Hi Tim,

I just found another topic which could be related, so posted there too!



Firstly, I would like to thank you for a great job on the software, which was pointed to me by a mutual friend and I am planning on using it once I get back to doing some VFR flying - not seeing where you're flying all the time can get a bit frustrating!



I posted in another topic about disused airfields not appearing to show up, which I find odd seeing as we have them on our CAA charts for navigational purposes and they do often provide very good landmarks. Is there a way to turns these on?

I thought at first it may just be the specific one I was looking for missing but then cross-checked with my VFR chart for ones in the Oxford area and can't find the others either.



Also, Just a small point, would it be possible to get other features such as the chalk carvings displayed such as the giant we have done in Cerne Abbas?



I've also noticed, that even when zoomed in, the road and river detailing seems very sparse.

For example, from Sherborne to Dorchester, the A352 is marked however the C12 is not, even though they are worthy of appearing on our half mil VFR charts (which I know are not the same, but surely the detail required there should also be available for this VFR planning software?).



Thanks again and I look forward to hearing from you so I can purchase the software.

Sam

Hello Sam,

Disused airfields are not included in SkyDemon, and neither are chalk characters such as giants and horses, quarries, and other distinctive ground-based landmarks. This is partly because we don't have a decent source of such data and partly because we don't consider it to be particularly useful in a flight-planning tool. I'm personally unclear why roads might be useful in such a tool, but since we have some data for them, we included them.

I know the folks at the CAA think it's necessary or useful to include minor roads on the charts but one of the main reasons people come to SkyDemon is because of the lack of irrelevant information, leading to a big increase in clarity when using a SkyDemon chart. Our charts are not designed to be a replacement to the paper charts, only as an aid.

Having said that, disused airfields and other landmarks that have been notified as being VRPs for airfields ARE included. If you think we're missing any of these, let us know for which airfield and we'll look into it.

Hope this helps.

Couple of comments:

> I'm personally unclear why roads might be useful in such a tool, but since we have some data for them, we included them.

Roads are terribly useful for locating a place of interest in the 'big open spaces' on the map.  I tend to choose landmarks such as road junctions, small villages, 'stately homes', and the like as turning points, and it is hard to place them without roads.  And of course, when using a linear feature such as a road or railway to route alongside, one wants to place the route to the right of the feature.  Hard to do if the feature isn't on the map.

> Having said that, disused airfields and other landmarks that have been notified as being VRPs for airfields ARE included. If you think we're missing any of these, let us know for which airfield and we'll look into it.

I noticed Chedworth wasn't there (a useful turning point close to the Northleach VRP for heading W a decent distance south of Gloucester a/p).

Mike

Mike,

I checked the AIP and there appear to be no VRPs notified for Gloucestershire airfield.

I don't dispute that roads can be very useful for in-flight navigation; I still fail to understand how they are useful to the planning of a flight. If there is a landmark somewhere, presumably a user waypoint can simply be created for it. Would you plan a flight by inserting as many waypoints as required to maintain a route to the right of a motorway, for example?

Tom, Thanks,

On Chedworth: apologies, it's not an official VRP, it's marked as a disused aerodrome -- but a very useful vrp (small caps) all the same.

On roads .. yes, one can insert a user waypoint -- but how can one decide where to put it in an empty area of countryside without the roads to narrow down the point?   Also, for the route plan, yes I do want to keep a long straight leg clear of (to the right of) a road or railway line, so if I'm flying on a bearing I'll be well clear and not accidentally cross it if I forget to look straight down for a while.

In truth, I'd rather plan my route using the CAA charts on Memory Map, then import the GPX into SkyDemon to generate & print the route plan.   Is GPX import on the wishlist?

Mike

I think we've had a couple of requests for it. Feel free to upload a sample GPX route created in such a way here, then we'll have some sample data to work with.

Here's one (my planned flight for tomorrow).  Very straightforward GPX file for a route ... it's really only the <rte> ... </rte> that needs to be parsed.   This is exactly as saved by MemoryMap.

Happy to send you a .zip with more if that would be of help.

Mike

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<gpx version="1.1"
creator="Memory-Map 5.4.2.1089 http://www.memory-map.com"
 xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
 xmlns="http://www.topografix.com/GPX/1/1"
 xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.topografix.com/GPX/1/1 http://www.topografix.com/GPX/1/1/gpx.xsd">
<rte>
<name>Route</name>
<type>Route</type>
<rtept lat="52.1390030035" lon="-1.7525129006">
<name>WP0001</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.1273444624" lon="-1.4509948048">
<name>WP0002</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.3071253263" lon="-1.3161476894">
<name>WP0003</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.3042960776" lon="-1.1417186377">
<name>WP0004</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.1351655506" lon="-0.9608996602">
<name>WP0005</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.1122765025" lon="-0.9679930356">
<name>WP0006</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.0786003295" lon="-1.1649384999">
<name>WP0007</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.0311946386" lon="-1.3807257990">
<name>WP0008</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.0581881486" lon="-1.6260537226">
<name>WP0009</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
<rtept lat="52.1390030035" lon="-1.7525129006">
<name>WP0001</name>
<sym>Dot</sym>
<type>Waypoints</type>
</rtept>
</rte>
</gpx>

Thanks. We took a look at this and since we already had code to export to GPX format, this was trivial, so we just implemented it. You'll see the feature in the next release (and the next refresh of the beta).

Excellent!   Off to your Store ...

Mike