Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.8-2
---------------------------------
- Fixed a bug in the Linux Makefiles (Makefile, Makefile.linux,
  Makefile.linux64): "make install" will now also copy the
  subdirectories of the "models" directory.


Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.8
-------------------------------
- New model: The Gap65 is a beautiful aerobatics model airplane
  designed by Pierpaolo Garofalo, who also created the model for
  CRRCsim. The model demonstrates some of the new CRRCsim features
  in 0.9.8: moving control surfaces and steerable tail wheel.
- When reading description texts from an XML file, excessive white
  space is removed from the text to make it more readable in the
  dialog boxes.
- The skybox texture offset option is now configurable through the
  GUI.
- The "wheel" section of an airplane description file now allows
  mapping of a wheel to an R/C channel (for modelling steerable
  nose- or tailwheels).
- Added a control surface animation class that can be configured
  from the XML model description file. This class moves the control
  surfaces of the model according to control input from the
  transmitter. The following models already use this feature:
  Gap65, Allegro, Flexifly XLM.
- Added a SAL option to the launch dialog to simulate a
  side-arm-launch (only try this with special DLG models like the
  Fireworks III from the crrcsim-addon-models package, because a
  standard model can't compensate for the initial rotation around
  the yaw axis!).
- Feature Request #1123364: Models can now bring their own launch
  presets in the airplane XML description file. The airplane
  selection dialog now has a checkbox to load the default launch mode
  when the model is selected. This checkbox is only shown if the
  selected model features a default launch config.
- The texture filenames are now defined in the scenery files, not in
  crrcsim.xml.
- Corrected a bug that sometimes caused the launch option dialog to
  be placed partly off-screen.
- Changed the default F3F sound folder to "sounds/f3f/default".
- Eliminated the need to have an empty "beep" sound folder to select
  the console beep as the F3F turn signal without .wav output.
- Default wind settings can now be specified in each scenery file.
  If no wind settings for a location are stored in the configuration
  file, CRRCsim will try to load these scenery defaults before
  falling back to the internal default.
- More realistic FDM parameters for the Flexifly XLM model.
- Patches to allow CRRCSim to interface to the Crossbow MNAV autopilot
  available at http://sourceforge.net/projects/micronav by emulating a
  Crossbow MNAV navigation and servo control board (product information
  available at http://www.xbow.com/Products/productdetails.aspx?sid=193).
- Applied patch #1646254 (Fix extra qualification in 0.9.7) submitted
  by J.D. Williams.
- Fixed a bug that made dynamic soaring impossible in 0.9.7.
- Added PNG icon from patch #1647962 submitted by J.D. Williams.
- Plane selection dialog now displays the current plane when it is 
  opened.
- Fixed problems with order of evaluation of f, x and y options.



Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.7
-------------------------------
- New, more realistic thermal model (V3). See "thermalsim.html"
  in the "documentation/thermals" subfolder for more details
  on the new algorithm. The thermal model can be configured in
  crrcsim.xml which by default contains some sensible
  configuration values.
- New airplane selector dialog: Airplanes are now sorted into
  various categories, and the dialog shows the airplane description
  from the XML file.
- Bugfix: joystick selection did not work properly, it always
  fell back to joystick 0. In addition, the joystick selection
  dialog now shows the full device name in addition to the address.
- Sky rendering can now optionally be done by projecting 
  90-deg-FOV-textures (generated by TerraGen 
  [http://www.planetside.co.uk/terragen/] or any other sky
  rendering tool) onto a sky box.
- Sky and some scenery parameters can now be configured through
  the provided scenery files "davis-orig.xml" and 
  "cape_cod-orig.xml".
- In addition to the "Sky Box" and "Original Sky Dome" methods
  for sky rendering, it's now also possible to render a simple
  untextured sky dome.
- Patch submitted by Kees Lemmens: Added support for accessing
  multiple sound cards with the AUDIO interface. The card ID can
  be configured in crrcsim.xml.
- Bugfix: When installing CRRCsim on GNU/Linux with 
  "make -f Makefile.Linux install_local", it didn't find the
  F3F sound folders (but reported all folders below 
  /usr/local/share/games/crrcsim/ as sound folders). 


Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.6
-------------------------------
- New XML file format replaces the existing .air file format.
- One model file can now feature more than one airplane
  configuration (different looks, additional ballast, ...)
- Converted all existing .air files to the new .xml file format.
- Airplanes can now be assigned more than one sound file. All 
  sounds will be played simultaneously, the mix ratio can be 
  configured freely.
- New sound type: "glider" sound (depending on relative and
  absolute speed of an airplane)
- Added a default glider sound file to some of the airplanes.
- Feature request #1184231 Mac OS X: file location change request:
  saved in user preferences folder
- Removed static linkage of dlportio.dll on windows
- Added a platform-specific message box that displays errors if 
  CRRCsim was unable to start up
- Fixed a rendering problem with F3F mode: base pylons appear 
  translucent in training mode and text color should be white 
  in "normal" mode
- Fixed the problems with the sound folders for F3F on windows
- improvement of macosx video intialisation reliability
- added macosx xcode version 2.2 project file
- Fixed sky display anomaly on macosx and atirage pro video
- New model: Pemotec Flexifly XLM
- New stars-and-stripes-finish for the "Sport"
- Some more wind and thermal presets



Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.5
-------------------------------

