music program, etc. and it does nothing. That only means if you double click on the .air that will be the program that is going to try and open it. That still does nothing to the .air unless you try and save it. Like Holger shows, Adobe Air changes the association of all .air to what they want as a program to open it. Because the FS .air is not a Adobe Air type .air it tells you that. Cancel out and no harm done.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 08:38 AM

Thanks, Jeff, I hadn't understood till now that your original post had actually been passive-agressive. (I can be such a softie sometimes.) Anyway, we'll try as best we can to muddle through without you.

Folks,

So if file associations are the problem/cure, how did Anthony in post #4 manage to get all (repeat all) of his .air files corrupted? I'm asking this seriously -- by what failure mode, other than the AIR application or something tied to it, could this have happened? Might Anthony be wrong in thinking he observed what he says he observed? If so, what had he actually been observing?

And let's say that was some kind of operator error so that changing file associations will in fact do the right thing. What happens subsequently if an Acrobat Reader does an automatic update? Will it change the file associations back to what they had been before the problem was "fixed"? Many apps do this kind of thing.

My guess is that an update/reinstall will in fact re-associate .air files with AIR, we shall see. It may in the end turn out that certain third party apps do as well -- we simply don't know and there is only one way to be highly confident. My point is that while changing the .air associations may in the end prove to be the right thing to do, there is not yet enough information available to warrant declaring that.

Finally, even if changing file associations is the right thing to do, and even if it's the ONLY thing that can be done, what are all the circumstances under which it needs to be done? Most FS users are system maintenance rookies. Should we simply require them to learn about this matter from forum posts that they may not be looking for? Or that might not exist?

So, even though Jeff might not approve, I'm going to apply my 45 years of experience here and assert that there is still work to be done. If the most promising line of attack is file associations then let's go down that path -- but let's not assume that, because we just saw a robin, Winter is over.

It may in fact be Spring, but we don't know that yet. As an EE friend of mine used to say, "The electrons have not yet spoken."

Finally finally ... Finally, let's say that a one-time change to .air file associations will cure cancer. The word still has to be gotten out, yes? And a way has to be found to reach as many non-users of forums as possible, yes?. Writing an article about this matter still seems essential to me, the only issue being what that article should say.

Am I missing something here? Because I'd certainly rather not be wasting my time -- I'd rather be outside getting sun and going swimming.

opaplano

09-01-2008, 08:58 AM

Hindsight is such a wonderful thing.

The one question no one seemed to ask of the original poster was "What program is generating the error message?"

Had we done that and determined that Adobe AIR was generating the message and NOT FS, perhaps we would not have gone into panic mode. (I am as guilty of that as anyone).

Not being a technical expert I can only reason that since FS air files are constructed differently than what Adobe Air is used to seeing, it reported the air files were corrupted when indeed they probably were not.

The testing that Holger and others have now done would seem to confirm that reasoning.

In any case this has been a good exercise if it makes us all a bit more aware of potential issues with FS and add-ons of any type.

jvile

09-01-2008, 09:16 AM

Hi Sacb52man
That happened to me some time back, I had made a back-up to a stand-alone harddisc and copied everything back as a new installation some time later, only to find that the original back-up had for some unknown reason corrupted the .air files, every d**m single one ( about 200) .I had to reinstall almost all of them. Strange that it was only the .air files affected.
Wish you the best of luck with that problem as xxMikexx says it will be interesting to hear what you find out.

Harold what is Adobe air please ?, I have never heard of it but it does sound a little hazardous.

Anthony

xxmikexx says
snip.....
how did Anthony in post #4 manage to get all (repeat all) of his .air files corrupted?

Why are you assuming that Adobe Air corrupted all of Anthony's FS9.air files. He does not even know what Adobe Air is. He backed up his FS9 files and then reinstalled them at which point he says he reinstalled the FS files as a new installation and his .air was corrupt. You cannot do that!! A new install of FS9 must be done from the Disk not a pure backup.

Different type backup programs do not always backup registry's, certain type files, etc. unless you set the backup properly. You know that based on some previous post in this thread.

A corrupt .air file does not say the .air file is corrupt when FS9 Loads. If you go corrupt one of your .air files which is very easy to do with any default program on your computer the error message when FS try's to load is

Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: fs9.exe
Application Version: 9.1.0.40901
Application Timestamp: 4135a208
Fault Module Name: SIM1.dll
Fault Module Version: 9.1.0.40901
Fault Module Timestamp: 4135a88e
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 00010ee3
OS Version: 6.0.6000.2.0.0.768.3
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: a11b
Additional Information 2: 61c527747b6af84d8672ee6fedeae17a
Additional Information 3: 2870
Additional Information 4: 96671d3f3ffffaddccf8656a2ef2e16a

That error is only produced if the default planes .air that loads on start up is corrupt. A corrupt .air file is a AppCrash in module sim1.dll since the FS sim1.dll cannot read the FS Planes .air.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 09:36 AM

Fair enough, I'll yield on the Anthony point. But what have you all to say regarding the rest of my post #47? You're not advocating ignoring the situation, are you?

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 10:10 AM

P.S. ...

Folks,

The question in my post #50 immediately above was rhetorical. In point of fact I'm going to proceed regardless of public opinion. However, I do hope for additional constructive input so please keep the cards and letters coming.

Again, the issue is not whether an article but rather what to say in it. The issue is not whether to alert sites other than Avsim, it's what to say to them. Also, we do still need to get with Abacus. They are in the best position of all to help us understand the situations in which file re-associations might get undone by their app or by third party apps that rely on AIR.

Finally, note that in making the file reassociations we may be talking about crippling Acrobat Reader as a side effect -- which would mean an inability to read pdf files till other additional corrective measures have been taken. I don't know that this will happen but does anybody have any information on this point? Asad knows of a freeware alternative pdf reader, but if we need shouldn't we test it over a broad range of FS-related pdf files? (Like pdf approach plates and airport diagrams.)

