On Monday 10 November 2003 23:47, Andy Ross wrote: > [Starting a new thread, since the original is getting a little strung > out. :)] > > In an attempt to depoliticize the combat flame war as much as > possible, it's worth pointing out that, irrespective of people's > opinions on the matter, there are not a lot of "combat" features we > can really avoid implementing: > > + A missile is just another aircraft with (perhaps) a variant FDM > configuration. Ditto for a bomb. > > + A collision is a collision, be it with a guided missile, a partner > in your close formation flight, or the tanker from which you are > refueling. > > + Hydraulic/control system failures (or whatever) don't behave > differently depending on whether the leak was caused by wear or a > shell fragment. Overstressed civilian aircraft have been known to > shed ailerons, wings, or tails on occasion. > > I'm sure others can come up with many more examples. Here are the > only three "combat only" features I can actually think of which will > require code or features we don't already have: > > + Weapon damage code. The system failures themselves can already be > modeles (or will need to be at some point for civilian simulation). > But computing "how much failure" results from a given event is > something that will need to know about what a "warhead" is and how > it differs from a bullet. > > + Gun trajectory modelling. Even this could *almost* be done with > generic collision code by treating each shell as a separte object > with its own FDM (do the math -- there aren't that many shells on an > airplane, and computers are mind bogglingly fast these days). But > still, the simplest gun implementation is going to be doing > gun-specific stuff. > > + Missile homing code. This could easily be plugged into a generic > autopilot framework, of course. But other than the framework > boilerplate, this isn't likely to share code with any civilian > autopilot implementations. :) > > Beyond that, all the "combat" stuff I can think of is going to be > server-side functionality. Stuff like radar coverage handling, > battlefield AI, etc... is all handled more cleanly by a separate, > shared server application. > > Hopefully this will help to push the flames down until someone > actually submits code to flame over. FWIW, I'm a mild, civically > minded democrat and peacenik. I still enjoy the occasional dogfight; > I've even been known to play Quake. :) > > Andy >
Identifying some of the specific bits is a good idea - it helps clarify things. The more I think about it, there seems to be more possibilities that match with both non-combat and combat environments - bird-strikes and large hail-stones were the latest things to occur to me, that might might require the same or similar code. LeeE _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel
