
A customer reported an error in the map used by Flight Simulator - Doubleguitars
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20170418-00/?p=95985
======
kpao
It's an everyday occurrence during the development of our app (Infinite
Flight).

We often get customers complaining about a misplaced sticker on a livery, a
missing exit door in a particular variant of a the 737-900... That type of
stuff is easily verifiable. But for things like the airplane not behaving in a
way they expect in certain conditions, or perhaps a wrong approach speed or
angle, discussions usually start with: "We tuned the airplane based on
information available to us at the time we built the airplane. We are happy to
make any changes based on an actual report from one or more pilots flying on
this airplane, or better yet, the aircraft manual if you can get your hands on
one."

The discussion usually ends there :)

One we get often is about why it's possible to do a barrel roll in a jet liner
in Infinite Flight. We simply point them to the video of that test pilot who
did one in a 707 ;-)

~~~
kordless
This was done in Seattle:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ra_khhzuFlE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ra_khhzuFlE)

~~~
hermitdev
Boeing also did a near-vertical take off in the 787 during their initial tests
(and a few times after at air shows) This video [1] from a past Paris air
show, shows a 787 ready for a delivery to Vietnam Airlines doing a very
aggressive & short (but not vertical take off). Pretty ballsy to do such a
thing in such an expensive jet that's on its way to delivery to a client.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5_8D8HCnS4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5_8D8HCnS4)

~~~
overcast
According to comments, it was nowhere near vertical, which is why they didn't
show it from a side angle. Apparently indicator light goes off at 30 degrees,
indicating imminent engine stall.

~~~
kpao
What do you mean engine stall?

As long are you have enough thrust, airspeed and no system preventing you to
go above a certain pitch or AOA, then the plane should fly just fine...

~~~
JorgeGT
Excessive AOA causes streamline detachments in the diffuser that cause
compressor stall: [http://www.free-online-private-pilot-ground-
school.com/image...](http://www.free-online-private-pilot-ground-
school.com/images/xcompressor-airflow.gif.pagespeed.ic.Sk_s8wyIqh.png)

~~~
kpao
Right, but there's no excessive AOA here... except during recovery maybe but I
doubt they let it go that high...

------
sandworm101
Reminds me of the funniest thing i ever read on the internet. I once played FS
with a realism mod that would simulate passenger needs. One day someone
appeared on our "virtual airline" forum asking for help:

" Hit severe turbulance over seattle on route to alaska. Didnt have seatbelt
sign on. One dead, several injured. Am playing in-flight movie but passengers
still angry. Should i serve meal early or wait until closer to destination?"

~~~
TerminalJunkie
This quote was stolen from the comments section on the original article by
Brian_EE

"I wonder how realistic the operations of the virtual airlines are. In the
game, do you get to have local police come on your plane and beat up your
passengers and drag them off before you take off on your flight route?"

~~~
sandworm101
FS is pilot-focused. They dont simulate the exciting world of ticket counters
and baggage limits. But there is probably a german sim that, from the makers
of AirportSimulator (see nerdcubed's coverage of that series). German
simulators are a strange market niche.

~~~
selimthegrim
I remember googling furiously once I discovered Euro Truck Simulator to
confirm it wasn't some Steam Greenlight prank...

~~~
yongjik
I heard that game has some cult followers in Korea. Some gamers buy steering
wheels and gears, put on the monitor a sticker saying "Freight Union", wear
fingerless gloves and a red Freight Union vest, and start driving while
listening to radio...

------
squeaky-clean
This reminds me of a story I read in PCGamer long ago (I tried searching for
the article, but I don't even know if it was published online). The author got
into their seat for a flight, next to someone with a gaming laptop running a
flight simulator. They chatted about video games for a while, and the gamer
explains that they like to set up the simulator to play the same flight they
are currently taking, and try to take off and land at the same time.

About halfway through the flight, the gamer remarks that the pilot is wrong,
and not taking the best route for the flight. The flight sim path and real
plane are going in slightly different directions. They try to tell a flight
attendant who assures them know "the pilot knows what they're doing." The
remaining half of the flight they complained to either the author or other
attendants, acting like they knew more than the staff.

They never got to finish their flight-sim though, because the real plane
landed 20 minutes ahead of schedule. I guess the pilot did take a different
path after all!

~~~
squeaky-clean
Actually I just remembered an even more relevant funny story. One of the
services I maintain at my job is a list of airport locations and their names
in various languages (for airlines to use) among other details. I get so many
requests to change things from airlines that don't understand basic geography
or even where they fly.

My favorite is when a customer was raising hell because London International
Airport (YXU) wasn't appearing under the city listing for London, UK and
demanding it be added immediately. I had to tell them you don't fly there...
it's located in Canada.

