Google Earth Flight Simulator

insidedesign writes "Blogger Marco has recently discovered that the newest version of Google Earth includes a flight simulator. Though simple in comparison to full-blown simulators, Google Earth's is fun and addictive. To get started, press Ctrl+Alt+A for the initial dialog (on OS X, Command+Option+A). Then choose your plane (F16 or SR22) and initial airport. Joysticks are supported; it has even been reported that force feedback works. The game's controls are sensitive so it takes some getting used to. Here are all the available controls. For a quick overview, check out this YouTube video."

Might I be the first to say...

That is freaking AWESOME!

Re:Might I be the first to say...

It's Google's Earth, so the Mac actually has a long way to go to be a good citizen on it.

Now maybe I should wait until tomorrow to try it

Or, can Google engine handle the load of being /dotted ? I guess I will wait an hour then try it out since the article just got posted. I will report back ;-)

Re:Now maybe I should wait until tomorrow to try i

There isn't a lot of air at FL500, so your IAS is gonna be pretty low.

Quickie: IAS or Indicated Airspeed is a flight dynamic that measures the unidirectional force of air along an aircraft's angle of attack and presents this data as a speed; it is measured with a "pitot tube," a metal tube on the wing or nose of a plane that collects air and measures the amount of force being applied down the tube. At standard temp and pressure, with no wind, and with the aircraft's angle of attack parallel to the surface, this number will theoretically give you the speed at which you are traveling along the ground. As ambient pressure goes down (say with altitude), IAS for a given ground speed goes down; as wind picks up, depending on the wind's bearing to the aircraft's orientation, IAS can go up or down (A plane flying a 100 kts headwind and 100 kts IAS will, all other things being equal, in fact have a ground speed of zero). As angle of attack increases, ground speed goes down. You might be flying at Mach 2, but if you're pointed straight up, your ground speed will be zero.

Terrorism?

I can just see the U.S. government attacking Google as a "terrorist training ground".

Everyone knows that if it teaches you to fly an airplane, it's an Islam extremist hotbed.

Another terrorist feature...

Now the terrorists won't even have to shell out $$ for MS-flight sim...

But at least they won't be able to simulate hitting Cheney's [wikipedia.org] house very well.

Which is of course the first fantasy I'd want to explore with it...

This would be a great post for April 1

I'd expect this from Slashdot on April First, or Google even, because so many people would think it is a hoax.

Re:This would be a great post for April 1

Quoting the very page you linked to:

Once you have entered flight simulator mode for the first time, you can re-enter the mode by choosing Tools > Enter Flight Simulator.

So no, it's not in the Tools menu by default, and yes, it's an easter egg.

Re:This would be a great post for April 1

You might try tinkering with one of these files, I'd start with this first:

%PROGRAMFILES%\Google\Google Earth\res\flightsim\controller\generic.ini

These others in the same directory seem to be for specific brands of controller:

genius_maxfighter_f16u.ini
speed_link_black_hawk.ini
speed_link_cougar_flightstick.ini

From generic.ini

axes = [
    A1 set(DE, 1.0, 0.0)
    A0 set(DA, 1.0, 0.0)
    A3 set(DP_0, -0.5, 0.5)
    A2 set(DR, 1.0, 0.0)
]

povs = [
    P0 set(HAngle, 1.0, 0.0)
]

It looks like:
A0..3 = the four axes
P0 = hat switch
DE = elevators
DA = ailerons
DP_0 = power
DR = rudder
HAngle = head angle

I swapped A2 and A3 and everything was hunky-dory!

Check out the other *.ini files and see the there are also button press and release events that can be programmed:
B0..n = buttons

Proceed at your own peril. And don't be a dummy like me, backup your files first!

If you want to get really adventurous here are the flight characteristics of the available aircraft (these are also plain text files):
%PROGRAMFILES%\Google\Google Earth\res\flightsim\aircraft\*.acf

It's like Christmas!

Re:This would be a great post for April 1

I guess I was a little too excited and posted before checking everything out. There are more files in the controller director for various sticks. And the files are pretty well documented. You can also create a custom HUD and keyboard setups. Damn! You can even change the gravity and atmosphere. And apparently you don't have to modify existing configs, you can add new ones and reference them in the flightsim.ini file (where you can also setup addition airports). Haven't tested that part yet. Fun-fun-fun!

Doom in Microsoft Office

This is kind of like the Doom "game" hidden in one of the old Microsoft office programs. If I remember right, one version of Excel also had a flight simulator.

I love easter eggs.

Re:Doom in Microsoft Office

> If I remember right, one version of Excel also had a flight simulator.

Yep, Excel '97 had a flight sim.
  - Hit 'F5'
  - Jump to cell X97:L97
  - Press 'TAB'
  - Hold down and
  - Press the "Chart Wizard" button on the toolbar.

I bet the graphics in this one are a little better, though.

