On Sat, 2002-02-16 at 16:06, Alex Perry wrote:
> > > > > Please note that there is a difference between fgfs's internal
> > > > > representation of wind, and the way it is set by the user. As an
> > > > > engineer, I am partial to using 'to' vectors internally.
> > > > Yup, that is more mathematically correct.
> 
> There is nothing mathematical about the wind vector convention;
> it's not as if we're actually modelling the wind as a particle field.
> 
> A pressure sensor that is exposed to the "wind" and pointed in the
> direction specified as the "wind direction" will indicate a pressure
> above ambient.  When pointed in the opposite direction, i.e. the
> direction that the air is travelling towards, the sensor will report
> the same as for the directions at right angles, namely no increase.
> Therefore, I could argue that the "pilot viewpoint" makes a whole
> lot more sense, for use in the context of aerodynamic modelling.

One could apply a similar argument to a vane; it doesn't change the
fact that the air is flowing the other way ( and that may well be 
why the aviation convention is "from" ) 

> 
> Trying to standardize here is about as pointless as making the
> whole simulator use SI units exclusively for _every_ numeric value.
> 
> > > IMHO, I think the way JSBSim does it is more consistent from an
> > > EOM/weather/smulation POV. However, perhaps we can account for the
> > > difference in the FGInterface-derived class for the specific FDM?
> 
> Purely on principle, I think it is more important to let each FDM
> subsystem use whatever conventions that its authors believe will make
> for a consistent and easy to maintain codebase.  We want them to work!
> Any sign (or axis) mismatches can be dealt with in the interface class.
> 
> > I'd be happier if we kept it as is.  Wouldn't be the first time
> > engineers have traded correctness for pragmatism.
> 
> Yes.
> That's been suggested as the differentiator between engineers and scientists
> and formed the basis for many many jokes at each others' expense.
> 
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-- 
Tony Peden
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We all know Linux is great ... it does infinite loops in 5 seconds. 
-- attributed to Linus Torvalds

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