~~~
Pxtl
Hah. The Y prefix alone should've been a tip off. I don't know a darned thing
about air travel but I know Canada is stuck with the Y.

~~~
Zombieball
I think technically Canada is stuck with the "C" prefix (vs. "K" for USA) eg.
CYVR, CYUL, CYXX

We also have airports with "CZ" (eg. CZBB).

I am not sure what the difference (if any) between CZ vs. CY codes is.
Probably just sticking with convention (begin with Y or Z because everyone
else does).

~~~
agrahul
Yes, the entirety of C is currently allocated to Canada[1]. The parent
comments were talking about IATA codes, though, which aren't allocated by
prefix.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Civil_Aviation_O...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Civil_Aviation_Organization_airport_code#Prefixes)

~~~
Pxtl
While IATA codes do not require a consistent prefix, all the Canadian airports
start with Y:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_airports_by_IATA_code:...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_airports_by_IATA_code:_Y)

~~~
Zombieball
Interesting. I still see Canadian airports starting with Z.

But Y is heavily Canadian. We should all just start our own airport. Sounds
like a good way to learn about naming. I imagine we will want an airport code
staring with YC, so it'll have to be in Canada :P

------
roryisok
Not funny but sort of relevant. Here in Ireland we just had an air disaster -
an air sea rescue helicopter crashed into an island off the west coast and all
aboard were killed. The accident investigation has determined that the island
was not registered on the aircraft's mapping system.

~~~
hermitdev
This is why every air craft comes equipped with a set of MKII eyeballs. Not
trying to make light of it, or anything, but this is a prime example of why
good vision is a requirement of any pilot. Not familiar with this incident or
whether it was night-time or during inclement weather.

Regardless of the circumstance, my apologies & condolences to the friends &
family of the crew and any passengers. From your short description, this seems
like an easily avoided accident and I hope actions are being taken to prevent
a recurrence.

~~~
roryisok
According to the recovered black box recordings, one of the crew did see the
island, but not soon enough.

Probably the most shocking part is that there was a lighthouse on this island,
which was operational at the time. This is shocking both because it should
have been blindingly obvious to the pilot and crew that they were flying
toward a lighthouse, and also that an island significant enough to have a
lighthouse on it would not be on a digital mapping system. It's on Google maps
- [https://goo.gl/maps/Xdt7rzUErX42](https://goo.gl/maps/Xdt7rzUErX42), even
has photos and information. This is not some insignificant rock

How an aircraft mapping system can have such a huge omission is just mind-
blowing

~~~
theoh
To be clear, the deficiency was in a warning system database of 3D elevation
geometry (the EGPWS) not a "mapping system".

Something that is geographically notable but quite small, vertical and
isolated (like Rockall) may very well also be omitted from that version of the
EGPWS database.

NB Blackrock is a designated navigational waypoint on the standard charts etc.
which is why they were flying straight toward it on autopilot.

~~~
roryisok
> Something that is geographically notable but quite small, vertical and
> isolated (like Rockall) may very well also be omitted from that version of
> the EGPWS database.

Why are "small" and "isolated" good criteria for omitting something from a
database of elevation geometry? It's evidently big enough to crash into and
cause loss of life.

~~~
theoh
I'm not suggesting that those are criteria, just possible contributing
factors. (And I'm not trying to exonerate the suppliers. We'll see what the
final report says.)

If the source is some kind of DEM (digital elevation model) data, it will be a
raster of elevation values at some limited resolution, so necessarily just
samples of elevation. With a relatively small island/rock, the full height
could be missed, and possibly then even further reduced by filtering (i.e.
smoothing of DEM values, either in the process of measurement or some kind of
processing). That likelihood is hinted at by this quote from the manufacturer:

"Honeywell’s terrain data is sourced from our supplier [named supplier]. It is
a digitized topographic map derived data set. It does not include Black Rock.
We have looked at alternate sources, including SRTM and ASTER. While Black
Rock is present in these alternate data sets, the actual altitude of Black
Rock is considerably higher than what is indicated in these alternate data
sets."

The data sources they refer to:
[http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/srtm/](http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/srtm/)
[https://asterweb.jpl.nasa.gov/gdem.asp](https://asterweb.jpl.nasa.gov/gdem.asp)

Again, not coming to any conclusions from this.

------
mdip
That's hysterical. Flight Simulator was an incredible product back in the day.
My father was a weather, IFR[0] certified small plane pilot.

He used MS Flight Simulator to train to get his license back after several
years of having let it lapse and to train for his IFR certification. To this
day, other than watching him play Pac Man at K-Mart in the 80s, I had not
before, nor since, seen him play any video game on his home PC.

[0] Most small plane pilots have basic licenses - VFR - or Visual Flight
Rules. IFR is for pilots who have instrument ratings. It's not all-together
rare, but not necessarily common and is usually reserved for pilots who fly in
a more professional capacity, as my father did. He was certified to fly a
single engine aircraft (he flew a Cherokee -- 6?) and had more hours on him
some years than some commercial pilots.

