Mobile Aviation Weather

wrote:

I would expect the wifi hotspot should probably be locked down to
allow access to aviation/weather related sites only.
This would minimize abuse of a hotspot and bandwidth usage.

As I mentioned I was able to connect to AT&Ts Edge network this weekend at
7k feet with my iPhone. On the same flight over town, including my on house
my iPhone was NOT able to even see any WiFi hotspots.

My thought would be an open source app that would run on the laptop.
Sites that want to be available
for use as in the air hotspots could either register with a central
website that would log the information and gps location
or perhaps broadcast a special wifi identifier. When a hotspot was
found by the laptop, it would automatically query
for any weather reports of interest and update the display.

I would expect the wifi hotspot should probably be locked down to
allow access to aviation/weather related sites only.
This would minimize abuse of a hotspot and bandwidth usage.

I don't see why a little more capability could not be utilized than that.
Perhaps some plain text E-mail connection could be made. It would be darn
handy to be able to send and receive a few E-mails while airborn. I agree
that wholesale web surfing would be a problem, though.

At this point I do not even own any wifi devices, so I am not sure how
much of the firewall capability is built
into wifi devices. Once I finish my pilot training this is something I
plan to experiment with though.

Cool. I await your results.

Something like this could bring a real awakening to hams, increasing numbers
of members and an increase of utility to a great degree.
--
Jim in NC

On Nov 1, 11:37 am, "Robert M. Gary" wrote:
On Nov 1, 6:44 am, wrote:



I have been wondering if more than that could be done. I know there
are experiments with war flying for wifi.
I have wondered though if a volunteer network of wifi
hotspots ,accessible to pilots while in the air,could be established
to pull down TAF's, METAR's, nexrad and such.
It would be an alternative to having to subscribe to xm radio's
weather service.

On Nov 1, 7:03 am, Felix wrote:

Hi Everyone,

I've found that I always want to look up METARs and TAFs when not in
front of a computer. So I wrote a Mobile website to do get this info
for me straight from NOAA.

I thought it would also be useful to others. So here is the URL:
awx.mobi Its a free service and no registering needed to use it. Just
goto that URL on your phone and you'll be able to get METARs TAFs and
the current national Radar image.

I'm working on other information as well like state by state radar,
airport runway lengths, freq...etc.

This is all in beta...I'm working on this at my spare time. But
updates will be coming.

If you have any problems like your phone isn't loading the site. Then
send an email to me at felix at bepilot.com and tell me your phone
model and ill add support for your phone.

Suggestions questions and comments also welcome at the above email
address.

What's wrong with aviationweather.gov? That's what I use on my cell
phone and I've never had a problem. Maybe you're using a 1980's cell
phone?

-Robert


I've used aviationweather.gov and it's a great site. But it's not
really made to be used on your phone. I use a Treo 750 with Verzion
(high speed EVDO connection) and it still takes a while to load. I'm
making awx.mobi (or m.airwx.com) work quickly on a whole range of
phones. Even the 1980s model :-)

-Felix

On Nov 1, 1:10 pm, Felix wrote:
On Nov 1, 11:37 am, "Robert M. Gary" wrote:



On Nov 1, 6:44 am, wrote:

I have been wondering if more than that could be done. I know there
are experiments with war flying for wifi.
I have wondered though if a volunteer network of wifi
hotspots ,accessible to pilots while in the air,could be established
to pull down TAF's, METAR's, nexrad and such.
It would be an alternative to having to subscribe to xm radio's
weather service.

On Nov 1, 7:03 am, Felix wrote:

Hi Everyone,

I've found that I always want to look up METARs and TAFs when not in
front of a computer. So I wrote a Mobile website to do get this info
for me straight from NOAA.

I thought it would also be useful to others. So here is the URL:
awx.mobi Its a free service and no registering needed to use it. Just
goto that URL on your phone and you'll be able to get METARs TAFs and
the current national Radar image.

I'm working on other information as well like state by state radar,
airport runway lengths, freq...etc.

This is all in beta...I'm working on this at my spare time. But
updates will be coming.

If you have any problems like your phone isn't loading the site. Then
send an email to me at felix at bepilot.com and tell me your phone
model and ill add support for your phone.

Suggestions questions and comments also welcome at the above email
address.

What's wrong with aviationweather.gov? That's what I use on my cell
phone and I've never had a problem. Maybe you're using a 1980's cell
phone?

-Robert

I've used aviationweather.gov and it's a great site. But it's not
really made to be used on your phone. I use a Treo 750 with Verzion
(high speed EVDO connection) and it still takes a while to load. I'm
making awx.mobi (or m.airwx.com) work quickly on a whole range of
phones. Even the 1980s model :-)

-Felix

Plus i plan to extend it so that you can file flight plans on your
phone with your duats account! And other neat features. So if people
really like it, they can suggest other things they need and i'll put
them in as well.

-Felix

"Felix" wrote in message
ups.com...

