FlightGear development team announced the release of the new version of FlightGear 2020.1, which arrives several months after the launch of the previous version and it integrates mMany new features, improvements, and bug fixes.
If you don't know about FlightGear you should know that this It is a multiplatform and free flight simulator. It is currently an important alternative to commercial flight simulators.
It is probably the only program of its kind whose code is free and without the intention of hiding how it works internally, which makes it very extensible. Although there are players who consider that it cannot exceed the graphic level of the best commercial products, the physical model of the flight and the realism of the controls is at the same or higher level than the best simulators.
This is because FlightGear was developed from the beginning with a high technical and scientific profile. It supports OpenGL and requires 3D acceleration hardware.
FlightGear has more than 400 aircraft, a database of scenarios around the world, a multiplayer environment, detailed sky modeling, a flexible and open aircraft modeling system, varied network options, multi-screen support, a powerful scripting language, and an open architecture. Best of all, being open source, the simulator is community owned and everyone is encouraged to contribute.
Main new features of FlightGear 2020.1
In this new version, the addition of a new multi-pass rendering framework "Composer" as a separate binary file and also a new Tower AGL view has been added. This is similar to Tower View, except that it keeps both the aircraft and the ground immediately below the aircraft in view, seamlessly zooming and panning as the aircraft moves.
In addition it also stands out better support for aircraft carriers, improvements in flight dynamics models JSBSim and YASim, improved display options, imore efficient building generation implementation OpenStreetMap, updated models Boeing 777, Airbus A320, AN-24, F-16 plane, Piper J3Cub, Saab JA37 Viggen, Piper PA28 Cherokee, Bombardier Q-400, space shuttle.
Aircraft can now be marked as "Favorites" and filtered, making it easier to view and find your favorite aircraft from the hundreds available.
On the part of artificial intelligence it has been updated traffic for Aeormar México, AirDolomiti, Air Tahiti, American Eagle, China Southern, Delta Connection, Horizon Air, IcelandAir, JetBlue, LoganAir, LOT, Lufthansa, Lufthansa CityLine, MNG (Cargo), SkyUp, United Parcel Service, Ural Airlines, Uzbekistan Airways, Westjet Regional.
As well as AI libraries Updated for Aeormar México, Airbus, Air Canada, Air Europa, Air Tahiti, American Airlines, American Eagle, Alaska, Belavia, China Southern, Gulf Air, Hop !, Icelandair, JetBlue, LoganAir, LOT, Rusline, SkyUp, South African Express , United Express, Ural Airlines, Uzbekistan Airways, Virgin Australia, Westje.
Finally, if you want to know more about it, about this new release, you can check the changes in the following link
How to install FlightGear on Ubuntu and derivatives?
For those who are interested in being able to install FlightGear on their system, they can do so by following the instructions that we share below.
Installation we will do it with the help of a repository which will provide us with the latest version and the new ones that arrive much earlier than in the official Ubuntu repositories.
For this we are going to add this repository by opening a terminal (You can do it with the key combination Ctrl + Alt + T) and in it we are going to type the following command:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:saiarcot895/flightgear
Done this now we are going to refresh the repositories with:
sudo apt-get update
The installation can be done by executing the following command:
sudo apt-get install flightgear
Finally, regarding the use of the application, you will be able to find various usage tutorials on the web and more specifically on YouTube, since FlightGear has a large community which likes to share their experiences and knowledge of the use of this great application.