Anyone Know Joshua Robertson?

He was the developer of FS Real Time.

I was using an older version and saw there was a link to donate so you could get the registered version. I donated and never got the key for the software even though the payment went through. I guess he doesn't support it anymore. I tried contacting him to no avail. That was last year.

I quit using it for a while because it doesn't just update the time. It also updates the date, which really annoys me. So now I'm looking to contact him so I can have a newer version that doesn't do that.

And I'm hoping someone here knows him or knows what his current email is.

Thanks.

From what I can find elsewhere on the web, this product is discontinued. We are all substantially older now than when FS2004 came into being and it is possible the gentleman concerned is no longer in the hobby.

A registered version of FSUIPC has the option to "Keep FS clock sync'd to real time" if that's your need. The free FSTimeSync does a similar job (available at Github) - the current version has display issues for me (possibly just my screen settings), but that's not to say it doesn't still work.

If it is correction to Time Zones you are after, the Time Zone files that come with FS Real Time are not Joshua Robertson's work and should work without it, they do not seem to be available in the file library here but can be found at AVSIM as TimeZone 3.0. There is also FS2004 Time Zone Scenery in the library here, which is apparently a development of that. Both require batch commands for different areas before starting a flight - personally, I find it easier to just set the simulator time according to one of the many web sites that show current time anywhere in the world.

John

All I want is something that fixes the enormously stupid mistake by M$ of having FS change zulu time instead of local time when crossing time zones.

Aside from that oversight, the biggest mystery is why they never fixed it.

All I want is something that fixes the enormously stupid mistake by M$ of having FS change zulu time instead of local time when crossing time zones.

 

Aside from that oversight, the biggest mystery is why they never fixed it.

That's not a mistake, it would be correct if the time zones were correctly configured. I have offered you two solutions for that above. Did you read that?

Time zones do change from time to time, so even if it was correct in 2003, you could hardly expect it to be correct today anyway.

John

On 11/27/2022 at 7:30 AM, johnhinson said:

That's not a mistake, it would be correct if the time zones were correctly configured.

How is that not a mistake and how is that correct? If I fly from point A to point B and the flight takes 4 hours and I cross 4 time zones and I leave at 0800z, then I should arrive at my destination at 1200z, correct? But that's not what happens, sometimes (why it happens sometimes and not others, I haven't figured out). Even FS Real Time states in its readme file, "...when crossing Time Zones, FS2002 changed its UTC time instead of its Local Time, which can cause problems. The same thing happened when crossing the International Date Line but even worse -- by a whole day! For example, if you were flying East at dusk, when crossing a Time Zone, all of a sudden you would find yourself flying in broad daylight again."

So time zones being correctly configured is completely irrelevant to what I'm talking about.

The version of FS Real Time I was using prevented that and would maintain the correct zulu time (actually, all versions of FSRT would do that). Unfortunately, as I said, it would also change the date, which is why I quit using it. A newer version of FSRT worked the same way but also let you offset the date, which is what the first version of FSRT should have done; an oversight on Josh Robertson's part, it seems to me. Unfortunately, he changed FSRT from donationware to newer versions that either added a banner that scrolled across your screen or shut down after a set amount of time.

Yeah, I get that all this stuff is old but I have an old PC. I also get that people lose interest in stuff like this. Unfortunately, there's a link in the "About" file of FSRT to donate. In the earliest versions, it provided an address to mail your donation. In the newer versions, it was automated to connect to PayPal or something similar (I forget which). So I clicked it and donated the suggested amount: $10. What I didn't know at the time was that support had discontinued. So I paid for nothing.

There's death, taxes and dead donationware.

I hate that silly mistake: it plays hell with planning long flights in which I want to arrive at a specific local time. I guess MS never thought anyone would care enough for a patch to be a priority.

There's a lot of "donationware" on this Site that is Outdated and frankly, should be removed... especially if the Creator is MIA and hasn't responded to any Inquiries for like, Years.

If the current File Library had the feature to Browse the File contents such as the Readme File, it would make it easier for potential Users to see if they want to use the Add On in the first place.

It's also incumbent on the prospective User to do their Homework and check out the Documentation thoroughly so they don't get caught sending $$ to a Dead Link.