Hi all,
i'm a long term user of AIFP with the P3Dv4 version and i know the program but now, with MSFS, something a little weird has happened to me with the last AIFP 3.4.3.15
When I open AIFP, I get an error message, (exception not handled in the application) but the program remains open and the window for scanning installed aircraft remains open and searching indefinitely.
However when I try to open a new existing bgl flight plan after that the aircraft selection becomes red (as the aircraft would not exist in my simobject folder) and this goes on and on for every single flight plan I open.
My MSFS is installed in the stock directory and so is the Community folder where i put my AI folder. I'm using the MSFS Addon Linker but I don't think that's the problem.
I tried to delete and download AIFP again but the problem remains.

Error details are the following:

System.ArgumentException: Invalid format path .
in System.IO.Path.NewNormalizePath(String path, Int32 maxPathLength, Boolean expandShortPaths)
in System.IO.Path.NormalizePath(String path, Boolean fullCheck, Int32 maxPathLength, Boolean expandShortPaths)
in System.IO.Path.GetFullPathInternal(String path)
in Microsoft.VisualBasic.FileIO.FileSystem.FindFilesOrDirectories(FileOrDirectory FileOrDirectory, String directory, SearchOption searchType, String[] wildcards, Collection`1 Results)
in Microsoft.VisualBasic.FileIO.FileSystem.FindFilesOrDirectories(FileOrDirectory FileOrDirectory, String directory, SearchOption searchType, String[] wildcards)
in AIFP3._4__Dev_.AircraftCfg.GetAllAircraftFolders(List`1& listFolders, Int32 fFSVer)
in AIFP3._4__Dev_.Common.MakeInstalledACFileItemList(String sSearchString, List`1& listACFolders_, Int32 fFSVer, List`1& listAC, Int32 fReportDups)
in AIFP3._4__Dev_.MainPanel.chkFS_CheckedChanged(Object sender, EventArgs e)
in System.Windows.Forms.RadioButton.OnCheckedChanged(EventArgs e)
in System.Windows.Forms.RadioButton.set_Checked(Boolean value)
in AIFP3._4__Dev_.FSVersion.FSControls_Select(List`1& controls, Int32 fFSver, Boolean bCheck)
in AIFP3._4__Dev_.MainPanel.Form_Activated(Object sender, EventArgs e)
in System.Windows.Forms.Form.OnActivated(EventArgs e)
in System.Windows.Forms.Form.set_Active(Boolean value)
in System.Windows.Forms.Form.WmActivate(Message& m)
in System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.Callback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam)

That's all , any help appreciated !!


Thanks in advance !

Well this is purely a first glance guess, rather than a confirmed answer.

I am going by the first two lines of the diags :- Would it be that your MSFS installation is in the default location in its entirely, i.e. on the C: drive.
Is this the case?
I am wondering if it may be the case is that it could be that the path name is too long when it goes deep into some of the aircraft folders.

It is one of those things that we are trying to cope with when we get to release MSFS packages.

Firebird thanks for your quick reply !
Well, actually my installation of MSFS is distributed on 4 physical disks through junction points created with direct linker, but the system is as if it were virtually on a single disk Then MSFS addon creates the links of the active scenarios in the Community folder which is in its stock position This combination works fine and fast for me even if i have a TB of sceneries (activated by MSFS addon as needed)

OK well it could either be that it doesn't like your links, although that system works fine for me for FS9. Having said that Don did have to do quite a major rewrite to accommodate that. Up until that time he automatically searched the default locations as well as any specified in the scenery.cfg which resulted in an awful lot of dupes.

It does depend on how he wrote the MSFS specific code.

I would have a look at the my first thought as see if any of the aircraft fall foul of the 255 character naming limit that the operating system has.

The only other thing that I can think of at the moment related to paths quite often if there is a space in the path name it will fall foul of the path checker. The irony here is that Windows has such paths built-in e.g. C:\Program Files (x86). Unless the app specifically is designed to cope with this then it will fall foul of it.
Check all of your path names to look for spaces.

Firebird wrote: ↑08 Nov 2022, 08:13 The only other thing that I can think of at the moment related to paths quite often if there is a space in the path name it will fall foul of the path checker. The irony here is that Windows has such paths built-in e.g. C:\Program Files (x86). Unless the app specifically is designed to cope with this then it will fall foul of it.
Check all of your path names to look for spaces.

Many thanks for the advice, I will proceed to a systematic check of all the paths. !!

Kulbit wrote: ↑08 Nov 2022, 16:01

Firebird wrote: ↑08 Nov 2022, 08:13 The only other thing that I can think of at the moment related to paths quite often if there is a space in the path name it will fall foul of the path checker. The irony here is that Windows has such paths built-in e.g. C:\Program Files (x86). Unless the app specifically is designed to cope with this then it will fall foul of it.
Check all of your path names to look for spaces.

Many thanks for the advice, I will proceed to a systematic check of all the paths. !!

Firebird, I may have found the SOLUTION for this annoyng trouble.

For the last 2 weeks, after checking all the paths over and over again, the problem was found...
In the registry there was mention about \STEAM_MSFS\HLM_Packages. Since steam has never been on my PC this was very strange. Mind me that this new PC was setup from an SSD that was in my older PC i realized that the registry was corrupt. After using CCleaner (found several faults) the mention to steam was gone in the registry.
But that was not all, and maybe NOT the problem.

After some checks i've noticed that Iin c:\Users\USER PC\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft Flight Simulator\*.* there was a UserCfg.opt "different" than the UserCfg.opt in c:\Users\USER PC\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\*.*
The last line in the formal one read: "InstalledPackagesPath "C:\STEAM_MSFS\HLM_Packages"
and the one in Local\Packages was InstalledPackagesPath "F:\MSFS2020"

So after copying the one in Local to the one in Roaming the fault disappeared and now i can work with that fantastic program like I did for P3D v4.

Hope this helps other people using AIFP without errors.

Regards

Congrats on getting to the bottom of it and for making everyone aware of the issue.