So there's still work to be done, if only in helping us to understand what tests I should be running, and/or what things we can rule out or must rule in. I don't have a vested interest in what the answer will turn out to be, only a vested interest in getting the problem worked through as completely as we can.

jvile

09-01-2008, 10:45 AM

By all means continue your testing. You already have a lot of time vested in the backup of your own computer. Some of the post in this thread are constructive. They lend some knowledge toward what might help to understand if Adobe Air can in certain default ways corrupt the FS.air.

Adobe has a lot of options that many users do not really know what they do. There could be some kind of option that could try and open/save any .air file it sees if that option is ticked /selected. In the past I have had to uninstall certain Utilities and then reinstall because I checked a option not realizing what it changed on some of my files. An example is Cooktop 1.2 that if you check certain options it changes files to XML both in FS and many program files which you really don't want converted to XML. However that only occurs if the User tells Cooktop to do as a option when it installs.

Asad Khawer

09-01-2008, 10:50 AM

*breathless* Sorry Mike, and everyone, almost no other work done now, GCSE (Year 10) just started and as you might understand my life is completely messed up at the moment. I have tons of Business Studies homework and some Physics to round up with, so please excuse me.

I haven't had the time to read the updates to the this thread, so colour me ignorant, but I will as soon as I get time.

Thanks everyone,
Asad. :)

Rnglgdj

09-01-2008, 10:53 AM

MY input:

My air files have the note "installer package" associated with them. And, if I click on the air file, I get the error message shown above.

However, running the FS application, the models load and run ok. I don't seem to have a problem.

This association must have happened when I did an update to Adobe.

I noticed the changed icon for the air files some time later.

Don R

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 10:55 AM

jvile,

Your notion of installer options is the kind of thing I would like us to have sketched out before we approach Adobe. As I said in effect earlier4 in this thread, we should have a strawman proposal for them to react to. That way we won't be seen as simply complaining. A concrete proposal will also give them a clearer idea of what problem we're trying to solve, even if they elect to solve it by some other means.

jvile

09-01-2008, 11:16 AM

xxmikexx

I would have thought that as long as Adobe has been around they would have researched all avenues to see if the .air extension exist in other programs. The .air is the foundation that Bruce Artwick used in the original FS so it is not something new.

Whether or not (based on further testing) Adobe Air changes the FS.air by default or by a option checked I think they ought to be told to change the .air extension and use something else.

Its probably an oversite on their programming side and if showed that the MS/FS has used it for years they would voluntarily change the Adobe Air coding.

JSkorna

09-01-2008, 11:53 AM

"and it is irresponsible of you to suggest to the community that they should not bother to back up before running tests."

Let it be known to the community that I never suggested this. I posted what I did and my results.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 12:00 PM

Jim,

People will now read your post as written and decide for themselves what it means in terms of your having made value judments about the need for backups and/or how they are most safely made. They can decide for themselves whether it's yet another in what they might conclude is an endless series of subtle potshots you've been taking at me since fsOC.

Folks,

I'm now going to explain how I'm trying to position my system for running these tests. This explanation is for people who are open minded and like receiving new information they can learn from ...

I'm trying to get to a state where my D drive has nothing whatsoever on it, and where my C drive has nothing whatsoever in My Documents. To achieve this I've moved all of this data -- 45 GB -- across the network and into duplicate removable HDDs. What I'm left with -- the C drive with all applications (including my developmental FS installation) -- is being backed up by Acronis as I write this. For technical reasons I have no choice but to develop the backup on the D drive before I can transport it across the network to the removable HDDs. Once that transfer is complete I will turn those removable HDD drives off -- electrically disconnect from their parent machine -- so that there will be zero chance of an application, or of a screwed up system, being able to clobber them. And even if one of those drives were to refuse to come back online (and I've seen this happen), the duplicate drive will be there.

Why do I want to arrive at the above-described state? Answer: So that all of what's left will come under the protection of System Restore. Yes, I will be able to do an Acronis restore at any time. However, to do so more than once -- in fact to do it even once -- would be a nuisance.

So the question then becomes, Why do I care about System Restore? Answer: So I can use it to completely back out application programs that are going to be installed and uninstalled and re-re-re-installed during the course of the upcoming tests. To ensure being able to get back to precisely the state my C and D drives are in now, I do not want to rely on any uninstall utility.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

But if not used properly, System Restore can become System Clobber. XP has a problem that Vista does not which is that it is an all-or-nothing proposition. Either both C and D are protected by System Restore, or neither of them is.

For example ... Sprinkled throughout the 25 GB of data that formerly resided on the D drive are a bunch of .air files that are not online to FS. If Adobe AIR or anything else were to clobber those files, or any other files, on the D drive (and I will be testing for this) I would then have to use System Restore to get the drive back into a clean state.

However ... System Restore sometimes will choke when presented with a very large System Restore data base out of which it is asked to do some file adds/deletes/changes in the course of a rollback. I'm not sure what the size threshhold for its getting into trouble is but I guarantee you that on my development system it is far less than the combination of the fully populated C drive and the fully populated D drive.

You see, when overloaded in the manner just described System Restore will create duplicate files, and/or it may fail to delete things, or to modify them, and so on. This is what I mean by System Restore becoming System Clobber -- if you exceed its capacity it will only make things worse for you.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I need a reliable way of getting back to precisely the same state I'm in now -- several times, perhaps many times. Acronis is not set up to do that kind of thing, certainly not regarding installed programs and their associated registry data. So now you know what I've been doing and why I'm doing it. It's the only way to avoid having these tests stretch out over weeks instead of days while at the same time ensuring that I will be able to get back to exactly where I was when this thread was opened..

This is what 45 years of experience come down to. Absolutely ANYthing can happen in this business. I've been through an office wrecked by firemen as they tried, unsuccessfully, to put out a fire started by a Bellanca crashing into the building where I was working. I've had a hard drive that was working when demonstrated to airport security at DEN be found to be dead when turned on again just four hours later in NYC. I've had a computer simply ruined by a lightning strike even though it was on a UPS. I've had ... ... on and on and on.

So if I don't want to lose any data (and I don't) then I must take whatever steps are necessary to safeguard that data with extremely high probability.

