Automatic schedule conversion testing!

[Sami]

A feature that many of you have been asking is now here for testing. The ability to move schedules between fleet groups.

In other words convert your DC-9 schedule to A320 schedule with a click of a button. No need to edit all of the routes individually! This will help in the fleet transitions a lot.

This is considered a beta level feature with limitations, possible bugs, and missing additional features.

It is currently only available to members to specifically sign up to use it, and it is not recommended for new users. The system does not support all combinations yet, bugs are highly possible, and some things may have been (accidentially?) omitted. This is why feedback is requested, required and more than welcome.


How to use the new feature

#1) You need to sign up for the test group: Join the Schedule Testing group. https://www.airwaysim.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;area=groupmembership

Being a member of this group enables the feature. Otherwise you will see the standard system.

#2) Go to scheduling page, and press the 'move schedule' button (arrow icon) and you will see the normal menu of aircraft but now a dropdown of fleet groups is available. Simply choose the fleet and plane and click go...

#3) If the feature does not work, go to the group membership page ( https://www.airwaysim.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;area=groupmembership ) and leave the test group - it will disable the new features for you.


Things to note

* I recommend highly to use this only on similar aircraft, i.e. planes with similar speeds and turnarounds. For example my BAC 1-11 to DC-9 conversion works well. But converting from a very fast plane like B767 to very slow plane like DC-7 will probably not work (untested).

* Error messages are poor and do not explain well where the error is exactly. In the case of errors nothing is converted and you need to do it all manually.

* Techstops are not supported yet by the conversion. Do not attempt.

* Turnaround times are not fully converted yet. The system defaults to the player's default turnaround time for that fleet for EVERY turnaround in the schedule, and it does not consider any longer turnarounds (for example overnight stops) at this time. If there is no default time set, the system uses the minimum turnaround for that fleet group.

* Slots are only converted directly, the system does not consider the availability of slots. The idea is that changes to the flight times are minimal and slot calculations so complicated that this will be left like this. Hopefully no abuse will happen, otherwise actions are needed. Curfews at airports are checked.

* If the routes flight times change so much that it arrives/departs on another day than with the previous aircraft the system will probably do something stupid. This is still totally untested.

* Other bugs and misbehaviour is expected. In case of something goes wrong, stop using the system (leave the test group), and the best course of action to make sure all routes/slots/data is correct is to delete the route(s) in question fully (including slots) and create the route(s) again from scratch (don't copy or edit; delete fully and add new).


Please post all comments to this thread only.

The testing is currently available in all six game worlds. If problems arise the testing may be disabled in some or all game worlds.

[Zombie Slayer]

Since I rarely use even my default turn time on every flight in a schedule my testing of this feature will be minimal at this time, but I did move 2 DC-10 to A333 in GW2 and both transferred perfectly. Ideally, when transferring a schedule, the same departure time will be kept on the return flight regardless of default turn time or saved turn time, or we would have to option of transferring with the saved turn time or keeping the same departure times.

I will play with it more when I have time. I have some routes that are shoehorned in and I would like to see error messages and such if they new plane does not work.

Glad to see this request added, and I look forward to its final release!

[JumboShrimp]

It would be great if we could pick between these 2 options:

1. Maintain default turnaround time
2. Maintain the same departure times

[[ATA] Hassel]

First of all, Thanks for this great feature which i have been looking forward too in a very long time.

im in the midst of transition of fleets in GW2 so will test the feature in there - so far i've successfully replaced MD80 with A321 and i plan to do a 767 to 777 replacement in the not too distance future.