I'm surprised....

I'm surprised that the Govt hasn't banned this, claiming it to be a terrorist cell training tool. Just a matter of time, I guess...

Wise Guys!

The only airport they list for Chicago is Meigs. The only airport that no longer exists in Chicago.

Re:Wise Guys!

We can all thank Mayor Daily for the airport distruction (I think I spelled the Mayor's name wrong, but correcting it is not worth the effort).

Paraphrasing the reason for the destruction, "the people of Chicago live in fear of terrorist attacks, and I need to do what I can to keep Chicago safe."

Secretly planning to destroy the airport in the early morning hours acheives that end?

Re:Wise Guys!

Yes, you did spell the mayor's name wrong, the correct spelling is "Emperor Daley." Mein Führer and All Hail the King would also be acceptable.

Re:Wise Guys!

Maybe that's a nod to subLOGIC's FS2, the first home flight sim to feature real locations and airports. Chicago's Meigs Field was the player's default starting point.

Easter Egg reminds me of...

when Microsoft embedded an entire FPS into an old version of Excel. It was truly surreal to be working in a "serious" application and be able to open up a secretly-coded real game engine.

Weird with a beard!

-Will the Chill

*this sig intentionally left blank*

So does it work...

...with Google Sky?

Start thrusters, take off, aim nose towards Andromeda, sit back and wait for two million years, find an airport, land.

Sweet! :D

Sweet

Just tried a flight, shows hills and everything. Way more than I expected from an easter egg. Kudos to the guy who dreamed this up.

Look out, Flight Simulator!

I'm a private pilot, and the other simulators disappoint. They are good for practicing Instrument procedure, and to a certain extent, airplane maneuvers, but for just plane fun (pun intended) they are weak.

Most of the joy of flying General Aviation (small) planes is the view - nothing like it anywhere else, including that commercial jet. (which rockets up to 45,000 feet in 10 minutes where you can't see jack) Flight simulators have typically given depictions of the landscape - patterns that are rough analogies of what you'd actually find out the window.

But this is the real McCoy! Resolution is still weak, and the plane handling characteristics are lousy, but when I'm flying 5,500 VFR over the East Bay, it actually IS the East Bay. I noticed that once you've started the Easter Egg, you can re-launch from any view, which let me spin a few circles above local Oroville, CA.

I recognized everything and had no trouble finding the local airport, and successfully landed the very first try in the SR-22. Since I've never flown an SR22, I had to stall it first in the air to figure out what my approach speed should be - about 70 knots seemed about right.

Really, if they put some spit and polish on this, it could give FS X a real run for its money - for just plane fun, it already rivals FS X!

Re:Look out, Flight Simulator!

Apparently, someone else did it for them with an addon called TileProxy...I have not tried it, but there's a video here [live.com].

Re:Look out, Flight Simulator!

Now if only somebody could port this as a plug-in for X-Plane.

Re:Look out, Flight Simulator!

I'm a private pilot, and the other simulators disappoint.

Even X-Plane [x-plane.com]?

get out of the plane and visit people's houses?

It would be nice if we could get out of the airplane and visit people's virtual homes. I got tons of cool stuff to show my virtual guests, I don't know about you guys. Another interesting way to meet people and establish relationships, what can I say?

Meigs the long time default airport in M$ flight..

Meigs the long time default airport in M$ flight sim is in hear.

Time to update the old corollary?

All programs expand indefinitely until they include a flight simulator. And email.

Doesn't work for me

Hymm, I just installed the new version on my mac, did the Command+option+A, and its not working!

Re:Doesn't work for me

Zoom to San Francisco airport and try it from there.
It is weird, but it works.
Also, use fn-up and fn-down in place of page up and page down on a powerbook.

Yeah, it's all fun at first

But I for one am going to be shitting my pants when they update the ground textures to account for the bombing missions I flew in the flight simulator. I will be shitting my pants once again when I leave my house and notice the houses I targeted in my neighborhood are no longer there.

Tried it out

I tried it out for a couple hours and I think it is pretty cool overall. It seems like a natural extension of Google Earth and I enjoyed flying over a couple familiar sites. I think it is a very good start, and I hope they continue working on it by adding more views and features! If you have it, definitely give it a go!

Google "20% time" at work?

I wonder if this is one of those projects that came out of Google's "20% time" policy, where engineers are given 20% of their time (one day per week) to work on a project of "personal interest"? It's plausible, since this isn't exactly a main feature of google earth. Then again, Google Sky might have been a 20% time project, too?

Bill Gates is probably going to be real pissed if this starts eating into his M$ Flight Sim profits, especially if (a) this remains free and (b) Google expands it to include more aircraft and options.

On another note, I wonder if they could make this a network thing, so perhaps we could have dog fights with other users in the air? But the feds would probably put a stop to that, since that would also require Google to install live missiles and bombs in the simulator, allowing people to start bombing various structures in google earth,...

it's in the tools menu

after you press ctl+sht+a it appears perpetually under the tool menu. i wonder if its a feature they planned on implementing in a later release.