"But Mike" you may ask. "What if there's another fire in your office. Won't you lose what's on those removable HDDs?" Not really. I have the base data -- the most essential 25 GB of the 45 GB -- uploaded to the Great FS Open Components FTP Site In The Sky -- my personal equivalent of Carbonite, and I send the most critical subsets of my incremental backups to that same FTP site. It's just that it might take me several days to get that data downloaded to a new computer.

By the way, while technical issues prevent me from using Carbonite <tried it>, for most of you, and for most of your spouses, and for many of your colleagues at work, Carbonite would be an excellent approach to the matter of backups. If you're not in the habit of making backups you really should look into it or one of its major competitors -- they will do it all behind your back without making you do anything other than install the software and get it running the first time.

You might also want to look into DropBox, discussed here ... http://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/showthread.php?t=186216

Holger Sandmann

09-01-2008, 02:26 PM

Hello Mike,

And let's say that was some kind of operator error so that changing file associations will in fact do the right thing. What happens subsequently if an Acrobat Reader does an automatic update? Will it change the file associations back to what they had been before the problem was "fixed"? Many apps do this kind of thing.

My guess is that an update/reinstall will in fact re-associate .air files with AIR, we shall see. It may in the end turn out that certain third party apps do as well -- we simply don't know and there is only one way to be highly confident. My point is that while changing the .air associations may in the end prove to be the right thing to do, there is not yet enough information available to warrant declaring that.

Finally, even if changing file associations is the right thing to do, and even if it's the ONLY thing that can be done, what are all the circumstances under which it needs to be done? Most FS users are system maintenance rookies. Should we simply require them to learn about this matter from forum posts that they may not be looking for? Or that might not exist?

[...]

Finally finally ... Finally, let's say that a one-time change to .air file associations will cure cancer. The word still has to be gotten out, yes? And a way has to be found to reach as many non-users of forums as possible, yes?. Writing an article about this matter still seems essential to me, the only issue being what that article should say.

The assumption in all of your questions above is that it matters to Flight Simulator what the Windows file association of any .air file is. The fact is it doesn't matter at all. File associations are just a shortcut to more easily start an application with a particular file; it's the equivalent of dragging-and-dropping of, say, a .txt file onto Notepad. FS doesn't care whether its .air files are associated with Adobe Air or any other application because FS works directly with the file names and headers in its folders and not with the Windows file association table.

Given that the evidence suggests that all that is happening when installing Adobe Air (or any other software that includes it) is a change to the file association table then there is no need to do anything. Even if you want to edit an .air file you don't need to have the "correct" file association; just start AirEd and load the respective .air file manually.

Cheers, Holger

opaplano

09-01-2008, 02:44 PM

You might want to read this post -

http://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/showthread.php?p=1220525#poststop

This user is trying to install an aircraft and is apparently getting the corrupt air file message.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 02:46 PM

Holger,

Thanks very much. Based on the information you're providing, you're probably right but I still want to test because ...

... Because computer novices are likely to be very confused by error messages like the one in question. In addition I'd like to see what happens when other apps that use AIR are run, and most especially I'd like to see whether any of the common ones are going to reset the .air file association.

It may be that in the end a front page article combined with some sticky posts will serve to keep newbies out of trouble. Cetainly we will want to say that FS itself is not broken. I quite agree, by the way, that starting AirEd manually and then navigating to the .air file of interest is absolutely fine.

Anyway, let me try to look at all this from the viewpoint of somebody who is neither an FS maven nor a computer software maven.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 02:53 PM

opaplano,

Thanks for the link -- we certainly want to test. However, this one sounds to me as if it might repeat might be somehow related to the Vista user privilges issue. (I forget the correct name ... UAC? User Account Control?.)

Nevertheless, in a few hours I'll PM the user and ask him to join this discussion. If he's not on Vista I should be able to recreate the problem because, while I'm not a repaints maven, I do know how to install a paint job.

If he is on Vista maybe we'll be able to recruit someone Vista-based who'd be willing to run specific tests, maybe the user in question.

So once again the question arises as to what I should be testing. We have time to decide what the test strategy should be.

Holger Sandmann

09-01-2008, 04:13 PM

Hi Mike,

Because computer novices are likely to be very confused by error messages like the one in question.

I'd say that is the key point here. It appears that there are FS users who try to explore or use FS .air files (via double-click) with no or little knowledge about what they are and fail to recognize that an error message they are getting doesn't originate with FS and are "scared" into acting on that message even to the point of re-installing their add-ons. Clearly, some guidance or education on this matter would be of benefit.

Points I'd consider highlighting:

* what are FS .air files and what are the proper tools to explore or edit them
* what are Windows file associations and how are they changed by users or third-party applications
* why Windows file associations aren't mandatory and not diagnostic tools for proper functioning of specific files
* that an installation of Adobe Air, manually or silently (i.e., via Adobe Reader 9 etc.) changes the Windows .air file association
* that the error message given by Adobe Air is misleading because it tests for the integrity of the specific Adobe Air file format not the integrity of the FS .air file format
* what happens in the sim if FS .air files actually have been corrupted
* that there is no need to revert the .air file association to AirEd etc. unless one regularly works with .air files (and even then it's not mandatory)

As for testing, the only aspect we don't know yet for certain is whether there would be any effect on Adobe Air applications if the file association was set to the FS AirEd editor. I highly doubt that's the case but haven't seen any confirmation on that.

Other than that, Jim has explained what happens if an FS .air file is indeed corrupted and how that error message differs from the Adobe pop-up, and I have shown how to reproduce the error message the original posters have described and that it's a false positive.

Cheers, Holger

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 05:06 PM

Holger,

Thanks for your perspective.

Those are two good pieces of information re failure modes. I still want us to understand why the post that opaplano linked to doesn't fit either worldview that you just mentioned.

Unless somebody has a better idea, what I'm going to do first is force an upgrade of my Acrobat Reader installation, something that has delberately not been updated in something like a year and a half. I will then change the file association to AirEd.

