VATSIM PRC Frequently Asked Questions. (FAQ)

[Steven Cullen]

What is VATSIM?

 

VATSIM is an on-line flight simulator "community" that provides client/server software for flight simulator enthusiasts to fly in a truly remarkable, realistic flight environment. From a people point of view, VATSIM is volunteer administrators, controllers, and support staff who keep the whole thing organized. VATSIM has roughly 90,500 members as of this writing. VATSIM differs from simple hosting of FS Multi-player sessions in these ways:

 

• Sheer scale - VATSIM can connect a thousand users in a global network. The number of aircraft you can "see" at any given moment, however, is limited to 40 miles in distance and by your FS multiplayer settings. Although currently MSFS will only draw in aircraft within 10 nm of your position.

 

• VATSIM has rather rigorous training standards for Air Traffic. VATSIM ATC attempts to mimic real world procedures.

 

• VATSIM is a virtual world. Europe, the Pacific Rim, North and South America, Asia, Africa all have daily flight activity and ATC support. VATSIM members come from, and populate the whole world.

 

• VATSIM is one of the most exciting things you can add to your flight simulator, and with it comes the opportunity to meet new friends from all over the world, who love airplanes and flying.

 

 

From a technical point of view, VATSIM is:

 

• A network of Linux/UNIX servers running the "FSD" server software and connected across the Internet

 

o This network is a clever "distributed computing" application. A user (pilot or ATC controller) can log into any server and that server will inform the other servers in the network. Thus, it does not matter which server you connect to. Everyone on the network is "aware" of everyone else. You should log into the server that is responding fastest to you (you can check this with "ping times" using the ServInfo utility. See question S-2 about ServInfo).

 

• Pilots use the "SquawkBox" or “FSInnâ€