RE: [Flightgear-devel] X-Plane coming to Linux

[Jon S. B. <js...@ha...>]

> The *real* news is that X-Plane is being ported to Linux:

Not so fast. This is one of the posts, too:

*******************

I'm the guy doing the port. I'm not sure whether Austin had plans for this
but I guess he gave up after the repeated requests he got to give me the
source to port on it. Some details:

1. It won't be open source.

2. It won't be free (I don't know what Austin's plans are but I guess the
price will be the same as the Win/Mac version).

3. I'm not getting any money for doing the port -- as I told Austin, I'm
doing it for the sake of having a good flight sim for Linux.

4. The file format, network data and outputs will be compatible with the
Win/Mac version.

5. The port uses libSDL (before you scream bloody murder about license
violation, have a look and note that it's dynamically linked).

6. Since it's SDL-based, a FreeBSD port should be easy enough to do once the
general *nix porting issues are solved. I don't know what's the status of
OpenGL on FreeBSD; X-Plane *requires* OpenGL and you probably don't want to
run it in software emulation. Until a native FreeBSD version will exist, the
Linux binaries should run just fine using the Linux compatibility mode (but
see the OpenGL notes above).

If you want to see the full app happening, here's how you can help:

1. Download the beta, test it, and send me feedback.

2. Email au...@x-... and tell him that you think a Linux version of
X-Plane is great. This is needed because I only got the subprograms source
so far, and he doesn't seem 100% convinced yet to send me the main source
too.