FlightGear versions

v3.2 [Sep 20, 2014]
Major enhancements in this release
Aircraft Modeling
A Failure Management Framework for FlightGear has been added
The JSBSim flight dynamics model now has support for ground effects like bumpiness, solid-ground detection and adjusting of friction factors. Additionally, bogey type contact points sink in non-solid surfaces, making it no longer possible to ride on water.
YASim now has versioning support. The YASim FDM now checks a version tag in it’s configuration file to allow improvements to the YASim FDM without risking breaking older aircraft.
Additional aircraft have started adopting the Canvas navigation display that was introduced with FlightGear 3.0.
Graphics
Improved rendering of VASI, PAPI, runway and taxiway lights.
Orbital rendering using textures from the NASA Visible Earth project
Additions to the Atmospheric Light Scattering (ALS) rendering include:
an experimental framework to render cloud shadows on the ground (requires Advanced Weather)
a substantial extension of cloud layer visibility using impostor techniques to 150 km
a new agriculture effect allowing to render fields without tiling artifacts
a new forest effect to simulate managed forest, varying tree size by patch
sparkle and fog effect on runway lights
much improved visual appearance of rock faces
Usability
An experimental aircraft package manager allows the download of new aircraft, and changing the current aircraft in-sim.
A new internal web server (aka httpd) based on mongoose httpd has been added. It supports various AJAX requests, a screenshot server, a property tree browser, and a web-based moving map and much more.
The integrated Map dialog now uses an azimuthal equidistant projection, for better representation in polar regions and across the International Date Line.
Windows users are now able to use the scroll wheel in dialog lists
Canvas System
Improvements to Canvas, FlightGear’s scriptable 2D rendering system include
Better performance
MapStructure-based layers can now be customized and styled
Support for mouse button and modifiers
CanvasImage now supports the http:// protocol for dynamically retrieving raster images.
An experimental Map dialog using Canvas is available under the Equipment menu.
Canvas Layout Engine
Nasal Scripting
A new fully-interactive Nasal GUI console based on Canvas has been added: Interactive Nasal Console
the hard-coded flight path history subsystem which samples aircraft position is now exposed via Nasal.
Documentation
Nasal documentation is now included,
Highlighted new and improved aircraft
Boeing 757-200: Improved autopilot and additional systems, like hydraulics and pneumatic. The aircraft comes with two engine options.
Cessna 337G Skymaster: Tuned autopilot and improved instrument stack.
Mainair Flash 2 Alpha: Simulated weightshift-control and new wing model.
North American P-51D: All new highly accurate external model based on factory blueprints.
Tupolev Tu-154B2: version 3.1
Other
A text-to-speech system based on flite hts_engine has been implemented, which is used for ATIS and other messages.
Improved loading behaviour for AI/MP aircraft
Bug fixes
A serious bug was found late in the release causing large numbers of crashes. Fixing this delayed he release, but had a nice side-effect of improving performance on some systems that were previously CPU-limited.

v3.0 [Jan 31, 2014]
Major enhancements in this release:
Aircraft Modeling
- All glider models have now Total Energy compensated variometers.
Environment Rendering
- Sea color is more realistic, using a a global sea map is used to render shallow ocean a different color.
- Improved random building textures
- Atmospheric Light Scattering (ALS) improvements including
- significant work on a more natural appearance of a low haze or fog layer which includes now altitude variations
- atmosphere rendering beyond the lowest fog layer takes now actual aloft visibility into account, leading to a blurred horizon
- the horizon line is now rendered with angular variations, simulating different vertical extent of air layers far away in the atmosphere
- the wake shader rendering the waves generated by a ship has been ported to ALS
Performance
- Terrain loading times improved by deferring loading of objects within scenery.
Usability
- Tab key is used to cycle mouse modes: aircraft control, view control, idle
- TerraSync is pre-configured and works as is without user configuration required
- FGCom, the multiplayer voice communications client is now integrated within FlightGear
Internationalization
- Italian translation of the FlightGear Manual.
Scenery
- Scenery 2.0 is now available, using improved elevation, road and terrain data.
- Updated navigation data
- Regional texture definitions have been added for Scandinavia, Corsica and Ascension Island.
Canvas System
FlightGear's fully scriptable 2D rendering system now includes improved APIs for creating maps and navigation displays amongst many other improvements. People no longer need to have programming experience to add a working ND to their aircraft, it can now be all done by copying and pasting 30 lines of text and customizing a few properties. The so called MapStructure back-end handles efficient updating of all ND layers transparently.
Nasal Scripting
- Faster complex spacial searches
- HTTP bindings
- A new Nasal library has been added for implementing specialised soaring instruments. The library currently supports Total Energy compensated varios as well as Netto, Super Netto (aka Relative) and Speed Command variometers.
Documentation
- PDF/LaTeX docs of the internals of the Nasal engine (C code) have been added to $FG_ROOT/Docs.
- An Italian translation of the FlightGear Manual is now available.
Highlighted new and improved aircraft
- Robin DR400 Dauphin 180ch
- CAP10C
- Boeing 707
- North American P-51D
- Boeing 777
Other
- Additional joysticks and rudder pedals are supported out-of-the-box:
- Logitech Flight System G940 (joystick, pedals and throttle)

v2.10 [Apr 2, 2013]
-Improvements:
-AI aircraft take-offs and landings are now more realistic.
-AI tankers can now be found using the HUD target marker.
-New features:
-A new tool allowing joystick configuration in-sim, making it easier for new users to configure their joysticks as they wish and get flying!
-The Nasal Console has been improved to support copy/paste, making Nasal script development easier.
-The About dialog now includes additional system information, and the ability to copy information to the clipboard, making remote diagnosis of users problems faster and more straightforward.
-The Select Airport option now displays an overhead view of the selected airport, allowing users to preview their new location, and making it easier to choose the correct runway or parking position.
-In-sim checklists have been introduced for a number of aircraft.
-An in-sim documentation browser is included, so users can more easily browse all the documentation available in the base package.
-The weather configuration UIs have been combined and rationalized into a single weather UI, making it easier to select a nice VFR day, or a difficult CATIII approach.
-Flight path can now be displayed on the in-sim map.
-Instant replay may now be saved as a flight recorder, edited externally to add a commentary, and then replayed as a tutorial, with the user able to take control at any point.
-Multiplayer setup dialog now includes a dynamically generated list of active MP servers, making it even easier to take part in FlightGear's worldwide multi-player environment.

v2.4 [Aug 17, 2011]
The new version has improved the aircraft operations, AI system, AI Traffic, flight dynamics, environment, interface, visual effects, highlighted new and improved aircraft and fixed various bugs