This feature will be a huge help with the 767 --> 777 especially

Currently my fleets and scheduled are already planned to make an easy transition, so i don't expect any major bugs. but i will try to do some more odd replacement later on as well, just to see the outcome

Now all we need is the mass scrapping of AC in the Aircraft page to complete the transition

[Hillians]

It would be great if we could pick between these 2 options:

1. Maintain default turnaround time
2. Maintain the same departure times

this would be very much welcomed from my part.. especially the later would work well for when you transition certain fleets
(F27->ATR, BAC - F100/  732AD/737Classics to NG's , MD8X->MD9Xs, just to name a few)
Maybe you can put a restriction that you can transition prop to prop and jet to jet.. even though prop to jet would work, I dont think it would help with the schedules..

[schro]

One thing that I could foresee helping the efficiency of this tool would be having some sort of setting to tell the system that you're in "transition mode" for a particular fleet as a way to save clicks.

For example -

Not in transition mode/normal - Clicking move schedule would pop up the same aircraft type as the default selection (i.e. You want to move a BAC schedule to a BAC)

Transition mode - Somewhere in the settings, you will make a selection that a particular fleet type is transitioning, and you can select one of your other fleet types as the intended destination (for example, you're transitioning BACs to F100's - you set that as the transition mode selection). Then, when you press the move schedule button on any of the BAC type, the default presentation to you will be the F100 (but it'll of course still be selectable incase you want to do something wonky).

This should make things significantly easier for those of us that rely heavily on keyboard use for efficiency, as I foresee this being nearly if not more annoying than the pagination that was introduced to the move schedule dialogue a while back.

[JumboShrimp]

For example -

Not in transition mode/normal - Clicking move schedule would pop up the same aircraft type as the default selection (i.e. You want to move a BAC schedule to a BAC)

Transition mode - Somewhere in the settings, you will make a selection that a particular fleet type is transitioning, and you can select one of your other fleet types as the intended destination (for example, you're transitioning BACs to F100's - you set that as the transition mode selection). Then, when you press the move schedule button on any of the BAC type, the default presentation to you will be the F100 (but it'll of course still be selectable incase you want to do something wonky).

That would be a good option.  Default option for Move Schedule would be the current mode, BAC to BAC.

But in addition to enabling BAC to F100 it would be great if we could get the selection box for sub-fleets, the same as it implemented as a filter on all of the other screens with filter.

So for example, an option to select BAC-500 sub-fleet only would be available.

Enabling sub-fleet filter would greatly ease the pagination pain on move schedule.

A 2nd filter, in addition to fleet/sub-fleet that would be helpful would be a toggle between seeing
- all aircraft
- aircraft not in maintenance

With Aircraft not in maintenance checked as a default option.  Again, this would also ease the pagination pain.  Generally, when moving schedules, one would not want to move schedule to an aircraft that is in maintenance only as a last option, not as a first option.

[Sami]

One thing that I could foresee helping the efficiency of this tool would be having some sort of setting to tell the system that you're in "transition mode" for a particular fleet as a way to save clicks.

I will do it so that it just remembers your previous fleet selection there (already planned but didn't do it yet for this first version).

[Sami]

Update

• Conversion of routes with techstops is now enabled.
  
  
• The fleet selector remembers your last choice, and does not default to the fleet you clicked to transfer out. The memory resets when you log out from a game world (and at the first time it shows the fleet of the aircraft you clicked).
  
  
• Sub-fleet selector added.
  
  
• A couple of minor fixes too.

Also, ideas are welcome on how to make the error messages as understandable as possible.

[schro]

I gave this a try for the first time over in GW3 - wanted to make sure the design is functioning as intended for this scenario -

777 to 787 conversion at EWR

1. Move a 787 to EWR as the only unscheduled plane in base.
2. Click move schedule on the desired 777
3. Move dialog box populates with the 777, even though nothing had been previously selected (I'm assuming because there were no unscheduled 777s at the base).
4. Move schedule (appears to work).

For giggles:
5. Click move schedule again
6. Defaults to the MD90/717 fleet group (apparently I had a couple unscheduled 717s there).

So, that being said, I would expect that the default "Move To" fleet should either be of the same type (even if there's none of that type in the base), or the previously selected type (as noted in the change implemented above) and not to the first available alphabetic fleet type.

