Flightbeam's San Francisco 2.0 screw up!

[specialist]

I've got almost all FSDT sceneries, and as we all know, it's activated through the addon manager. Flightbeam put out their 2.0 update today, and for some reason not only does it have a problem activating through the addon manager, but it screwed up all my FSDT sceneries. Now I can't see none of the terminals in all off my FSDT airports!!!

[cmpbllsjc]

In the post above yours in the Flightbeam forum, Amir said that its an Addon Manager problem and will be fixed shortly.

[virtuali]

It's not an Addon Manager problem.

It's just not possible the Addon Manager included in the KSFO installer would cause problems with our sceneries, because it's EXACTLY THE SAME Addon Manager we install with our sceneries. The files are taken exactly from the same location, are updated online, so they are always the same and the latest version.

Your problem is surely caused by something else entirely, like the antivirus mistakenly blocking our modules.

Check if you have BOTH the Addon Manager menu AND the Couatl menus under the Addons menu in FSX.

 If only Couatl is missing, than it's 100% sure you haven't correctly set the antivirus, please follow this to the letter, don't skip any step.

- Uninstall the scenery. Reply YES when asked if you want to remove the Addon Manager and the Couatl Engine. Reply YES to both questions.

- TURN OFF your antivirus. Don't just exit from its interface, but turn off the real time protection. Actual wording changes between products, however, it's the option to scan every file that gets open in real time, without user intervention.

- Reinstall the scenery with the Antivirus TURNED OFF. Don't launch FSX yet.

- Configure the antivirus to exclude the following files from scanning:

YourFSXFolder\bglmanx.dll
YourFSXFolder\fsdreamteam\Couatl\couatl.exe

YourFSXFolder it's usually C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Microsoft Flight Simulator X, if you installed it in the default folder.

- Now you can turn the antivirus back on, and launch FSX.

- Check you are seeing BOTH the "Addon Manager" menu AND the "Couatl powered products" menu under the "Addons" menu.

[specialist]

When I get home this afternoon from work, I will try your suggestion. Although, I don't use antivirus programs with my dedicated FSX computer, since that is all I use it for.

[Bakern]

Hi Virtuali.

I have never had any problem with disapearing object's\terminal's when installing your and FB scenery, have done all this thing's with AV, so that should not be a problem. But installing FB's v.2 today, i have no longer terminal building's at KSFO and your scenery's, so i think something is messing up here, some place... Just take a look at my dll.xml files and you see!!!

DLL.XML before installing KSFO v.2

http://i1009.photobucket.com/albums/af218/Bakern/Before.jpg

DLL.XML after installing KSFO v.2

http://i1009.photobucket.com/albums/af218/Bakern/After.jpg

Brgds
Stein-Ove

[virtuali]

Just take a look at my dll.xml files and you see!!!

There's nothing wrong with your dll.xml file after the KSFO installation (which is the same installer as FSDT anyway), it would have been easier for me to check, if you posted the actual file here, instead of a screenshot of it.

However, it doesn't seems wrong, it's just not cleanly formatted, which still indicates something wrong happened during the installation (because we run a reformatting tool at the end of the install to clean up that file). However, not being cleanly formatted it's not a problem at all with an XML file since, the whole point of an XML file is not being dependent on formatting: as long as all the tags are properly open/closed, the file is still a legal XML file and will be parsed correctly by FSX. The only reason why we run a reformatter to clean it up at the end, it's ONLY because OTHER 3rd party installer, that are unable to deal with XML files properly, and mistakenly threat them as being text files, can be confused, which is why we clean it up at the end.

For some reason, yours haven't been cleaned up (perhaps the antivirus has even killed the reformatter...which is absurd, considering it's a standard W3C utility) but, as I've said, the file is correct.

If it wasn't, you wouldn't see ANY 3rd party module. If you see the Addon Manager menu, it means the DLL.XML is OK.