After that I'm going to try to recreate the add-the-paint-job-and-it-blows scenario. If it doesn't blow up immediately I'm going to change the file association back to AIR and we'll see what happens after that.

Again, my experience says that we need to try to BREAK my system by a variety of different methods. If it doesn't break beyond the initial error messages out of the offending app, then and only then will I consider testing the heck out of the AirEd workaround.

I'll be ready to begin those tests in about two hours.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 05:14 PM

Folks,

For those of you who read my earlier post about how and why I've been backing up, here's an addition to my procedure that is ongoing right now ...

I realized that I would like convenient access to the backup that's duplicated on the two removable hard drives. So before turning them off I'm making a copy of the 45 GB of data on the D drive of my flight machine where it will be easily accessed via the LAN.

Why am I not backing up the C drive of the flight machine? Answer: Because everything on there is easily recreated -- it's mainly FS2002, FS2004 and FSX testing-motivated installations, each with a few carefully chosen addons. There are also a large number of non-FS games but I haven't installed any addons for those.

So if something in these upcoming tests manages to corrupt something in the flight system, I'll simpy rebuild it from a zero drive state, installing the various FS versions and non-FS games on a demand basis. That would spread out over several months whatever time hit might be associated with the zero-the-drive-etc approach.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 09:02 PM

Holger,

Based on what I saw in the continuation of the thread where the poster was having a problem altering an aircraft.cfg file and then ran into the Adobe AIR file association problem, I have tentatively concluded two things in advance of testing whether other apps (like Acrobat Reader) will be bothered by the association of .air files with AirEd ...

First, short term we have no choice but to document the procedure by which a naive user can stay out of, or recover from, trouble. This means telling him what you said, then teaching him how to download and install AirEd, then showing him how to do the file association step. We can do this but it's a prescription for disaster if we're dealing with a newbie.

Therefore second, I will offer to write a program "A" that will do the file assignment of .air with AirEd. I will also offer to build an installer that will take program "B" (the AirEd executable), install it, and then install and run program A. And while I've never done it before I should somehow be able to create a desktop icon for this whole package when the installer is first run, either out of the installer or programmatically out of program A, so that double clicking on the desktop icon will result in the installer being run again, thereby recreating the file association of .air with AirEd. (Superfluous installations of A and B should not hurt anything, nor should a superfluous forcing of the .air/AirEd file association.)

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

But before I write any code I'd like us (you and I seem to be elected) to work backwards in a planning sense from the situation of a new FS user who is not computer knowledgable. What I said in the paragraph immediately above is simply a straw man proposal that can be changed as we see fit. I'm simply trying to show what's achievable here. I could go further. I could make the program start when the system is rebooted, "lurk", and periodically jam the desired file association into the registry without trying to decide whether the desired file association was in force. (I've never done an autostart program but that's fine, for planning purposes it's enough to know that it can be done.)

What I'm really saying is, All things are possible in software but how far do we need to take this? What's the minimum amount of functionality required to properly take care of Mister Newbie? If we're going to roll this out in stages, for example, how many stages and what's the content of each stage?

I have other obligations so I'm going to have to interleave this work with the other things I'm doing, including doing my usual level of posting to the forums. But let's imagine that we're at the day when I've accomplished Plan 2, the writing of the necessary software. What does this software look like, how is it packaged, where does the user get it, how does he know to get it, what should be done given that there are many FS-related sites that a newbie might be starting from, blah blah blah.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I'm asking for your help in planning out what needs to be done here. (And anyone else who would like to contribute to the planning process, please jump right in.)

I would also like to release this tool in source code form as a VS6 project (C, not C++) along with something like the ClickTeam installer, and have it released as a freeware production of my PC Game Controls business.

Thoughts? Comments?

opaplano

09-01-2008, 09:12 PM

Just FYI -

AirEd already has a built-in association option. A new user might not readily see it as it is under the Special label and reads "Set AirEd for AIR files"

Hope that info is useful.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 09:23 PM

opaplano

09-01-2008, 09:36 PM

opaplano,

Thanks for your input.

I know how, programmatically, to hand a program a command line and then start it. Do you know offhand whether AirEd could be started this way? Whether you do or you dont, do you know who has the AirEd source code? (I suppose we may need to put the request for source code in the to-be-written front page article.)

P.S. Please re-read my post #66 above. I may have edited it extensively since you first saw it. You're a major player in supporting the FS community, will you pitch in on the planning of the phases for this project? With Phase I being what we have no choice but to do in advance of the Phase II code?

I will help anyway I can of course.

The last update I see for AirEd dates back to August 2006 - somehow I feel Mr. Roth (the original author) may have retired from simming as his name does not come up after that date. The co-authors of that last update were William M. Roth, Ronald Freimuth, Yahia al Wajid.

Of course I hope that Adobe will see fit to work out a solution so that program does not reference files with an air extension. That would be the best of all solutions.

Edit Added - New Info

I just visited the Adobe site and this is what I found regarding Adobe Air:

quote:

Flight Simulator X
Adobe Air is reported to take possession of the .air extension when installed. If you are a user of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 or Microsoft Flight Simulator X, the installation of Adobe Air will cause aircraft files to be misinterpreted as Adobe Air files. This causes Flight Simulator to incorrectly report corrupted .air files. The solution is to uninstall Adobe Air.

end quote:

Hope this helps.

Holger Sandmann

09-01-2008, 09:44 PM

Hi Mike,

I'm confused: one of my points is that file association doesn't matter for FS so why would you want to write a program that enforces the AirEd association?

All the average user needs to know is that there's nothing to worry about should Adobe Air end up on his/her system and take over the .air file association.

Other than the question of how Adobe Air responds - if at all - to having .air files associated with AirEd there's nothing further to check as far as I can see.

Should you end up writing a summary as mentioned above I'm happy to read through it prior to publication. Beyond that I'm back to doing what I was doing before...

Cheers, Holger

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 10:01 PM

Holger,

I'm sorry you're bowing out. Yes, I'd like you to read the summary, which will be published in this thread before being widely published. Now ...