Also, there may need to be some sort of information or constraint placed on the move box to deal with variance in range. It's nice that the plane's range is all shown, but I think it'd also be good to have a max(flight distance) for the schedule proposed to be moved in the dialog box to help keep things straight from an MTOW variant perspective...

[Sami]

The selector is one of the following when the dialog opens, in this order:

a) the previous sub-fleet group selected on previous move schedule action - if it has unscheduled aircraft
b) the previous fleet group selected on previous move schedule action - if it has unscheduled aircraft
c) the current fleet group, on which MOVE is clicked - if it has unscheduled aircraft
d) alphabetically the first fleet group - if it has unscheduled aircraft
e) nothing shown (no unscheduled planes anywhere in that base)

[schro]

The selector is one of the following when the dialog opens, in this order:

a) the previous sub-fleet group selected on previous move schedule action - if it has unscheduled aircraft
b) the previous fleet group selected on previous move schedule action - if it has unscheduled aircraft
c) the current fleet group, on which MOVE is clicked - if it has unscheduled aircraft
d) alphabetically the first fleet group - if it has unscheduled aircraft
e) nothing shown (no unscheduled planes anywhere in that base)

Ok. Good to know on the intention. Still something wobbly going on with it, and i think it's that the a/b steps are using a global sort of variable where it makes it sticky for ANY fleet move rather than for that particular type/subtype. For example, GW3 -

1. Click move schedule on an MD-90, select 787, click cancel.
2. Click move schedule on a 777, boom - 787 is presented, even though the 777 did not previously have selected move to type/subtype.

This is a bit jarring as I would expect that each individual plane type would remember where it's going for that particular session.

[schro]

Another odd one in GW3 -

1. Move a single 773ER from LAX to EWR
2. Select a EWR 772ER, move schedule to 773ER (choice is automatically selected, could have been cached, dunno - I did not actively select).
3. Go to LAX, select a 772ER, click move, and ALL 777's show up (option B) even though there are 773ER's with open schedules at LAX.

[Tim]

This feature looks great, but we definitely need a setting to maintain default turnaround / same departure time. For DC-10 -> 777 transition I'll use second option.

[Zombie Slayer]

Yep, it is great to see this added. I moved 28 DC-8 -> L1011 in 10 minutes earlier, normally about an hour task. But, as said, we need that option to keep the same departure times for the return when the schedule is converted!

[Sami]

Update

• Turnaround conversions are now done too. You can choose to:
  
  
  • a) maintain the current departure times on all routes (but this can change if the turnaround with the new aircraft would be below the minimum turnaround for that type)
    
    
  • b) or change all turnarounds to your default time
    
    
  • c) or if no default time is set use the minimum time for all turnarounds
    

All of the features are now done related to the new functionality. Better error messaging, general testing and fixes remain (for example the date conversions when the flight day changes).

[Zombie Slayer]

Awesome! I will be doing mad work in GW2 later on. One more request if I can. In the case of curfews or arrivals right at 2355 or 0500, can a 4th option be added, to keep original arrival times?

[JumboShrimp]

Excellent.  Ability to select fleet sub-groups helps a lot even in regular move/swap schedule

[Zombie Slayer]

Bug:

While converting MSN 50180, DC-10-30ER Reg No G-DYFA to an A340-300, I get the error message that LHR is closed at the arrival time. Manually converting routes 609960 (LHR-EZE-LHR) and 543015 (LHR-DIG-MEL-DIG-LHR) show arrival times of 0600 and 2250 respectively, both within LHR's curfew hours.

Edit: GW2

Edit 2: It seems this may be related to tech stops. MSN 50407 also gives me an error about LHR being closed yet the earliest arrival for any flight is 0725. In both cases, there are two tech stop flight assigned to the aircraft.

[Sami]

I see some errors in the log at 01.18 - 01.29UTC this morning, from your previous IP .. so yes, something wrong there.