What Asobo needs to do is create an auto-save process that writes to an xml or json file the flight plan info, the current coordinates of the plane, and all plane settings at a specified time interval that can be decided on by the user in a front end setting somewhere (maybe default it to 5 or 10 minutes). This way an incomplete flight can be resumed (a flight that has taken off and not landed). The user should be able to select from a list of incomplete flights (and also have the ability to delete undesired incomplete flights) in order to pick up right where they left off. When a flight is completed, the data from the file can then be used to populate the logbook as well so total flight time is not lost for those who wish to track their logbooks."
and there is one problem – non-Asobo planes with multiple, complex, states and variable that need to be saved. ie All your current FMC settings … etc etc.
That would be one thing if you were purposely quitting a session… then it would be possible…
However, a CTD is an unexpected crash. It’s not going to save at that moment.
Yes, it could continuously save states all along the way, so maybe you could start from a minute or 5 minutes back, but, that’s yet another process sucking resources, and writing to a file, which can be expensive, especially depending on how much data is being saved… And, I agree with Geoff, 3rd party planes add a whole other layer that Asobo has zero control over.
How would things like Live Weather, Air Traffic, and Multiplayer be managed? And online ATC like VATSIM and others?
If the MSFS logbook is used, partial flights can be flown again as a new flight, not a continuation of the logbook flight. And I doubt flights are logged when a CTD happens.
Actually, it should and there really isn’t any excuse that a program like MSFS (which is likely always going to be somewhat unstable) doesn’t do this. Without getting too deep into how exceptions work, the bottom line is that the operating system provides varying levels of services such that applications can be notified when exceptions occur and do something about them. It should be relatively trivial for MSFS to install a global exception handler and then save state when it is called. That said, it may be that the architecture is a mess and grabbing all of that state isn’t as easy as it should be. But still, this is something that absolutely should have been in the product on day one. It is not hard to implement.
Beyond the sim itself, third party aircraft (and possibly apps) may have additional state that needs to get saved that the simulator won’t know about. What is really needed is that in addition to the sim properly handling exceptions and saving its own state, a callback needs to get added to SimConnect so that add-ons get notified when an exception occurs and can save their own state. On next load of the sim, the user can be given an option to recover the previous flight and then the sim can issue another callback letting third party apps know to recover their state.
I have gotten into the habit of saving my flights as soon as I begin an approach. This way I have a big collection of approaches I can jump into if I just want to practice a landing - and I can at least try to complete a flight if theres a CTD.
The problem is they are struggling with even stock UNMODDED airplane save-state.
I use the Asobo A320neo (no mods) and when I load a saved flight: all autopilot settings are erased (SPD, ALT, V/S, LNAV etc). and plane screams around the sky with engines at full power.
Therefore its a mad scramble as I try to stabilize the flight.
I just dont understand why they are struggling with this. FS9 saved flight just worked, FSX saved flight just worked, XP11 saved flight just works, MSFS saved flight = good luck with that!
So if they are struggling with a user-created save-state with even their own default unmodded planes it will be a long time before they can manage a resume function for a CTD flight (with the game writing a save file continuously in the background to capture for example the last 10 minutes)