My goal is to see to it that naive FS users don't get any error messages at all. Maybe the goal is not attainable, but maybe it is. The AirEd file association appears to be an integral and essential part of that solution family.

Folks,

I've done AirBoss (TM) by myself, I'll be doing most of the FS Flight Training (SM) courseware development by myself, and if I have to do the planning for this Adobe AIR nonsense by myself then that's what I'll do.

But I refuse to give newbies an IQ test ("My FS installation is broken") if there's a reasonable way to avoid it. I'm asking for help in defining that reasonable way. I hope that some public-spirited citizens will step forward re this product definition process.

xxmikexx

09-01-2008, 11:34 PM

opaplano,

My having thought about these matters a little more, let's consider defining Phase II but holding off on it. If we do a good Phase I maybe the frequency of problem encounters will be small enough that we can ignore Phase II.

I like your idea of using AirEd to make the association and for Phase I that may well be good enough. I think that we should additionally consider repackaging AirEd as a self-extracting executable that will install to a standard location, say in the root of the C drive. That will ease the installation process. After all, we're not expecting the newbie to run AirEd, we simply want the safety of associating .air files with AirEd. (Was it you who pointed out that this is the only safe program for the file association?)

For the moment let's try ignoring what ought to go into an article. What I'd like to focus on instead for the next day or two is how to draw newcomers' attention to that article. Webmaster Nels Anderson has already agreed to run an article just as soon as it's submitted to him but is that enough? The article will drift off the front page. So we need to propose one or more prominent links to this article. Should we start with the forums? Should we plan to request pinned links to the article in each forum per my original thinking?

Whatever we decide to do, it should be something that other sites will be able to make effective use of. Francois Dumas of SimFlight has already put something up on his front page and in his forums. Presumably we will submit new material to him so he can replace what he has today with a good Phase I. I haven't looked at what Francois did because he has a better understanding of how to reach his membership than we will.

Similarly, Jeff Taylor of SkyBlueRadio has suggested that we submit a news article for them to consider. I haven't heard anything back from Avsim or SimPilotNet, we shall see, but it seems clear at the moment that we don't need to try to involve Microsoft's Phil Taylor though I hope he will monitor what we're doing.

As for Abacus, we should plan to approach them with some kind of concrete proposal, but I think we should hold off on that till we've got Phase I rolled out. It is more important that we be able to fend for ourselves than that we try to budge Abacus. Maybe Abacus is Phase II and the code stuff is Phase III. I don't know, what are your thoughts?

I'm ready to test but I'm holding back until you and I have a better idea of what we want to test. However, in the meantime I think we should evaluate the proposed self-extracting executable and I'll put that together tomorrow. My desire for a self extractor is that many newbies are not going to know at first about WinZip or WinRar, but a self-extractor will work even when they don't possess one or the other of those utilities. We can always switch to a ClickTeam installer if we like, but my guess is that a self-extractor will be preferable, we shall see what we shall see.

In the immortal words of Grand Ole' Opry's Minnie Pearl, I'm through talkin' now.

Holger Sandmann

09-02-2008, 12:38 AM

Hi guys,

just FYI, there's a recent post by Oliver Goldman, Adobe staff member, on their website in response to a user inquiry:

"The conflict with FS is only over which program opens files with the .air extension. Adobe AIR is in no way corrupting any of the existing FS .air files.

What AIR is doing is attempting to read those files when they're opened and, since they aren't really Adobe AIR .air files, displaying an error message. Any user can change this behavior by re-associating .air with a different application.

Again, Adobe AIR is absolutely *not* corrupting these files."

Source: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/messageview.cfm?forumid=72&catid=670&threadid=1389507

Cheers, Holger

xxmikexx

09-02-2008, 01:07 AM

Holger,

Thanks very much, it simplifies what to say to people, doesn't it.

xxmikexx

09-02-2008, 05:54 AM

Gentlemen,

I've been thinking again ...

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

In a perfect world the newbie will somehow be led directly to a download package. (Perhaps via a link embedded in the article?) When he confirms that he wants it he will be allowed to choose Run versus Download. If he chooses Run the following things should happen automatically ...

1 - A folder should be created in the root of the C drive. The download package should be unpacked into that folder, including AirEd.

2 - A desktop icon should be created for the downloaded AirEd version. I'm not sure what we should do if such an icon already exists -- do we overwrite it with our own version? I think so but what do you guys think?

3 - AirEd should be started automatically. The user will have been instructed to elect the file association option.

4 - A scrollable text box would appear explaining to the user that Adobe AIR might get reinstalled so that it would become necessary for him to re-do the file association via AirEd.

How can we make this, or something like this, happen so that the user will be led to do the right thing with a minimum of effort?

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Again, holding off taking action till we've got a test/development plan forumulated ...

I've downloaded the ClickTeam install maker, and I have an ancient version of InstallShield that could be used if need be, but I don't understand how to automate the Download-With-Run-Versus-Simply-Download stuff. Would this be a script on the site hosting the download? If so, let's plan to base it here at FlightSim.com, figure out what we think we want, and then ask webmaster Nels Anderson what he thinks.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Change of subject ...

The version of AirEd that's in the FlightSim.com library, 1.42, is out of date. I compared the license agreement in that zip package to the one in the version in the Avsim library, which is 1.52 with update 806 by Yahia Al Wajid. The license language is the same and there is no additional license language in the Al Wajid version. From this I conclude that it would be perfectly fine to repackage the version that resides on Avsim, though I would want us to first discuss that with Nels, and perhaps with the Avsim publisher, Tom Allensworth.

Alternatively we could simply use the existing 1.42 version since it will be adequate for the pupose at hand which is defending ourselves against Adobe AIR. This would not be my perfect world preference but it is a viable approach from a technical viewpoint.

I will further point out that whichever version we use for the file association purpose, that executable could be renamed, and a custom desktop icon created, so that even if it's 1.42 it would not conflict with an existing installation of some other version.

Comments? Thoughts?

opaplano

09-02-2008, 06:28 AM

Gentlemen,

I've been thinking again ...