~~~
chrisper
I pretty much only play X-Plane as well. Don't really play any of the other
games anymore. X-Plane is probably the only game I played that has over 300
hours.

------
fanf2
Shower curtains are often terrible. My periodic table shower curtain is a
jarringly awful mixture of Arial and Helvetica:
[http://fanf.livejournal.com/147327.html](http://fanf.livejournal.com/147327.html)

~~~
Sharlin
How is that even possible? I mean, unless it's intentional.

~~~
dotancohen
The information was copy-pasted with a "smart" formatting tool.

~~~
Sharlin
Eh, that doesn't explain how the letters _in the same element name_ end up
having different font...

------
TerminalJunkie
It's very impressive to me that Microsoft took the technical details of Flight
Simulator so seriously that it fielded questions from customers like this.
What's doubly more impressive is that Bill Gates got directly involved with
what is essentially a bug report.

~~~
draw_down
It's interesting certainly, but should we be impressed here? In the end, the
team's time was wasted and a nonsense issue was escalated to _the CEO_.

~~~
tbrake
They fielded the question and did a lot of work because they cared about the
quality and details of their product at a level that I would agree with OP was
impressive.

That it turned out to be a nonsense issue is immaterial to that judgement.

~~~
draw_down
There are exemplary aspects to the story, but I think the only real lesson to
be learned is "don't blindly spend a bunch of time/effort on an issue unless
we're sure it's actually important".

------
janwillemb
The story may be a bit exaggerated for entertainment purposes, but this seems
like a classic case of "try to fix first, ask questions later". They could
have saved a lot of time by asking the customer for clarification first.

~~~
newsat13
Totally this. Funny story, but if it's real this only talks of Microsoft's
incompetence rather than the customers.

------
orng
This reminds me of a story I remember hearing a few times as a child:

During WW2, British, and later, American forces set up base in Iceland. On
some of the maps they had created, items of note had been added with symbols.
This included lighthouses and there were little lighthouse symbols littered
around the coast. However for some reason there also was a lighthouse symbol
in the middle of the Icelandic highlands, far from any seashore.

The explanation was that this supposed lighthouse was by the volcano Askja,
who's largest crater is called "Víti" (Hell), while the Icelandic word for
lighthouse is "viti". Since English doesn't have the accented letter "í", they
would have been spelled the same in English.

I could have sworn this was a true story up until now when I tried to find
sources for it, but came up empty. In any case it makes for a good story.

------
alasdair_
Given that an incorrect map caused Windows 95 to be banned from the whole of
India, it's understandable that BillG was worried about an incorrect border :)

Story here:

[https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/01/how_microsoft_offen...](https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/01/how_microsoft_offended_millions/)

~~~
sb057
Not really incorrect, just disputed.

~~~
pqr
This is how Google handles disputes (give everyone what they want)
[http://slightlywarped.com/wp-
content/uploads/2015/06/google-...](http://slightlywarped.com/wp-
content/uploads/2015/06/google-maps-different-borders-depending-on-country-
you-are-viewing-from.jpg)

~~~
golergka
I would prefer they'd show actual reality on the ground instead of trying to
win political points though - for the sake of people who're actually trying to
use it for navigation.

~~~
Declanomous
Yeah, I'm not sure how travel in the affected areas worked, but if I'm
travelling in an area occupied by Pakistan, I want it to show Pakistan on the
map. If I'm stopped while visiting that region, I'm sure I'm not going to get
any brownie points for showing the Pakistani military an Indian visa.

~~~
golergka
Elsewhere, driving into a wrong area might cost you your life. Specifically
not referring to particular areas to avoid offtopic flame war, but other apps
would alert you about it - but not Google Maps.

------
filereaper
Does anyone know why Microsoft killed off Flight Simulator?

I really liked that product, and it has the legacy of being one of Microsoft's
oldest product lines.

There's also a very vibrant community about adding mods and additions onto
Flight Simulator, I'm really curious as to why it was killed off. Was the the
Flight Sim team really that big of a drain on Microsoft's balance sheet?

