Hello. I am looking for websites that provide real time tracking info
on IFR flights,. I would like to allow family to track me when I am
on longer flights.

Free would be best, followed by a per flight charge, followed by
monthly service charge.

Any suggestions.

Thanks,
Nathan

>Hello. I am looking for websites that provide real time tracking info

>on IFR flights,. I would like to allow family to track me when I am
>on longer flights.
>
>Free would be best, followed by a per flight charge, followed by
>monthly service charge.

Hello Nathan,

I use fboweb.com, $10/month. I looked far and wide for free or
cheaper options to no avail. Fboweb is probably less capable than
FlightExplorer, but it's web based so I (or my wife) can use it from
anywhere...

Cheers,
John Clonts
Temple, Texas
N7NZ

www.avweb.com to the flight explorer link



"Nathan Young" > wrote in message
...
> Hello. I am looking for websites that provide real time tracking info
> on IFR flights,. I would like to allow family to track me when I am
> on longer flights.
>
> Free would be best, followed by a per flight charge, followed by
> monthly service charge.
>
> Any suggestions.
>
> Thanks,
> Nathan
>
>
>
>
>

Nathan Young wrote:
> Hello. I am looking for websites that provide real time tracking
info
> on IFR flights,. I would like to allow family to track me when I am
> on longer flights.
>
> Free would be best, followed by a per flight charge, followed by
> monthly service charge.


I agree, free would be best! After all, since taxpayers pay for the
FAA to collect the data and operate their infrastructure, it would make
sense that the data is freely available, like weather data is from the
NOAA.

However, your friends at the FAA, AOPA, FlightExplorer, etc, have all
teamed up to make pilots pay for flight tracking data. If the data was
freely available on the internet in some open format (like XML), there
would be countless free services offering flight tracking with superior
technology to the stuff you can pay for.

Companies like AccuWeather were lobbying for the NOAA to stop freely
distributing the data that taxpayers paid to collect. Ultimately, word
got out about their intentions, complaints ensued, and they didn't
get what they wanted. I'd like that precedent to be applied to the FAA
and flight tracking.

Perhaps a few letters to the FAA and AOPA would help.

Chip

"Chip Hermes" > wrote in message
oups.com...
>
> I agree, free would be best! After all, since taxpayers pay for the
> FAA to collect the data and operate their infrastructure, it would make
> sense that the data is freely available, like weather data is from the
> NOAA.
>
> However, your friends at the FAA, AOPA, FlightExplorer, etc, have all
> teamed up to make pilots pay for flight tracking data. If the data was
> freely available on the internet in some open format (like XML), there
> would be countless free services offering flight tracking with superior
> technology to the stuff you can pay for.
>
> Companies like AccuWeather were lobbying for the NOAA to stop freely
> distributing the data that taxpayers paid to collect. Ultimately, word
> got out about their intentions, complaints ensued, and they didn't
> get what they wanted. I'd like that precedent to be applied to the FAA
> and flight tracking.
>
> Perhaps a few letters to the FAA and AOPA would help.
>
> Chip
>
You are so right, Chip. This reminds me of the days when the National
Library of Medicine put together their index of the medical literature (with
taxpayer dollars, like the weather data) and sold it to third parties who
then turned around and charged libraries, physicians, and researchers for
the data. About 5 or so years ago (I don't remember exactly when), they
made it freely available on the internet (www.nlm.nih.gov), as it should be.
I'm not sure whether political or other pressures were behind that decision.

"Chip Hermes" > writes:

>I agree, free would be best! After all, since taxpayers pay for the
>FAA to collect the data and operate their infrastructure, it would make
>sense that the data is freely available, like weather data is from the
>NOAA.

Oh, sure, that seems reasonable to us taxpayers. But how do you expect
those poor corporations to make money without limiting our access to our
data?

>However, your friends at the FAA, AOPA, FlightExplorer, etc, have all
>teamed up to make pilots pay for flight tracking data. If the data was
>freely available on the internet in some open format (like XML), there
>would be countless free services offering flight tracking with superior
>technology to the stuff you can pay for.

My understanding is that the data *is* "freely" available...with lots
of strings attached. I've got details about that around here somewhere
but here's what I recall.