- New power and propulsion system: Instead of the old
  "magic source of thrust" the powered planes now
  feature a detailed simulation of the propulsion system.
  It is mainly aimed towards electric planes and simulates
  things like changing battery voltage over current drain
  and capacity, engine/shaft/gearbox inertias and efficiency,
  prop efficiency and prop folding.
- Added a battery capacity indicator to the HUD
- Added indicator for wind direction to the HUD
- Airplane 3D models are now rendered by loading common
  3D file formats (AC3D, 3D Studio Max, ...) instead of
  describing their geometry in the .air files.
- Video setup will now try different color depths before
  giving up
- Fixed bugs #1251999/#1252344: CRRCsim crashed when
  selecting the parallel interface on Win32
- Fixed a lot of coordinate system issues
- Lots of structural changes to the code



Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.4
-------------------------------

- Integrated F3F mode from crrcsim-f3f
- More flexible engine sound handling: A .wav file for
  the engine sound can be specified in the .air file,
  together with an engine attribute (electric or glow)
- "Pure" gliders now ignore the throttle input
- New models: Zagi-XS, Rutan Quickie
- Improved RCTRAN2 interface
- Improved FMSPIC interface
- Feature request #1184223: audio input mixer disable option.
  Mixer can now be disabled for all interfaces.
- Bugfixes



Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.3
-------------------------------

- Acoustic variometer for all platforms
- Configuration dialog for audio settings
- Simplified configuration (one central dialog)
- New dialog for transmitter calibration and mapping
- New interface type: FMSPIC - serial connection via an
  FMS-Pic-style cable. Supports 19200 baud / 0xFF and
  9600 baud / 0xF0+ cables (9600/0xF0+ is still experimental)
- Added a software mixer to the audio interface (exponential,
  trim and rate limit settings)
- Enabled new thermal simulation code
- Added an FPS limiter to reduce CPU usage on fast systems
- Fixed bug #1177488: Rudder reversal in test mode
- Fixed issue #1093835: CRRCsim now reports an
  error and cleanly exits if a texture file is missing instead of
  crashing without error message.
- Joystick now has a default mapping (axis 0 and 1 mapped to
  elevator and aileron)
- Fixed issue #1176549: overflow in windfield simulation
- New model: arkanj-mg11.air




Release Notes for CRRCSim 0.9.2
-------------------------------

What's new in 0.9.2?
--------------------

Graphical user interface

The most obvious new feature is a dialog-based graphical user
interface (GUI) which can be activated by pressing <ESC>. Use
it to configure your transmitter interface, the video and audio
settings, to choose a different airplane model or to save your
configuration changes to disk. The GUI also provides a
replacement for the old "verbose" mode which printed various
information to stdout. All information will now be displayed
right inside the simulation window if you activated the verbose
mode (View-->Toggle verbose).


XML configuration file

The configuration is no longer stored in crrcsim.cfg. This file
was replaced by crrcsim.xml. If you prefer configuring CRRCSim
by hand instead of using the GUI, you can still edit this file
with a text editor or an XML editor. Just in case you messed up
anything in this file you can simply delete it. On the next startup
everything will be reset to default values and crrcsim.xml will
automatically be recreated.


Transmitter interfaces

AUDIO: This interface type now is an official part of CRRCSim on
all supported platforms. It acquires the transmitter's PPM signal
from the trainer chord plug via the PC's soundcard. More information
on how to connect the transmitter can be found in the documentation
directory.

RCTRAN2 (experimental): This interface type is included as a
possible replacement for the existing RCTRAN interface on GNU/Linux.
It uses the /proc file system instead of sharing memory with the
kernel through mbuff. For more information on how to build the kernel
module and how to use this interface, please consult the information
from the documentation directory.


Launch mode configuration

In older versions of CRRCSim the initial status of the airplane after
a simulation reset was described in the .air file of this plane. Thus,
you had to edit this file if you wanted to start at a different
altitude or with a different velocity. Now the launch parameters
(altitude, velocity and angle) can be configured from within CRRCSim.
The launch dialog offers presets for a variety of launch modes 
(hand start, ground start, HLG throw, winch start) and also offers the
possibility to create new custom launch parameter sets.


Auto-zooming

To compensate for the limited resolution of a PC monitor which makes
it difficult to control the plane when flying at great distance from
the viewpoint, the zoom can now be configured to automatically follow
your plane. You can access this setting through the video resolution
dialog. Set the auto-zoom value to zero to disable this feature.


New airplane models

    * Skorpion, an F3F-oriented slope soarer
    * Melyan 01, a twin-boom sports plane
    * Tug, another sports plane
    * Skimmer, a typical beginner model
    * Zipper, a flying wing for slope soaring made by Birdworks
    * Zip60, the sixty-inch-Zipper 


Support for joysticks with up to eight axis

Older versions only supported four axis which made it impossible
to use the Great Planes USB controller as it maps the rudder control
to a higher axis number.


Basic sounds

There is a simple audio variometer (currently linux only) and engine
sound. Please notice that engine sound is currently not related to the
selected model. When chosing a glider you have to turn of the engine
sound manually. Plane-dependend sound effects will be integrated in a
future release. 


Test mode

Pressing 'd' will change to test mode. This shows the effect of the
input control signals on the plane without the risk of crashing.
If AUDIO is selected as transmitter interface, a small oscilloscope
will show the signal from the sound card input.
