Module: FLYING

The Flying module offers dynamic multi leg lifght planning and in flight navigational tools.
On your PDA, create flight plans based on POIs -airports, navaids, cities,…- and get automatic calculation of headings, winds, time and fuel! In the air, connect a GPS and follow your course on maps and legs when navigating with automatic recalculation of heading, destination, ...

While this application is build as a tool for aviation use it is quite usable for cars, boats and even hiking use as you can define both vehicle specificity and direction distortion.

Use in conjunction with the mapping module, legs are visualized on digital interactive maps WAC, Sectional and vector airways. Even instantly get appropriate aeraunautical online maps, charts, trip ticks via Aeroplanner.com web portal.
Coupled with the GPS module, get in-flight navigation tool with the assistance of GPS navigation: follow your course on maps and legs with automatic recalculation of heading, destination,

Terminology

A flight leg is the route segment defined from a referred departure point -airports, navaids, cities,…- to a referred destination point -airports, navaids, cities,…-. A flight leg is created by linking 2 POIs together in a sequence.

A flight plan details the full route of an intended flight: it is composed by several contiguous flight legs, and by vehicle and wind aloft specificity.
 

Set up flight legs

To define your multi-legs plan, enter your departing, destination and en-route's POIs.

Click on the empty entries of the first column list and select from the POIs list the desired leg entry.

Once a leg entry is defined, you can also view it, remove it, replace it insert a new entry in between via the contextual popup menu available via the entry name.

Once a leg is defined (i.e 2 POIs are consecutively specified), the program automatically reports and computes leg Magnetic Heading MH, total distance Dist, and estimated time en route Ete.

If you click on one entry of the second column list, you get dynamic navigational information from your current position to the leg destination point: Magnetic Course MC –magnetic heading corrected with deviant current- , total distance Dist, and estimated time en route Ete.
Clicking on the dynamic update table will turn it off again.

If there is a GPS connected, all the computing data are recalculating at current speed.

To change distance unit use the menu Options-Preferences.
 

Vehicle description

Describe vehicle specificity for best pre-flight and in-flight navigation estimation.

The vehicle view is available by selecting the vehicle box in the log screen. To edit or delete the current vehicle, apply the Vehicle-Edit or Vehicle-Delete options menu. Click on the option menu Vehicle-List, to select a vehicle among the predefined ones, or to create a new one – New button at the bottom of the list-.

A vehicle is defined by

• A name,
• A category – modifiable via the top right corner dropdown list-
• A registration number,
• Average speed of the vehicle
  Average speed of a vehicle is used to compute Estimated Time en Route and the wind correction in the flight-plan.
  To change vehicle's speed unit use the menu Options-Preferences
• Fuel on board
• Description free note

You can create many different vehicles: car at highway speeds, car at street speeds to easily estimate trip times of any journey.
 

Wind Aloft

Define prevailing winds – direction and speed - to take into account wind effect on flight plan headings and ETE's. Very useful for marine navigation too, to define currents or any deviance from pure directions.

The wind view is available by selecting the wind box in the log screen.

Enter both Direction and Velocity of the wind or any deviant currents or select the No Wind for a very calm day!

The air module will automatically computes the wind compensation angle for each leg of your route.
 

Flights display

A flight log is not attached to a map and can extend past the map boundaries. The Flying module manages multiple logs but only the active one is shown on the screen.

A flight plan is visualized on maps by thick color lines drawn on maps. You can modify the color of the route via the menu Options-Preferences.

The menu Map-Best Fit -available when coupled with the Tracking or Flying modules - allows to display the entire track log or flightlog on the best-scaled map.

You can also simulate (play) your route travel before you go, by applying GPS simulation option available via the option menu GPS-details.

With a GPS connected, you can pinpoint your course over the selected flight route. With a glance, you can tell your position with respect to your intended course. This is much more intuitive than a CDI.

Flight and on-line maps

After entering your flight plan, you have the possibility to request full on-line maps coverage of your flight log. Check the full route check box, in the Map-aeroplanner box, and get full set of maps covering your entire flight.
 

Navigation information

The navigation panel -visible on demand on an extra layer at the top of the map view- assists your navigation in specifying total distance and estimated travel time from your current location to any specific destination. Time is estimated by current speed, average speed if a GPS is connected.

To make the navigation panel visible/invisible on the map screen, click on the top left corner of the screen and select the Show/Hide option from the popup menu.

The information listed in the panel refer navigation data from your current position to the selected destination. From left to right, you can see:

• Current heading to reach your destination represented by a red arrow
• Destination POI ‘s n
• Estimated distance between the 2 points
• Estimated Time En route (Ete) to reach your destination. Time is estimated by average speed, or current speed if a GPS is connected.

Via the navigation popup menu, you can also get the details of the your selected destination POI, or replace it by any other POIs from the POIs list that represent all the POIs predefined on your device.

The destination POI can also be set by selecting on any POIs displayed on the map and applying the Set to option from the contextual popup menu.
 

Flight management

The option menu Log-List visualizes the list of the flight plans loaded on your Palm.

You can choose the current log's database through the categories' menu list located at top-right corner of the screen.

To load a log, select its name from the list. To create a one click on the New button at the bottom of the list.

Note: if you get these ?-( symbols on your flight log, these mean that some of the legs are not anymore known because some of the POIs are unknown too. The causes could be that the POIs database or the POI has been erased from your device. Be careful when you remove POIs database if some POIs belong to flight plans, at this time move these POIs to Personal databases

Route-Map view/Map-Log View switches the flight plan view between log and map display.

Route-Delete allows to delete the current flight plan from your device.

Route-Reverse instantly reverse the current flight plan.
 

Units and flight color

To change distance, vehicle's speed units or modify the color of the current flight on maps use the menu Options-Preferences.
 

Hard key assignments

The PDA physical buttons are redefined as shortcut for GPS Pilot applications.

Button 2 and center key for Palm Tungsten users switches between the Log and map views.
 

Contextual help

A first-aid tutorial that answers to most common questions is available via the menu Option-Help.

> Flying FAQ
> FLY product page