To run FlightGear you need to install the binaries. Once you’ve done this you may install additional scenery and aircraft if you wish.
Pre-compiled binaries for the latest release are available for
To download them go to
http://www.flightgear.org/Downloads/binary.shtml
and follow the instructions provided on the page.
The FlightGear base package contains scenery for a small area around San Fransisco, but the entire world is available at a high level of detail, so you will almost certainly wish to install extra scenery at some point.
The scenery is based on SRTM elevation data (accurate to 30m in the USA, and 90m elsewhere and) VMap0 land use data. Additionally, various people have created buildings, bridges and other features to enrich the environment.
You can download scenery in 10 degree by 10 degree chunks from a clickable map at
http://www.flightgear.org/Downloads/scenery.html
Curt Olson also provides the USA or the entire world along with the latest FlightGear release on DVD from here:
http://www.flightgear.org/cdrom/
If you are interested in generating your own scenerey, have a look at TerraGear - the tools that generate the scenery for FlightGear:
The most actively maintained source tree of the TerraGear toolchain is co-located at the FlightGear landuse data Mapserver:
http://mapserver.flightgear.org/git/gitweb.pl.
Whatever scenery you shoose to download, it should be kept in a separate directory from the scenery delivered with the binaries.
To do this, create a WorldScenery directory in the FlightGear data directory, usually
c:\Program Files\FlightGear\data
on Windows or
/usr/local/share/FlightGear/data
on *nix.
Underneath this directory create Terrain and Objects subdirectories. These are used for terrain information and buildings/bridges/structures respectively.
Unpack the downloaded scenery into the WorldScenery/Terrain. Do not de-compress the numbered scenery files like 958402.gz! This will be done by FlightGear on the fly.
As an example, consider installation of the scenery package w120n30 containing the Grand Canyon Scenery into an installation located at
/usr/local/share/FlightGear.
Once your installation is complete, you’ll have the following directories
/usr/local/FlightGear/data/WorldScenery/Objects/
/usr/local/FlightGear/data/WorldScenery/Terrain/w120n30/w112n30 /usr/local/FlightGear/data/WorldScenery/Terrain/w120n30/w112n31 ... /usr/local/FlightGear/data/WorldScenery/Terrain/w120n30/w120n39 |
As well as the scenery itself, objects such as bridges, skyscrapers, radio masts can be downloaded from http://scenemodels.flightgear.org/. See the website for more information. You can exploit FG_SCENERY environmental variable or the --fg-scenery=path command line option if you want to install different scenery sets in parallel or want to have scenery sitting in another place. These are more fully described in Chapter 3.
The base FlightGear package contains only a small subset of the aircraft that are available for FlightGear. Developers have created a wide range of aircraft, from WWII fighters like the Spitfire, to passenger planes like the Boeing 747.
You can download aircraft from
http://www.flightgear.org/Downloads/aircraft/index.shtml
Simply download the file and unpack it into the FG_ROOT/data/Aircraft subdirectory of your installation. The aircraft are downloaded as .tar.gz files. Some computers will download them as .tar.gz.zip files. If so, simply rename the file to .tar.gz and unpack. If you are successful, there will be a new sub-directory in your FG_ROOT/data/Aircraft directory containing the aircraft. Next time you run FlightGear, the new aircraft will be available.
Most of the packages named above include the complete FlightGear documentation including a ṗdf version of The FlightGear Manual intended for pretty printing using Adobe’s Acrobat Reader being available from
Moreover, if properly installed, the ḣtml version can be accessed via FlightGear’s help menu entry.
Besides, the source code contains a directory docs-mini containing numerous ideas on and solutions to special problems. This is also a good place for further reading.