In a perfect world the newbie will somehow be led to directly to a download package. When he confirms that he wants it he will be allowed to choose Run versus Download. If he chooses Run the following things should happen automatically ...

1 - A folder will be created in the root of the C drive. The download package will be unbundled into that folder.

2 - AirEd will be started. The user will have been instructed to elect the file association option.

How can we make this, or something like this, happen so that the user will be led to do the right thing with a minimum of effort?

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Change of subject ...

The version of AirEd that's in the FlightSim.com library, 1.42, is out of date. I compared the license agreement in that zip package to the one in the version in the Avsim library, which is 1.52 with update 806 by Yahia Al Wajid, there being no additional license language in the Al Wajid version. From this I conclude that it would be perfectly fine to upload the file from Avsim, though I would want us to first discuss that with webmaster Nels Anderson.

Alternatively we could simply use the existing 1.42 version since it will be adequate for the pupose at hand which is defending ourselves against Adobe AIR. This would not be my perfect world preference but it is a viable approach.

Comments? Thoughts?

Your keywords are "Perfect World" - we probably can never prevent a newbie (or an old hand for that matter) from making incorrect assumptions. If we could, we would never see the often asked question "where is my FS9.cfg file".

Please note that my earlier post about Adobe Air was not from the Adobe site as I thought it was - it came from the Wikepedia site. I had searched so many Adobe related sites seeking correct information that I did not realize where I copied that "uninstall Adobe AIR" text from.

Here is what Holger has found and posted at Avsim:

quote:

Here's what an Adobe staff member posted today in response to a similar user report on their website:

"The conflict with FS is only over which program opens files with the .air extension. Adobe AIR is in no way corrupting any of the existing FS .air files.

What AIR is doing is attempting to read those files when they're opened and, since they aren't really Adobe AIR .air files, displaying an error message. Any user can change this behavior by re-associating .air with a different application.

Again, Adobe AIR is absolutely *not* corrupting these files."

Source: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/messageview.cfm?forumid=72&catid=670&threadid=1389507

In other words, there is no real problem other than FS users taking an Adobe Air error message for an FS error message and acting on that. Thus, it's a matter of educating FS users, not of removing Adobe Air, which appears to be part of an increasing number of web applications making it difficult NOT to use it, directly or indirectly.

end quote:

It seems to me that the best we hope to do is get the word out about the error message which may be misunderstood and be prepared for the occasional question from those who do not see and heed it - much like the ever present "where is my FS9.cfg file" questions.

Like the old saying goes = "you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make him drink".

BTW - it does not matter which version of AirEd one uses - the option to associate is available in both.

Those are my thoughts on the matter after having re-read the various posts and sleeping on the implications.

xxmikexx

09-02-2008, 06:44 AM

opaplano,

Most likely you were composing your post #76 at the same time I was extensively editing my #75. Kindly read mine again and then restate your views, taking them from the top so we don't get out of sync again.

I don't think that the issue is who said what on which forum. I think it's What should we do to minimize problems for a naive newbie? (And I still think it would be wonderful if AirEd could be started with a command line such that it did the file association election without being told.)

alastairmonk

09-02-2008, 07:03 AM

If I can add my "two penneth" .....

If we want to consider the actions of "newbies" then we also have to consider that any user who is having trouble downloading and installing a zipped flightsim package is probably too new to be wanting to modify an AIR file.

There's a lot about the complexity of MSFS that many of us "old hands" may take for granted because we have learned how to do things over time. There is an arguement that those who are new to simming should learn how to walk before they learn how to run, and these practices should be dealt with step by step rather than all at once.

Bear in mind that editing an AIR file is in itself a relatively sophisticated requirement and usually only done by those who see deficiencies in the file and/or aircraft under analysis. To get to this point they need to be able to fly in the sim well enough to be able to appreciate that something "isn't quite right", which in itself takes a certain time and expertise.

This is, of course, working on the assumption that there is actually something wrong in the first place, and that the performance requiring the AIR file edit is faulty rather than the assumptions of the pilot - that the flight profile doesn't conform to how they think (or actually know) it should be.

For those that reach this point of advanced flight analysis it shouldn't really be much of a stretch to be capable of running AirEd and manually selecting the AIR file that they wish to modify. The process has no need of automation and I would speculate that if the user in question cannot do this they shouldn't be "messing" with AirEd in the first place.

Alastair

xxmikexx

09-02-2008, 08:06 AM

Alastair,

Thanks for joining in. You have an incorrect perception of what's happening, but after that's been corrected you can be of material help is spec'ing out what ought to be done here. Now ... It's not that we want newbies to edit .air files, it's the following issue ...

If we do nothing, when a user installs a recent version of Acrobat Reader, or when he allows his installation to be updated, the latest Adobe software is going to install something called Adobe AIR, which apparently is some kind of analog to Microsoft's .NET library. The problem is that files used by Adobe AIR are given .air extensions. When AIR starts up for the first time, it searches the entire drive, looking for .air files. In the case of an FS installation it will find them, conclude that they have been corrupted because they're not valid Adobe AIR files, and then issue a series of error messages, one for each .air file that it believes to have been corrupted.

So the scheme, already validated by others, is to change the file association for .air files away from Adobe AIR, which is what the Adobe installer will have established. Changing Adobe's association will prevent AIR from seeing what it believes to be corrupted .air files when it runs for the first time. (Apparently it's happy to find no .air files at all.)

So then the question becomes one of which program to re-associate .air files with. The quick answer is that it should be AirEd since this is the only program guaranteed not to corrupt an FS .air file.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Unless somebody already has the answer (and it might be in the forums on another site), there is a question in my mind. With the file association changed to AirEd, on AIR initial startup is it simply going to open up all the .air files in AirEd instead of erroring out of AIR? My impression is that it won't but I do want to know. Because if it does do this then there will be no point in changing the file associations -- we would simply warn the user to ignore the error messages.