Thank you Google

Thanks to everyone at google, this is so amazing.

THIS
THIS is the flight sim i have wanted to fly all my life!

Really awesome, BUT...

I just wish there was a way i could pre-cache a certain area at the highest detail level.
As it is now, it only starts to download when you are already in an area which means
that you are always seeing sub optimal detail levels when you fly into new areas.

For Google it should be easy to make a simple position prediction algorithem (including z) to prioritize
map content area and detail level download. Especially in a flight sim it should be fairly easy to predict
near future positions with a relative high degree of certainty.

Oh well, i was still having more fun playing this then i was playing MS FlighSim X...
Performance probably had a lot do to with that, but also the fact that high res.
aerial pictures for everything is simply better then crappy generated (i should say composited)
detail textures for most everything.

Of course this is this and MS Fligh Sim is something totally different in terms of scope and realism.
Nevertheless, this is free, fun, quick and simple and for me that simply wins :)

3D Buildings please!!!

Where the earth is really bumpy, i.e., mountain ranges it looks great. So when you take of from Kathmandu (the default), you can head for the big Himalayas and the definition is excellent. The problem is that the 3D buildings aren't rendered in flight sim mode, as far as I can see.

PS: Spacemouse works too....

I've been playing Google earth with a space mouse for ages.

It's 10000% more fun than the normal mouse controls.

Crash

Shit. I just accidently crashed my SR22 into the Google Campus. I hope they don't log these kind of things..

LHX

I don't know if it's hard to control this simulator or if it's realistic, but I wish it was more like LHX [wikipedia.org]. in fact, a hybrid of LHX Attack Chopper with Google Maps would kick ass.

The "bug" has been fixed???

Just downloaded it to try it out and nothing happens when I press the keys.

I got version "4.2.0181.2634 (beta)"

What's up?

What I would like to see

What I would like to see isthis bieng combined with a flight sim like X-plane or Flightgear. It would definately make for some nice flying plus you get a load of extras in aircraft.

Thanks for the youtube video

I've never wanted to die so much after listening to the narrative. Talk about taking a long time to explain nothing.
"Us computer people" and did you really need to read out the URLs?

Key combo not working? Enable it by hand

The key combo to enable the flightsim is reported to vary, I had to press Ctrl+WinKey+A to enable it (Kubuntu).

In case you're having difficulties, try changing the value in the file .googleearth/Registry/google/googleearthplus/User/ flightsim/isenabled manually from 0 to 1 and the flightsim should appear in the tools menu.

unstable ram hog

Within seconds this easter egg had consumed more than a gig of available ram then locked up. Not what I would call "freaking awesome".

Web Version

When Google's map webpages [google.com] are speedy and interactive enough to offer a flight simulator, with even the most rudimentary features, Google will finally have arrived at a "Web platform" that competes with desktop platforms. And when all its functions are available as an API (including downloadable scripts and objects) for anyone to bundle, they'll actually have the beginnings of a "Web OS".

Of course the test is whether it can run games like a flight sim. But as a truly native network platform, the games should be even more interesting, whether P2P, client/server, or whether we can't even tell the difference.

X-Plane

Very nice, but their flight sim is very basic, I think they should deal with someone who's done good in the flight sim business. My first thought is that guy who made X-Plane [x-plane.com], I think they should hire some of his services to make Google Earth Flightsim a fully fledged flightsim that would compete with MS's flightsims

Flightgear

For some time now I had been hoping the Flightgear community would plug into something like Google Earth. Now it seems the opposite has taken place but I wonder how their flight models compare?

oh! come on!

this has been into GoogleEarth since day 1. and yes flying the Grand Canyon is fucking amazing...

This is super!

Now, can anyone tell me how to fly a plane?

Re:Pentagon?

Is it possible to fly the plane into the Pentagon while hitting light poles along the way?

It's hard to tell, as soon as you approach the Pentagon things get really fuzzy and 8-bit.

Re:i can't wait..

Or ABC, CBS... hell, even PBS will stoop to that level if they need cash...

Re:Pentagon?

Flying close to the ground is pretty crappy anyway. Apparently there are 1500 foot rolling hills in central Arkansas. But flying from the whole-earth view in space down to little houses is awesome.

Re:that blog

I could have summed it up in 30 seconds

But you didn't.

Re:To make it work in Linux..

Uh I think that was the point.

Re:To make it work in Linux..

It may depend on your window manager. On Fluxbox I just used Ctrl+Alt+A to get into it. One thing for sure though, my crappy joystick works better with X-Plane which happens to run beautifully on linux as well.

Re:is there any way

English US keyboard layout is the key, if you try eabling the shortcuts with other english keyboard layouts it fails