Just really sad about spending hours on a product dying off... :(

~~~
ThrowawayFS
> _Does anyone know why Microsoft killed off Flight Simulator?_

From an external perspective, it seems most likely due to IEB's leadership at
the time wanting to focus all their resources behind the upcoming Xbox One, in
hopes they could replicate the success of the Xbox 360, and the misguided
belief that PC gaming was dying out.

Neither of those bets worked out particularly well for them.

> _Was the the Flight Sim team really that big of a drain on Microsoft 's
> balance sheet?_

Rumor has it that it consistently turned a small but not insignificant profit.

------
microtherion
Speaking of flight simulator war stories... A friend once smashed into a giant
wall during take-off in a flight simulator he was testing, since the runway in
question crossed either the equator or the null Meridian, and the cumulative
altitude rounding errors caused a sizable discontinuity.

~~~
tigershark
I hope that you mean Greenwich, aka meridian _zero_ rather than _null_
meridian. I don't really think that the latter exists unless you are an old C
programmer flying _quite high_ right now.

~~~
microtherion
Heh. I hadn't realized that the German usage in this case did not transfer
directly into English. Yes, I meant the prime / Greenwich meridian.

------
rburhum
I worked in the mapping (GIS) pipeline for MS Flight Simulator. The amount of
tools we wrote just for QA was on par with what countries use for their census
(I also worked on those st ESRI). I try to be of the philosophy of love and
obsess about your customers, but every industry has fellows like this that
make you question your beliefs. Still love them though... (mostly)

------
JustSomeNobody
How many thousands of dollars could MS have saved if they had asked that
question first?

------
sarreph
I love the Boeing management anecdote being referenced in comparison to Bill
Gates nudging you off'f an email he receives![0]

Great nugget to pull out if you have a manager with a penchant for stating the
obvious!

[0] -
[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20100705-00/?p=...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20100705-00/?p=13503)

------
11thEarlOfMar
Because the customer is always right.

~~~
6stringmerc
"The customer is frequently misinformed." \- More realistic variation I came
across, can't remember attribution, paraphrased anyway.

~~~
TallGuyShort
"The customer hired you for a reason." Make their needs a priority and don't
talk to them like they're idiots, but by all means recognize when you're the
expert who needs to make the right things happen for them to be successful.

~~~
6stringmerc
"There are some customers you just don't want." The 80/20 offhand calculation
of 80% of obligations can be traced to 20% of customers is pertinent.

Or, as I learned over time, trying to save a drowning person without the help
of a flotation device just might pull you down into the abyss as well, good
intentions not withstanding.

------
nommm-nommm
Next bug report, "non-existent islands shown off the coast of Australia" \-
[http://worldmapswithout.nz](http://worldmapswithout.nz)

------
tiku
This reminds me of the story of the navy ship and the lighthouse.

------
GTP
This made me laugh

------
magma17
clearly fake 'cause bill gates doesn't email with under a billion worth
people.

------
akud
This shows poor leadership by Bill Gates. Did he not value his team's time?

------
bsenftner
This is not a Flight Simulator story. This is an end-user that cannot separate
software from reality. Similar to the just released Facebook AR Studio, I've
spent time in "personalizing technologies" which manipulate imagery of people.
The types of bug reports common to that type of work reveals the lack of
understanding everyday people have with their own vision system and how basic
physics in the world work. It's hard to describe the disconnect some have in
their relationship with software - almost like it's a magical authority to
them. Cartoon effects like classic loony tunes bombs and dazed-dizzy-stars
scare some people as if the effects are real.

------
thekevan
How does this even matter or is relevant at all? I'm confused it received
upvotes. Am I missing something?

~~~
fizzbitch
Preach it! Humor should be disallowed on HN. I come here for uberserious
discussion only.

~~~
B1FF_PSUVM
Or uplyfting insights.

Hey, we've got company: in the MS blog's comments, there's a fellow who archly
informs the peasants that "I usually archive & star (bookmark) articles that
have an amazingly interesting or peculiar technical aspects. With this one,
I’ll gladly make an exception."

Dammit, Raymond Chen is out of pocket for a refund on that guy's subscription.

~~~
knodi123
> Dammit, Raymond Chen is out of pocket for a refund on that guy's
> subscription.

?!? That sounded like a positive review from somebody who liked the article.
He says it's neither amazingly interesting nor technical, but still good
enough to bookmark.

~~~
aryamaan
Woah, I misread it too and in retrospective, it looks like an honest mistake
to make. That pessage could mean the both things (could give positive or
negative intent). I wonder what other such good examples can be. And does such
phenomenon is called with some name?

~~~
FroshKiller
It's called a backhanded compliment.