I'll test this issue as soon as I begin overall testing, but I don't want to do anything just yet, not till we have a better idea of what we're trying to accomplish.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

So now you know what's going on. Will you continue to monitor and contribute to this thread? I want us to make life as simple as possible for the newbie who has been running FS and now has installed Acrobat Reader so he can read pdf files. What I hope we'll accomplish here is the definition of "as simple as possible", without my having to write a program to deal with this issue.

alastairmonk

09-02-2008, 09:36 AM

Hi Mike,

I have actually been following the thread for a while .....

I guess at the heart of the matter is the question:

"Do the FS2004 AIR files still work if the association has been re-mapped to Adobe AIR" ?

I know for a fact that I've updated Adobe Reader to the latest version and that Adobe AIR is likely to be on my own simming system, but have been running FS2004 for a long time since that point. As it was only in the last few days that I learned about AIR I obviously haven't yet run it explicitly on my home PC, not needing to.

So my thought on this are:

If the answer is Yes, and once AIR has been given exclusive "ownership" of the .air prefix FS2004 aircraft will no longer work, then we all have a problem, best resolved by making sure that users do not run AIR unless they have to, and reversing any damage caused.

If the answer is No, and the reallocation does not actually stop the .air files from being correctly read by FS2004, then a simple note to ignore any Adobe AIR-generated error messages should suffice.

So far I have not been able to determine exactly the extent of the problem, as most discussion appears to me to have been about (re)assigning the program used to edit these files.

One thing I have determined, on my elderly PC at work, is that it is difficult, if not impossible to assign the AIR files away from Adobe AIR - selection of the installed AirEd as the program of choice appears not to be accepted. However, opening AirEd and manually selecting the .air file works as it should.

So perhaps users who have had Adobe AIR reassign the .air files can comment on whether this "breaks" FS2004 or not, so that we can establish what needs to be dealt with.

Hopefully this focusses the discussion on where our efforts should be targetted.

Cheers,

Alastair

xxmikexx

09-02-2008, 09:44 AM

Alastair,

The answer to your question in bold letters is "Yes, but ..."

All that file associations do is determine which program will be launched when a file name/icon is double clicked. So even with the association set to AIR, there is no reason in the world why AirEd can't be started and then navigated to the .air file of interest. There would be nothing to prevent AirEd from working in that situation.

But we would be losing the benefit of having AirEd be launched when a .air file was double clicked on, so this is yet another argument in favor of changing the file association of .air files from AIR and over to AirEd.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

In summary, allowing the association of .air with AIR to stand would mean a) confusion to some novices when they get that initial round of error messages from the AIR software, and b) inconvenience for people who are accustomed to starting AirEd by double clicking on the file they want to edit (because they earlier elected the make-association option built into AirEd).

So unless I'm missing something we have nothing to lose and everything to gain by changing the file association. Of course we would still need to tell the users what the AIR messages mean.

Am I missing something?

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Now ... I will test of course, but the following issue has apparently been tested by others ...

If your concern is that loading an aircraft in FS will cause either AIR or AirEd to be launched, this is not going to happen. Based on my knowledge of Windows API programming I will guess that when AIR opens a .air file it does it with a statement that it is going to edit the file in question, and that the "associated" program for that file type should be launched. In contrast, FS probably simply opens the .air file for reading and therefore will not cause an editor to be launched.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Again, I stand ready to test all the issues we conclude should be tested, but let's continue to expose concerns and analyze them before I begin that testing.

alastairmonk

09-02-2008, 11:04 AM

Hi Mike,

Certainly if it is the case that FS2004 is "neutered" if the .air files have been re-assigned to Adobe AIR, then this is a very troubling development that needs to be resolved, because an accidental "double-clicking" of an .air file will assign the suffix to Adobe AIR and render FS2004 unusable.

However, perhaps I need to re-emphasise the fact that I do not consider anyone who wishes to delve into or modify .air files as "novices". I completely agree that for those who wish to use AirEd to look at or modify these files then not being able to "auto-launch" AirEd using a double-click would be annoying. However this "problem" is not one that "novices" should encounter because they should not be tinkering with these files. If they double-click the files the best thing that can happen is that they are prompted for a program and can "back out" before doing any damage !

To summarise; there are two issues here.

Firstly the reassigning of the .air file to Adobe AIR that appears to stop FS2004 aircraft from loading (if this is the case) due to this reassigning causing the .air file to become corrupted.

Secondly, re-assigning .air files (back) to AirEd for convenient editing by those in a position to benefit from the AirEd program.

Of the two I consider the first vastly more important than the second. Many users will have Adobe Reader on their system, and, by association, Adobe AIR, which will activate the first time a .air file is double-clicked either deliberately or by accident. If the very presence of Adobe AIR is going to potentially corrupt all flightsim .air files if inadvertantly activated (and on my system this may run to hundreds of files) then a solution needs to be sought. The convenience of AirEd users can take a back seat.

This isn't to devalue the need to reassign the double-click to AirEd, just a matter of relative emphasis.

Alastair

opaplano

09-02-2008, 12:35 PM

To try to recap:

This entire matter now seems to be one of mis-understanding regarding what Adobe AIR does and does not do and what file associations really mean.

I suggest that anyone interested read this portion fo the thread again regarding file associations:

http://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/showthread.php?p=1220477#post1220477

FS does not care what program you have associated air file with - it will read and use them even if associated with a graphic program like Paint Shop Pro. However, if you ever want to edit an air file, it should be associated with AirEd as that is the only program which can properly save any edits without corrupting the file.

Adobe AIR is apparently NOT required for the Adobe Reader to work properly.

If Adobe AIR has been installed on your system via an update, just uninstall it.

Those false positive error messages are being generated by Adobe AIR and NOT from FS.

Why make this any more diffucult than it needs to be?

alastairmonk

09-02-2008, 12:47 PM

Hi David,

Thanks ! My own concern was that the presence of Adobe AIR could potentially cause a fatal corruption of the flightsim .air files if they were reassigned. This was the implication when Mike answered my question with a "yes".

If this is not the case, and even if Adobe AIR does try (and fail to) open the .air files no lasting damage is done, then the "problem" is less catestrophic. I tend to agree that removal of AIR is perhaps the easiest solution. If some web pages fail to display properly due to its absence then this can be balanced against its negative affects.

