Status of the fplan airport, nav database files (long)

["John C. Peterson" <jaypee netcom com>]

Greetings Everyone...

Now that the long summer days are a thing of the past, I've finally
found some time to get back to work on fplan. Things may be a little
slow with all the holiday stuff coming up, but I should have more
time on my hands. On that note, I wanted to post an update on the
status of the fplan airport, nav database files.

First off, I know that you pilots outside of the US may be feeling a
little left out with regard to the database files, so let me address
that situation first. I can appreciate your frustrations as I had the
opportunity to experienced it myself with my vacation to Sweden and
Germany this summer.  The one little bit of good news I have to
offer, is that I have discovered a web site that has lots of free
data (for most of the world). It's called the "Worldwide Airport Path
Finder" and is hosted by Falling Rain Genomics. Inc. They clearly
state that the data may be inaccurate or obsolete.  However, this
might serve as a good starting point for those willing to do a little
of their own data validation. The site is at;

	http://www.fallingrain.com/air/airports.cgi
	http://www.fallingrain.com/air/cache/geo/stats.html

A short term solution that uses this data might not be that
difficult.  It should be possible to cobble together a script to
automate the construction of a database from this data.  A URL
grabber like wget or curl could be used to fetch the desired pages,
and then some simple awk, sed programs to strip out and reformat
the data.

It appears that much of the data at the WAPF site comes from a
NOAA product called "Digital Aeronautical Flight Information
File".  I did a little surfing around, and found some information
on NOAA's web site.  Unfortunately, the data is a little on the
expensive side. A one time purchase is 108.75 US$, and 1413.75 US$
for a year subscription with updates every 28 days. I dont know if
the data can be freely distributed? See these pages for more info;

	http://acc.nos.noaa.gov/PriceLists/PricesNOSAero.html 
	http://acc.nos.noaa.gov/Catalog/DAFIF.html

For the long term, I suspect the best option for non-US pilots is
purchasing data in ARINC 424-13 format.  I haven't had a chance to
research the specifics of this format, the documentation can be
ordered :( for $100) from ARINC;

	http://www.arinc.com/Ind_Govt_Srv/Characteristics/arinc400.html
	http://www.arinc.com/Ind_Govt_Srv/Characteristics/424.html

The main advantage of this approach is that current and accurate data
in ARINC 424-13 format can be purchased from a variety of commercial
sources for just about any country.  The NavData CD-ROM product from
Jeppesen is one familiar example. (By the way, I'd be interested in
expired Jepp NavData CD-ROMs if anyone has one they would be willing
to part with). The disadvantage of this approach is that it wouldn't
be free.  Each pilot would likely have to purchase the data due to
the license restrictions. (Not sure of this, just a good guess?)

For US airports, there have been some changes, some good and bad
news.  Two pieces of bad news; 1) the format of the comma delimited
NFDC files has changed and that broke avdbtools, 2) as some of you
may have discovered, these files are no longer available for free
download over the Internet. Now for the good news...

The "official" (meaning current and up to date) US National
Airspace Data can now be purchased on CD-ROM for 36 US$. They have
new releases every 56 days, and also offer a subscription service
(details below). I've never worked with the old tapes they used
to distribute, but I've heard they were a real nightmare.  They
advertise the new CD-ROMs as being much easier to work with. I'll
find out shortly, as I just mailed off a check for the next release
due out in early December. Anyhow, there is some work to be done on
avdbtools to get it to work with the new format they are using. So
unless you are planning to help with that effort, don't rush out
and order this stuff just yet. Actually, it shouldn't be much work
if they distribute the "original" fixed format data files that the
comma delimited files are derived from. The older releases included
the awk scripts that are / were used to generate the comma delimited
files, and they could be tweaked to meet our needs without too much
sweat. Anyhow, here are the new web pages describing everything;

	FAA - Aeronautical Information Services
		http://www.faa.gov/nfdcata100/100miss.html
	FAA - National Airspace Data Distribution
		http://www.faa.gov/nfdcata100/120/120nadd.html
	FAA - National Flight Data Center
		http://www.faa.gov/nfdcata100/110/110splsh.html

This brings up another issue. I don't think there is a problem with
redistributing this data for free. So perhaps we can find a corporate
sponsor, or pool our money to enroll in the subscription program.
Add a few volunteers to help reformat the data when it comes in,
and we would once again have current US databases available for
everyone to download!

Best Regards, John

-- 
 ___|___  | John C. Peterson, <jaypee@netcom.com> | "Once you have flown,
  -(*)-   | you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there
  o/ \o   | you have been, there you long to return." -- Leonardo da Vinci.