Which is why I asked to check for COUATL instead. Do you see its menu ? The Couatl program is in the EXE.XML, not in the DLL.XML.

[Bakern]

Thank's for answer.

This thing happens every time i install a scenery who use addon manager and coatl, seems you have to take look at that reformatter.  

I have now disabled AV totally, uninstalled KSFO (addon m.\couatl also), deleted  "trusted" section in FSX, and restarted my pc, disable my AV again, installed KSFO.

I have followed your install routine, all the way, and get this result:

http://i1009.photobucket.com/albums/af218/Bakern/Pic3052.jpg

Checking other scenery's who use AddonM.\Couatl, same thing, terminals\buildings are gone. Period.!!

I'm getting real frustated over this addon\couatl "thing" every time i install a new scenery with addonm.\couatl are in use, please fix this one time for all.

Brgds
Stein-Ove

[virtuali]

This thing happens every time i install a scenery who use addon manager and coatl, seems you have to take look at that reformatter.  

The reformatted works and, as I've said, it's not really needed, it's just a precaution because, if you run OTHER installers (not ours) that can't handle XML files properly, they can't be confused by an unformatted XML line. So, it doesn't have anything to do with your issue.

Checking other scenery's who use AddonM.\Couatl, same thing, terminals\buildings are gone. Period

That's to be expected, if there's no Couatl, no scenery that requires it will work, now we need to understand why it's not working on your system. Please standby for a check we need to do here.

[ewerber]

Hello, I own your KFLL scenery and today I went to try the new KSFO 2.0 and also lost all building.
After a bit of checking I discovered the fault is in couatl.exe.
FSX tries to open the new couatl.exe and it immediately closes down.
I then copied the last version of couatl.exe over the new version the FB installer downloaded
and couatl.exe is now lunching ok so it appears we have a problem with the new couatl.exe.
I am running Windows 7 Ultimate x64 and as i said couatl usually runs fine, also no AV.

[Bakern]

Ok, thank's.

if you run OTHER installers (not ours) that can't handle XML files properly,

Just for your info, this issue happens with your's installer too, i have to manually edit dll.xml after installing scenery who are using this addonm\couatl, it's not a big issue for me but i'm thinking of thoose who maybe can have a issue with it.

Stein-Ove

[virtuali]

Just for your info, this issue happens with your's installer too

As I've said, since the KSFO installer it's the same as ours, if something that's wrong on your system is preventing the reformatter to run, it's still there regardless which installer you use.

i have to manually edit dll.xml after installing scenery who are using this addonm\couatl, it's not a big issue for me but i'm thinking of thoose who maybe can have a issue with it.

Again, this is not a problem, your XML files ARE correct, the reformatter it's just an extra precaution in order not to risk potential issues with other installers that are not XML-aware you might run in the future, but having it cleaned up, it's not required to run the scenery, because FSX is able to correctly parse the XML file even if it was all in a single line.

So, please, let's put aside the reformatter issue, because that's not the issue here. The problem is Couatl not running for a reason.  

As I've said, standy for a check, because maybe we found the issue, doesn't have anything to do with anything ever reported here before, it's a new problem, which we should be able to fix.

[Flyboy0284]

Tried to re-install everything.  Still the same problem.  Anti-Virus off the entire time.  Anyone have any other suggestions?

[virtuali]

As I've said in my last message, standy for a check, because maybe we found the issue, doesn't have anything to do with anything ever reported here before, it's a new problem, which we should be able to fix.

[Flyboy0284]

As I've said in my last message, standy for a check, because maybe we found the issue, doesn't have anything to do with anything ever reported here before, it's a new problem, which we should be able to fix.

Thanks.  That last message squeaked in as I was composing my post.

[virtuali]

While we are fixing the problem, I've put a slightly older version of Couatl.exe which should probably work. You can get it by reinstalling any scenery or the Stand-alone Addon Manager. This should be able to get you going while we work at the problem with the new version.