Installing beta versions

Orbiter development snapshots are occasionally posted to a subversion (SVN) repository. To try the bleeding edge of Orbiter, check out the latest version from SVN.

• You need an SVN client installed on your system. On Windows, Tortoise SVN is a popular choice.
• Create a directory for your beta installation (it is strongly recommended not to install the beta version into an existing Orbiter 2016 installation directory).
• Check out the head revision from svn://svn.orbiter-forum.com/orbiter. If you are using Tortoise SVN, the easiest way to do this is via the File Explorer context menu:
• Open the File Explorer, and navigate to the beta directory you created.
• Right-click in the empty directory display, and select "SVN Checkout..."
• In the checkout dialog, set "svn://svn.orbiter-forum.com/orbiter" as the URL of the repository.
• Make sure the checkout target directory is correct.
• Set Checkout Depth to Fully recursive.
• Make sure the HEAD revision is selected.
• Click OK, and wait for the SVN download to finish.
• In the future, you can update you beta installation by clicking "SVN update ..." from the Explorer context menu in the Orbiter beta directory.
• Note that the texture maps for most of the planetary bodies are not included in the SVN repository. You need to install those separately. The easiest way is to re-use the texture directory from an existing Orbiter 2016 installation:
• If you haven't done so yet, install Orbiter 2016, and optionally the high-resolution texture packs.
• In your Orbiter Beta installation directory, open Orbiter.cfg in a text editor If this file doesn't exist, just launch orbiter.exe and close it again. This will generate a default Orbiter.cfg.
• Add the line
  TextureDir = <path-to-Orbiter2016>\Textures\",
  where <path-to-Orbiter2016> is the full path to your Orbiter2016 root installation directory.