There was some pretty interesting news this morning/afternoon (depending on your global location!).   Paul has released a "viewer" tool to help modelers and texture artist examine there work as it would appear in the sim engine. 

 Just a little of the discussion after Paul/Outlaw sent it to Bomber:

• [5:04:18 AM] * Paul Guhl sent file "viewer.zip"
  [5:04:24 AM] Paul Guhl: works on windows and linux
  [5:04:35 AM] Paul Guhl: tested on windows
  [5:14:34 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: that is absolutely brilliant !!!!!!!!
  [5:15:00 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: I have it working first time on my works machine.. looking at a helecopter at this moment
  [5:17:15 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: so that's using the same render engine as the game... yes
  [5:17:32 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: so what I'm seeing is exactly the same as the game output ?
  [5:18:39 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: it's a fanatastic start !
  [5:18:45 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: first comments...
  [5:19:09 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: needs layer control so as I can turn them off an on
  [5:20:07 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: rotate needs to function from the centre of the visible layer boundary boxes... so as I can rotate easily all around an object...
  [5:24:36 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: Mouse wheel zoom convention is the other way around on both excel and autocad.. so scrolling the wheel forward should zoom in..
  [5:24:50 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: hope you're happy with this feedback..
  [5:24:58 AM] Gen Ex Design  Heanor: have I said how good it is yet? 

 I've since ran it several times using a Ubuntu 10.04 powered desktop...It works perfectly!

Come join the testing and discussion.  You'll find the viewer and test file in the downloads area.  Then come to the forum with your results here:  http://cms.simtechnologies.de/the-community-board/topic.html?id=32