Boris Koenig:

After applying the attached patches (based on latest CVS) you should
have a new option available within your version that should also
show up using fgfs --help, the syntax is:

    fgfs --min-status={level} --show-aircraft

whereas "level" can be anything between

    "alpha","beta","early-production" and "production"

Of course running something like

    fgfs --min-status=alpha --show-aircraft

should not return any aircraft right now, as none of the
current aircraft definition files in your base-package is using the
required

    <status></status>

tag - but you can easily give it a try by adding something like

    <status>alpha</status>

The tag should be placed as a sub-tag within <sim> - so directly behind
the <description> tag would be just fine and straight-forward.

Translations/strings-default.xml

@@ -126,6 +126,7 @@
  <aircraft-options>Aircraft</aircraft-options>
  <aircraft-desc>Select an aircraft profile as defined by a top level &lt;name&gt;-set.xml</aircraft-desc>
  <show-aircraft-desc>Print a list of the currently available aircraft types</show-aircraft-desc>
+ <min-aircraft-status>Allows you to define a minimum status level (=development status) for all listed aircraft</min-aircraft-status>
 
  <!-- Flight Dynamics Model options -->
  <fdm-options>Flight Model</fdm-options>

options.xml

@@ -419,6 +419,13 @@
     <brief/>
    </option>
 
+   <option>
+    <name>min-status</name>
+    <arg>{alpha,beta,early-production,production}</arg>
+    <description>strings/min-aircraft-status</description>
+    <brief/>
+   </option>
+
    <option>
     <name>fdm</name>
     <arg>name</arg>

preferences.xml

@@ -293,6 +293,9 @@ Started September 2000 by David Megginson, david@megginson.com
    <enabled type="bool">true</enabled>
    <!-- <scenario>aircraft_demo</scenario> -->
   </ai>
+  
+  <!--to provide a default value that shows ALL aircraft regardless of development status-->
+  <aircraft-min-status>all</aircraft-min-status>
 
  </sim>