Help with ProjectAI

[Eric_Rose]

Okay...can someone help me installing project AI? Before, when you wanted a certain airline in your sim world, you would just click on the darn thing and then run the installer. Well, I went back to ProjectAI.com and the installers are no where to be found. I don't know what I need to get things loaded! There are no instructions on the site, the FAQ link in not active and there is no help!
Can someone help me out?????
Thank you!!!

[ross607]

Hi Eric,  :)

I'm new to this forum (first post actually!!!) but think i can help you out.

Projectai have changed there website round quite a bit recently so it is pretty confusing..... basically from the home page you need to select "Certified Resources" from the list of choices on the left. On that page you will see a  hyperlink called "Packages".  Click on that and it will take you to the screen that you should be familiar with where you can download the base installer and then all the auto install airline pacakages that you want.

Hope this helps, cheers mate.

Ross

[Eric_Rose]

Hey there Ross, For being your first post, you are already family...you helped me out a great deal.
I use to be proficient in all this stuff, until I went on a 3 month unexpected vacation from simming due to a computer crash and a dog-chewed FS2K2 disk 1.
Anyway, Thank you bunches!

[ross607]

Hey no probs, i've been lurking here for a little while picking up some great tips from others on the board, everyone seems really cool and friendly...  Thought it was about time I made myself useful!! hehe.

Yeah I read your other post in a different thread  about the dog chewing incident!!! nightmare!! although the image of your dog chomping on your disk did amuse me slightly sorry!  ;)  Can imagine the look of horror on your face when you saw the disk!! I dont blame you for buying it again though, dont think I could be without FS2002 for too long!!

Ross

Ps. Congrats on becoming a Dad!!!!!  ;D

[Eric_Rose]

Thank you for the very nice sentiment!
We are very glad to have you in the community.

I do have another question for you or anyone!
I downloaded the base installer...and the airline packages (both the old installers and the new). Everything seems to go great, but when the self installer (for the new style) runs, it goes through and installs all the appropriate files and a check mark appears next to all the items...but unfortunately there is no check mark next to "AFCAD Files Installed". I have AFCAD, so, I am not sure if this is normal, or should it have installed them?

[zcottovision]

That just means that no AFCAD files were included in the release of that particularly airline, because none were needed. Most of the PAI files don't have any AFCAD files, so you don't have to worry about it.  :)

[FSTipster]

Whilst I've used AFCAD to get the A.I. aircraft to use my add-on scenery correctly (where I can find the files) I've never bothered with the A.I aircraft themselves.

However, the more I read this thread, the more inclined I am to take a look.

Lee Swordy's original Ttools, whilst an EXCELLENT creation and grandfather of all A.I. utility files, always looked a bit too complicated for me to have the times to get to grips with it.

These Project A.I. installers sound interesting though.

Do they install all the required A.I. aircraft too if you don't have them? Lastly, what are the frame rate penalties like? I realise that an increase in A.I. traffic is one of the major culprits for f.p.s. drops, but how bad is it exactly?

[BFMF]

I've been using the old installer and files so i'm not sure how much of a difference there is with the new formats.

PAI has built their own aircraft models to be used with  AI traffic. These models are specifically designed for AI and are built to have the frame rate penalty as low as possible.

[Eric_Rose]

Hey there Tipster, Project AI (using the installers) loads all the required aircraft models and textures and everything. In addition, after you install a certain airline "package" you will also have all those aircraft as flyable. As far as the FPS hits, I haven't found any -and I mean any- framerate distortion. If I ever have to do a re-install of my flight sim, Project AI is the first to go back in...which is how and why this thread came to be.

On a personal note...it is glad to have you still here. I read all that was going on with you and I am so glad that some admirable person did such a good thing!
There are still good souls in the world!

[FSTipster]

Thanks for the info - I'll be on my way there now!

Eric - good to see you back and indeed, humanity still has hope.  :)

[FSTipster]

Following the instructions above, I arrived at:

http://projectai.flight1.net/installer/default.php

I went to d/load the PAI-Installer...and......"File not found".

[FSTipster]

I'm downloading stuff from PAI like crazy here.

Before I set about installing it, could someone answer me a few questions please:

If I have, say, British Airways as a d/load, will it overwrite my British airways textures that I have on my POSKY 747? Or does it just affect the default models?

Or does it just add a whole bunch of new A.I. aircraft?

Finally, I've downloaded the 2 files to remove the default traffic. First - my FS2002 setup is WAY beyond default, and I noticed a warning about that. What does it actually do? Just remove the use of these aircraft as A.I. or delete them, or what?

All help appreciated.

[BFMF]

If I have, say, British Airways as a d/load, will it overwrite my British airways textures that I have on my POSKY 747? Or does it just affect the default models?

Or does it just add a whole bunch of new A.I. aircraft?

PAI adds it's own AI only aircrafts plus textures, see my above post about the aircraft

Finally, I've downloaded the 2 files to remove the default traffic. First - my FS2002 setup is WAY beyond default, and I noticed a warning about that. What does it actually do? Just remove the use of these aircraft as A.I. or delete them, or what?

That file doesn't delete the default aircraft, it just removes them as AI traffic from FS2002.
What I did was move and rename my default traffic.bgl file to a safe location, that way if I ever need to return to the default AI, I could.

All help appreciated.

I hope I helped

[zcottovision]

No, PAI files won't overwrite any of your existing textures. They create seperate aircaft files, using seperate models and seperate textures. They just show up in the Aircraft list as PAI planes.

About the default traffic: I used ones called "restore traffic.bgl to default state" and then "remove GA/commercial aircraft" patches, before starting again from scratch. There are some great GA AI files available, much better than the MS ones, so you don't get hundreds of cessnas landing at Heathrow...!

[FSTipster]

Ok thanks for that both.

Two (hopefully final questions.

I know i'm sounding like a pregnant Father with all this, but this is stepping into the unknown for me and I get real twitchy about installing anything if i don't know what it's doing, so please bear with me.

1) The base installer I've got is PAI Installer v1.19d.zip.
Is that the old one or the new one and where do I find the other one? (I assume I use the old installer for the airline files duly marked that way.)

2) I already have AFCAD files installed for a lot of my add-on scenery because the taxiway and parking positions are often different. Are project AIs files going to overwrite these with their own AFCAD files for the default positioning?