To get the data you must sign an agreement that says you won't share it
freely. You must also provide specific communications equipment to be
installed at the data center and pay for (partial T1?) access to that
equipment. I think there's a data center charge too.

I was looking into this when "but the terr'rists would use it!" would
quickly shut down any discussion of Free access to such useful data.
Maybe that's changed. I'd be happy to provide money, equipment and
software to help make this data available to those who pay for it
(taxpayers) but I don't have effort to spare to bang my head against
this wall right now.

BTW, I think I recall that a university (MIT?) might already have
access. That would be a good place to start sharing.

--kyler

"Chip Hermes" > writes:

>I've seen things along those lines, too, and think that any significant
>barriers to entry are essentially complete barriers for the
>distribution of information freely. The idea of requiring a leased
>line circuit for the transmission of data might have been reasonable 10
>or 20 years ago, but it's beyond ridiculous now.

It's about as reasonable as the FAA charging a subscription fee to
FedEx ~14MB of ATA-100 data on CD every month. I've been happy to foot
the bill make that data freely available and I'd be happy to do the same
(at least partially) to get the flight tracking data. The usage
agreement stopped me though. It doesn't appear to be possible to
legally distribute the data freely after getting it.

(BTW, note in the information below that more modern data transmission
services such as ISDN and ADSL are specifically disallowed.)

>I've already written a letter to AOPA about their support for Flight
>Explorer. As an organization that's all about keeping costs down and
>making sure that GA pilots don't have to pay more, etc, it's weird that
>they support something that takes advantage of all taxpayers, including
>pilots.

Be careful about your assumptions. My experience with AOPA (of which
I'm a "valued member since 1989") leads me to believe that they are
primarily interested in being valued by their members. They are
careful to remain in a position of controlling data so that only their
members benefit from it. I wouldn't expect them to advocate for free
availability of data.

Ah ha! Here's some information I received from another person who
researched this. (I don't think he'd be bothered but I'll omit his
name for now.)

http://www.fly.faa.gov/ASDI/asdi.html

[...]

1. The vendor shall install a communication line to Volpe. This must be a
frame relay or a T1 line; ISDN and DSL are not allowed. A connection over
the Internet to Volpe is not allowed.
2. The vendor shall provide a CSU/DSU with an EIA 530 interface. The
dimensions for the CSU/DSU must be no larger than 11 inches deep, 8.5 inches
wide, and 2 inches high, with a 10Base-T port that can be installed in a
nineteen-inch rack.
3. Since Cisco routers are used on the Volpe end, the router on the vendor
end should be Cisco-compatible.

[...]

If you can find a friend at MIT, that might be your best bet to get the
feed.

I'm not finding the message about MIT but my recollection is that they're
getting the data. I didn't pursue it after I realized the data would be
strictly encumbered. Perhaps there's a way to filter the data so that it
can be distributed.

Tell me if I can help.

--kyler

Hmmm, so the "terr'rists" can't afford 10 bucks a month???

On Sat, 12 Mar 2005 14:08:07 GMT, Kyler Laird >
wrote:

>
>I was looking into this when "but the terr'rists would use it!" would
>quickly shut down any discussion of Free access to such useful data.
>Maybe that's changed. I'd be happy to provide money, equipment and
>software to help make this data available to those who pay for it
>(taxpayers) but I don't have effort to spare to bang my head against
>this wall right now.
>
>BTW, I think I recall that a university (MIT?) might already have
>access. That would be a good place to start sharing.
>
>--kyler

(gary) writes:

>>I was looking into this when "but the terr'rists would use it!" would
>>quickly shut down any discussion of Free access to such useful data.

>Hmmm, so the "terr'rists" can't afford 10 bucks a month???

That's correct. They also can't scale 8' high fences, buy paper
maps or perform their own aerial surveys (among other things).

C'mon, do you really want to bang your head on that wall?

--kyler

Why don't you try www.airnavsystems.com ?

Their software rocks, I've been using it for 2 years, it is cheaper,
gets you 60 hours per month and graphically is way much better.

It is called AirNav Live Flight Tracker, I believe.