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General information on the development of AirTraffic. Where it has been and
where it is going.
3.1 In the next few releases...
A view of the future of the AirTraffic project. I would love to give dates
of future releases but I simply can't. Ideally I can just move the
items on this list to the change-log once the feature is
implemented. The changes are small between releases, to have a fast
release cycle, and have fast feedback (release early, release often;
like ESR preaches).
The list of stuff that will have to be done for the client part of the
AirTraffic in the next few releases. If you want to work on any of these
points, please announce it on the airtraffic-devel mailinglist so that
work can be coordinated between developers.
- Move from Corba to xml-rpc.
- Displaying of flight plans of the planes.
- Implement a better map/location projection scheme, taking into
account the curving of the earth.
- Improve height and speed slider. Showing current, requested,
min/max, landing and curse speeds and heights.
- Support for saving user settings to a XML file in user homedir.
- The client supports receiving data on static items in the
simulation (scenery).
- Client supports the user changing the host where the meta-server
runs in the client configuration.
- Additional information on specific planes can be shown
- Get bulk data such as sceneries over the http protocol from the
server.
- ...
The additions and changes to the AirTraffic server in the upcoming releases.
- Moving away from CORBA to xml-rpc to make server location
publishing much more straight forward. This will make the
server more simple and the server will not need any extra
libraries installed.
- Generate valid callsigns for the planes.
- Generating simple random scenery and sending it to
clients.
- Collision detection *g*
- Simplistic handing off of planes entering/leaving the zone of
control and airports.
- Notify the client of flights and their plans before they enter the
controlled airspace.
- Reading pre-done scenery from a XML file to send to the client.
- Make the servers (sim and meta) listen to the TCP/IP ports.
- Move the ``reality engine'' (the thing that calculates the
positions) into a process of it's own, to leave the server to
just be a gateway of information.
- Use a simple http server to transfer scenery and other bulk data.
- ...
3.2 Change Log
Reverse chronological (newest events first) list of past events in the
history of AirTraffic project.
- 18, Februari 2002
- Release 0.3.3: First Interactive release.
- Server: If the simserver cannot connect to a meta-server it will
start one up.
- Server: Added order processing, the planes now change accoding to
orders send by the client.
- Server: Planes change direction, height gradually and letting
the client know of their changes.
- Client: Controls the planes by sending simple ``order'' messages
to the sim-server.
- Client: If it cannot connect to a meta-server, it gives the
possibilty to start one.
- Client: Added the Control Window, that allows the client to give
orders.
- Client: Added network exception handling by callbacks.
- Client: Added generalized dialog window construction.
- Client: Added an abstract window class with registration and
``hide when closed'' methods.
- Client: Added an about box.
- 02, Februari 2002
- Release 0.3.2: First Graphical release.
- Server: Very basic plane model implemented as prove of concept.
- Client: Implement very simple model of mapping locations to
radar screen.
- Client can visualize the location of a plane on the region the
client controls.
- Client: Maintain a list with the planes that the client gets
information about from the server.
- Client+Server: Allow very simple ``Sim server to/from client''
communication via a subscription interface.
- Server: Sending and receiving information on planes and their positions
via a subscription interface where the clients subscribe to.
- 04, Januari 2002
- Release of 0.3.1: Meta- and Sim server IDLs are
much improved. Added one thread for each network
connection. Wrote an installer. Added 40+ unittests to the
server code.
- 19, November 2001
- First rewrite release. Basic program functionality and
layout is in place. Basic networking is working. A client can connect
to a server and exchange information with the server. A Basic
interface has been designed, but much functionality is missing.
- October 2001
- Restarted a new rewrite again. This time looking
like it's working out. Learned many things about the limits of my
abilities to find memory leaks in C++. Re-wrote all of the previous
work in around 1 week because i switched from C++ to python with corba
for networking... if only I'd known earlier :/.
- Long time
- Development frozen because I moved countries
(The Netherlands to Chile), and had to straighten out my life.
- January 2001
- Many many changes, rewrite is taking real shape
now. Client and server have been given separate CVS trees. Basic
networking works, as does XML sending/receiving. Redid the website, to
make it more maintainable and up to date.
- June 2000
- Redesign and rewrite of AirTraffic 0.3 started. the
0.2 source code has been branched away into a separate branch of CVS
as it is now marked as legacy code.
- 30-Apr-2000
- AirTraffic-0.2a released. Fixed a nasty bug with
the selecting of planes, added an about box. Updated the airport
distribution algorithm.
- 28-Apr-2000
- AirTraffic-0.2 released. The first playable
release. Fixed countless bugs. Preferences work. Airports get numbered
visually. Also updated the screen shots to reflect the new game look.
- 20-Apr-2000
- Added RPM's and DEBs for easy installation.
- 08-Apr-2000
- AirTraffic-0.1b released. This version checks the
distance between planes. Very basic scoring is implemented and the
images are now external .png
- 10-Mar-2000
- AirTraffic-0.1a, which fixes compile problems with
0.1, was released.
- 10-Mar-2000
- AirTraffic-0.1 was released.
- 07-Mar-2000
- Put up the first preliminary screen-shots of the
game in the "shots" section as well as minor changes to the rest of
the site.
- 20-Jan-2000
- Moved AirTraffic to Sourceforge in anticipation of
the first release.
3.3 Future ideas
This is a list of ideas that have been proposed. They are in no
particular order and there are time scedual for implementing these
features. But if someone has an itch... drop me a note :).
- Client integration with Gnome.
- Load GIS data from one of the public GIS databases.
- Write a propper chart mapping widget, and make it available as a
seperate gnome service via bonobo so that other projects can reuse
it to display Geospacial data.
- Load the (and freely available) Official Aeronautical information
into the simulation. Sending the clients just the needed info.
- Inter-region communication for the servers (AirTrafficWorldWide)
- Career database for players.. Worldwide score lists.
- Complicating factors like mountains, NFZ's, power-cables, storms.
- Multiple plane types (jets, props, helis, UFOs, etc.)
- Sound support.
- Program AirTraffic-admin for controlling and setting up the server.
- Waypoints for the planes.
- Debian packages.
- Different airline or plane themes for the game.
- Scenery like lakes and hills and sloping terrain.
- Real world air traffic situations and scenarios.
- Movies for events via a real-time rendering engine.
- 3D game board, see the situation from all sides.
- Using a speech generator to ``speak'' radio
- Integration with flight simulators.
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Copyright © 2001 Marijn Vriens
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.
Last change: 2002-02-18