autower - automatic tower position for FS 2004

This is autower's homepage. There are no Web 2.0 fancy rounded buttons here, but you should find all the information you need.
In a nutshell, autower is an add-on to Flight Simulator 2004 that automatically sets the tower position to the closest airport.

Abstract:

Have you ever been annoyed by the fact that when you want to see this perfect
touchdown you just made from an outside perspective, the tower is anywhere
but where it should be? Got frustrated trying to get the tower where
you think it is in reality, or at least somewhere where it fits well?

If the answer is yes, then take a look at autower. Designed to operate in
the background without any user intervention, it automatically moves the tower
to the airport where you want it to be, to the spot where the tower sits in
reality (well, at least somewhere close).

autower is free and open source software, released under the GNU General Public License.

While there are versions available on popular sites related to Flight Simulation (uploaded by myself or by other people), those are not updated on a regular basis; the latest version, official support, and source code, is only guaranteed to be available here. In other words: this page is the authoritative source of information about autower.

autower requires FSUIPC. The free version of FSUIPC will work just fine, unless you're using an extremely old version (for FSUIPC 3.70 or older, you need a registered version).

Downloads:

autower 2.4.0
autower 2.4.0 source code | github
If you like and regularly use autower, please consider donating for an important cause (see just below).
Old versions can be found in the archive .

Want to link to or redistribute the files? Go ahead, but please read this.

Please help if you can

autower is, and will always be, free for you to download, use, and modify.

I'm glad to see that in general, the FS community is willing to recompensate developers for their efforts. If you think that autower is worth it, you're more than welcome to contribute -- but don't give your money to me. Please, if you can, donate to a Literacy Project in Laos. Thank you!!!

Note: I am not personally affiliated with Big Brother Mouse in any way. I simply fell in love with Laos and the people there, and I saw that BBM is doing something that is very much needed. Your donation will make a difference!

PS: Yes, I also did put my money where my mouth is :-)

News, Hints, Notes, Version history ...

Nov 04,2011: Version 2.4.0 released. The logic for determining the available sceneries has been completely rewritten. Now, an arbitrary number of sceneries is supported, and the order in which they are considered should exactly mimic FS9's behavior. Previous versions supported a maximum of 999 layers, and may have gotten the ordering wrong under certain (unusual) conditions. This version also fixes a glitch accidentally introduced with version 2.3.0, where a debug message would be unconditionally displayed if the tower settings for TNCM were changed using autower.ini.
Oct 30,2011: Version 2.3.0 released. This version allows to conveniently override tower positions (and names) within the configuration file, instead of having to directly modify the airport definition. Moreover, closed runways are now accounted for, thus yielding more accurate results on roughly 500 airports.
Aug 02,2011: There is an alarming increase in network surveillance being done by ISPs notably in the UK and the USA (Vodafone, TalkTalk, and probably many more), where the Internet Service Providers are literally stalking their customers, monitoring and then replaying every browser request. Not only does this completely screw up all usage statistics and double or triple internet traffic, but most importantly, it is a totally unacceptable invasion of user privacy.

Therefore, I've switched over to providing all of the content of my site by encrypted HTTPS only. More background can for instance be found here, here, and here. If you are a TalkTalk or Vodafone subscriber, I urge you to switch to an honest provider who takes your privacy seriously.
(There are also older announcements. Click here to see all of them.)

Frequently asked questions

Feedback

You're also very welcome to contact me by mail. Please look into any of the downloads to find my mail address.

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<< Newer Displaying comments page 6 of 19 Older >>

2010-05-19 Clipfish When flying between Rotterdam and Amsterdam towerview shows the aircraft in a vertical "birdview" from the sky towards the ground. When reloading the flight the primary towerview ist sometimes correctly horizontal from a tower, but as soon as the view skips to the next tower in the vicinity the bird view pops up instead. Is this due to the ground being below zero?

2010-05-16 Tom I was using 2.02, 2.03 indeed resolved the issue, thank you.

2010-05-15 Christoph Tom: are you using version 2.03? This is the error message that was silenced :-)

2010-05-15 Tom I would like to inquire about the possibility of including a exclude function to prevent scenery errors on startup. I am experiencing the same error on each FS start: \tropicalsim\sbglx\sbgl.bgl, offset 021600A4: expected airport ID (0003), but found 003C.

2010-04-26 Christoph @Karsten: please read the hint that I inserted above. It describes why you're getting that error, and how to solve it.

<< Newer Displaying comments page 6 of 19 Older >>