I've used aviationweather.gov and it's a great site. But it's not
really made to be used on your phone. I use a Treo 750 with Verzion
(high speed EVDO connection) and it still takes a while to load. I'm
making awx.mobi (or m.airwx.com) work quickly on a whole range of
phones. Even the 1980s model :-)

-Felix

Plus i plan to extend it so that you can file flight plans on your
phone with your duats account! And other neat features. So if people
really like it, they can suggest other things they need and i'll put
them in as well.

Just checked it out Felix--works great! I don't have a "SmartPhone" but I do
have a Mobile Web 2.0-capable phone and have been looking for a site like
this. Thanks!

Specifically, I've been looking for TAFs, METARs, and flight plan filing
since their simple text-based format works well with the limited screen real
estate and low bandwidth.

For soem other ideas, Winds aloft might be nice and can be driven by the
airport code. Others like area forecast, airmets/sigmets, and PIREPs I
imagine would be a bit harder since they'd have to cover a larger area and
tend to be text-heavy.

Good luck with the project.

Marco

Oh, to have the old Palm wifi technology back...

wrote in news:1193924673.760774.184400
@z9g2000hsf.googlegroups.com:

I have been wondering if more than that could be done. I know there
are experiments with war flying for wifi.
I have wondered though if a volunteer network of wifi
hotspots ,accessible to pilots while in the air,could be established
to pull down TAF's, METAR's, nexrad and such.
It would be an alternative to having to subscribe to xm radio's
weather service.



On Nov 1, 7:03 am, Felix wrote:
Hi Everyone,

I've found that I always want to look up METARs and TAFs when not in
front of a computer. So I wrote a Mobile website to do get this info
for me straight from NOAA.

I thought it would also be useful to others. So here is the URL:
awx.mobi Its a free service and no registering needed to use it. Just
goto that URL on your phone and you'll be able to get METARs TAFs and
the current national Radar image.

I'm working on other information as well like state by state radar,
airport runway lengths, freq...etc.

This is all in beta...I'm working on this at my spare time. But
updates will be coming.

If you have any problems like your phone isn't loading the site. Then
send an email to me at felix at bepilot.com and tell me your phone
model and ill add support for your phone.

Suggestions questions and comments also welcome at the above email
address.

Thanks!

Felix

Judah wrote:
Oh, to have the old Palm wifi technology back...

If you mean connect via WiFi when you are near one and via cell when you
aren't, you can get it back with the iPhone.

"Gig 601XL Builder" wrDOTgiaconaATsuddenlink.net wrote in
:

Judah wrote:
Oh, to have the old Palm wifi technology back...

If you mean connect via WiFi when you are near one and via cell when you
aren't, you can get it back with the iPhone.

No, I mean Palm.Net. Palm used to have an internet connectivity solution
that was proprietary to their phones (I think series 7). It was not
available everywhere, but where it was available, it was pretty reliable,
and worked over really long-distances. I was able to get it up at 10,000'
as well as on trains, in cars, and in buildings.

It wasn't the fastest connection in the world, but there was even a live
NEXRAD weather app for pilots that I used more than once from the air. The
app was free, and the service was $20/month with bandwidth limitations, and
maybe twice that if you wanted unlimited bandwidth.

I think it was less reliable than cell service on the ground, but in the
air it was substantially more reliable than cell service.

In 2004, they dropped the service. A lot of people here thought someone
would pick it up specifically for aviation benefits, but 3 years later it
is all but forgotten technology.

Would have been nice if one of the cell providers picked it up as a backup
for their backbone or something...

Yes, please! I still have my Palm i705 charging on my desk. That, with
PalmNet and Cheap *******s software gave me almost live radar up to 8,000'
for almost no money. It was a sad, sad day when they stopped that service.

"Judah" wrote in message
.. .
Oh, to have the old Palm wifi technology back...

wrote in news:1193924673.760774.184400
@z9g2000hsf.googlegroups.com:

I have been wondering if more than that could be done. I know there
are experiments with war flying for wifi.
I have wondered though if a volunteer network of wifi
hotspots ,accessible to pilots while in the air,could be established
to pull down TAF's, METAR's, nexrad and such.
It would be an alternative to having to subscribe to xm radio's
weather service.



On Nov 1, 7:03 am, Felix wrote:
Hi Everyone,

I've found that I always want to look up METARs and TAFs when not in
front of a computer. So I wrote a Mobile website to do get this info
for me straight from NOAA.

I thought it would also be useful to others. So here is the URL:
awx.mobi Its a free service and no registering needed to use it. Just
goto that URL on your phone and you'll be able to get METARs TAFs and
the current national Radar image.

I'm working on other information as well like state by state radar,
airport runway lengths, freq...etc.

This is all in beta...I'm working on this at my spare time. But
updates will be coming.

If you have any problems like your phone isn't loading the site. Then
send an email to me at felix at bepilot.com and tell me your phone
model and ill add support for your phone.

Suggestions questions and comments also welcome at the above email
address.

Thanks!

Felix

AGREE 100%!

On Nov 2, 2:47 pm, "LWG" wrote:
Yes, please! I still have my Palm i705 charging on my desk. That, with
PalmNet and Cheap *******s software gave me almost live radar up to 8,000'
for almost no money. It was a sad, sad day when they stopped that service.