Alastair

xxmikexx

09-02-2008, 12:48 PM

opaplano,

Do you agree or disagree with the spirit of my post #75?

GeorgeM

09-02-2008, 05:20 PM

When AIR starts up for the first time, it searches the entire drive, looking for .air files. In the case of an FS installation it will find them, conclude that they have been corrupted because they're not valid Adobe AIR files, and then issue a series of error messages, one for each .air file that it believes to have been corrupted.
Has your testing shown this to be the case? My understanding was that the user would only get the error message if they tried to open an FS .air file after Adobe Air had taken over the extension.

AirEd appears to be an old application. Anyone know how it deals with FSX .air files?

This whole thing seems very much like making a mountain out of a molehill. At the worst, you run the risk of turning a benign issue, the user getting a confusing error message, into a potentially dangerous one where you're giving novices a tool with which they could actually alter their .air files. Education seems like the best course of action here.

xxmikexx

09-02-2008, 05:46 PM

GeorgeM,

Thanks for your input.

Tests will begin tonight and may well last a few days. I've told the management of the major FS-related sites, and Phil Taylor of Microsoft, that I'm going to conduct my own investigation into this matter, then make a solution recommendation of my own, and then implement that solution on my own.

If the answer turns out to be as simple as writing a cookbook document for newbies then that's while I'll do. If it's as complex as building a download package including my writing a program then that's what I'll do. I want to put an end to rumors and speculation and hand-wringing and the best way for me to do that is to grab the bull by the horns myself.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Now ... Any error messages encountered while editing an air file would be due to double-clicking on the file on the assumption that nothing had overridden the previously-established .air file association with AirEd, which I am told is an option that can be triggered from within AirEd itself. But if something did come along later and re-establish the association with AIR, the Adobe software will trigger on the double click and report a corrupted .air file -- but in fact the file will be fine as far as FS is concerned.

And even in this case of the file association still citing AIR, if AirEd is started manually and navigated manually to the .air file of interest, it will operate correctly. The only danger is if the user associates .air files with any program other than AirEd, because an inadvertent save of a .air file that was opened with, say, NotePad, easily could result in true corruption of the .air file.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

All of the above is the best available theory, I'm going to check it all out myself. I'm also going to try to find out which other third party applications may also be installing Adobe AIR and therefore may either be a source of trouble, or that may un-fix an earlier-fixed system.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

As for whether AirEd is compatible with FSX .air files, the answer is yes though some of the file offsets may have changed. I wouldn't know, I'm not a .air file maven.

I hope this helps,

opaplano

09-02-2008, 07:23 PM

Has your testing shown this to be the case? My understanding was that the user would only get the error message if they tried to open an FS .air file after Adobe Air had taken over the extension.

AirEd appears to be an old application. Anyone know how it deals with FSX .air files?

This whole thing seems very much like making a mountain out of a molehill. At the worst, you run the risk of turning a benign issue, the user getting a confusing error message, into a potentially dangerous one where you're giving novices a tool with which they could actually alter their .air files. Education seems like the best course of action here.

AirEd works on FSX and FS2004 air files properly.

Most folks do not seem to understand that "associating" an extension with a particular program is simply a convenience for the user. When an extension (.doc for example) is associated with Mircrosoft Word it simply means the user can now double click on any file with a .doc extension and it will automatically be opened with Word.

The same holds true if you associate a graphic extension like jpg with a particular graphic program - a double click on a jpg image will then automatically open it in that graphic program.

It is a convenience, nothing more and nothing less.

FS does not care how you might associate FS air files - but if you want to be able to open/view/edit them, they need to be associated with AirEd if you want the convenience of automatically opening them in AirEd. Otherwise you would have to open AirEd and then search for the air file you wanted to work on.

The only way an .air file can be corrupted is if you should open it with a program such as Notepad and then SAVE it. That WILL corrupt the file and FS will give an error message when you try to load that aircraft. Only AirEd should be used if you need to make edits.

I have tested this numerous times by opening an air file with Notepad - you cannot read what you see - and then closing it cleanly (NOT saving it). The air file was not changed or corrupted in any way.

FS air files in the default state have no association at all - it may say "unknown program".
In any case, they do NOT have to be associated with anything in order for FS to use them.

I repeat, associations are simply a convenience for the user if they elect to use them.

Anyone who gets an error message of ANY kind should always take the time to read it carefully and write it down. Too often we all tend to jump to conclusions which may be in error. In this case the error message is being generated by Adobe AIR - NOT FS - as Adobe Air is not understanding the FS air format it is seeing and is thus reporting what it thinks are corrupt files.

In my opinion the solution is education and if necessary, the uninstalling of Adobe Air if it is on your system.

Hope that clarifies the situation a bit.

jvile

09-02-2008, 07:29 PM

The FSX .air file has changed in some areas. This is due to ACES giving the aircraft.cfg more control over the flying characteristics then what was allowed in FS2002/FS2004 aircraft .cfg.

Other areas of the FSX.air have been deleted and also brought into the aircraft.cfg. The aircraft .cfg in most cases always takes precedence if the control of flying behavior is listed in both the .air and the .cfg.

AirEd opens FSX .air files and reads them properly and if the .air is saved it does not corrupt any part of the .air. AirEd is designed that if it cannot read a new record in the .air it does not list what the record means and we do not change that record unless a hexeditor is used and we are not talking novice here.

There is no need to worry about if Aired can open a FSX .air file because it can and save it properly. What the main issue is with the FSX .air is that most User and AI Planes that continue to say they are FSX planes are not fully FSX even if the model.mdl/texture conversion says they are with some type of utility that reads the model.

I open and look at a lot of .air files. Many so called FSX model planes on some kind of published list are still using FS2002/2004 .air files but then turn right around and copy a FSX aircraft.cfg file. This does not work correctly (not matched properly) for certain airport features that the Aircraft.cfg is suppose to control but the FS2002/2004 aircraft.air is causing non-capatible issues.