PowerFLARM Range Issues - Part Two with info from todays flights

David,

that's a good idea and we'll keep it in mind when it comes
to further development decisions!

Best
--Gerhard
My solution to that is simple. The third party app or device can as

easily keep track of all thermalling/climbing gliders withing Flarm

range at all times and present them to the pilot in some order of

preference such as some smart combination of distance and climb rate.

Then all the struggling pilot needs to do is, for example, tap on the

first one on the list (~1 second) and voila, he gets the voice vector.



All am saying is that it would be highly beneficial to keep a forward

looking approach because it has been shown again and again we don't

really know what the killer app is going to be that will stimulate the

widest adoption. And the widest adoption is what the Flarm concept

(and we all) needs for it to really succeed.



Best,



David

(proud early adopter of many many devices, including a Brick

PowerFlarm).

That's how LK8000 is actually doing since two years, and maybe LX8000/9000
(the Big brother).
You enter a list of traffic ids, you can keep this list sorted by distance,
direction, lift.
You choose the traffic you want to monitor (we call it target)
Target is now available as a normal "goto", already selected as destination.
You can flight to the target always looking at it in a sight, telling you if
(at your current glide ratio) you will get there higher or lower.
Or you look at the target on the map, just like a waypoint, with an arrival
altitude relative to it.

But apart from user interface aspects, there is an important issue here to
be kept in mind, if you are thinking about improving traffic monitor for
non-safety purposes.
Flarm traffic will not be always broadcasted, even if in range.
And even if in range, your antenna might not be in view with the other
antenna, resulting in a perfect "invisible" traffic maybe a few miles away.
This is normal, as we have experienced so far in europe.
So the concept of "traffic" on display is misleading, a lot! In fact, I came
to conclusion that it is better to have 3 kind of traffic objects:
1- Live traffic (data received in the last 10-20 seconds for example)
2- Ghost traffic (data missing since up to a minute, or two.. dont remember)
3- Zombies. Traces of old traffic that disappeared.

Experience shows that zombies or ghost can reappear as live anytime, maybe 1
second after they were elected non-live.
It depends on the above factors.

Now if you log the nearby trafic data, for showing a trace of objectes, like
we do, in different colors to show where they actually climbed or sinked,
this trace will be held valid even if it belongs to an object that it is no
more visibile, for any reason, but still a ghost or a zombie.

I know this might sound funny, at least, with all these ghosts and zombies
going around, but this is like it is really happening in the air when you
transmit with small antennas at 10mw, and the antenna is not placed
externally to the canopy, with lots of carbon fiber around..

It is actually very fun to think about the infinite approaches a
manufacturer can choose from, for its technology.

Personally, I think the little butterfly is such a nice device to have, and
so simple to use...!
But people want more gadgets and beep machines aboard..

paolo



wrote in message
...

David,

that's a good idea and we'll keep it in mind when it comes
to further development decisions!

Best
--Gerhard
My solution to that is simple. The third party app or device can as

easily keep track of all thermalling/climbing gliders withing Flarm

range at all times and present them to the pilot in some order of

preference such as some smart combination of distance and climb rate.

Then all the struggling pilot needs to do is, for example, tap on the

first one on the list (~1 second) and voila, he gets the voice vector.



All am saying is that it would be highly beneficial to keep a forward

looking approach because it has been shown again and again we don't

really know what the killer app is going to be that will stimulate the

widest adoption. And the widest adoption is what the Flarm concept

(and we all) needs for it to really succeed.



Best,



David

(proud early adopter of many many devices, including a Brick

PowerFlarm).

Paolo,

very good writing, thank you.

This traffic display you described also improves situation
awareness about the traffic near you. You can see if there is
someone near you, gliding the same direction, and you can see
his call-sign. If he keeps in the blind spot behind you, you can
ask on radio if the other pilot is aware of situation (without this
application he might not) and what are his/her intentions.

-kimmo


At 00:08 20 October 2012, pcool wrote:
That's how LK8000 is actually doing since two years, and
maybe LX8000/9000
(the Big brother).
You enter a list of traffic ids, you can keep this list sorted by
distance,

direction, lift.
You choose the traffic you want to monitor (we call it target)
Target is now available as a normal "goto", already selected as
destination.
You can flight to the target always looking at it in a sight,
telling you
if
(at your current glide ratio) you will get there higher or lower.
Or you look at the target on the map, just like a waypoint, with
an arrival

altitude relative to it.

But apart from user interface aspects, there is an important
issue here to
be kept in mind, if you are thinking about improving traffic
monitor for
non-safety purposes.
Flarm traffic will not be always broadcasted, even if in range.
And even if in range, your antenna might not be in view with
the other
antenna, resulting in a perfect "invisible" traffic maybe a few
miles away.
This is normal, as we have experienced so far in europe.
So the concept of "traffic" on display is misleading, a lot! In
fact, I
came
to conclusion that it is better to have 3 kind of traffic objects:
1- Live traffic (data received in the last 10-20 seconds for
example)
2- Ghost traffic (data missing since up to a minute, or two..
dont
remember)
3- Zombies. Traces of old traffic that disappeared.

Experience shows that zombies or ghost can reappear as live
anytime, maybe
1
second after they were elected non-live.
It depends on the above factors.

Now if you log the nearby trafic data, for showing a trace of
objectes,
like
we do, in different colors to show where they actually climbed
or sinked,
this trace will be held valid even if it belongs to an object that it
is no

more visibile, for any reason, but still a ghost or a zombie.

I know this might sound funny, at least, with all these ghosts
and zombies
going around, but this is like it is really happening in the air
when you
transmit with small antennas at 10mw, and the antenna is not
placed
externally to the canopy, with lots of carbon fiber around..

It is actually very fun to think about the infinite approaches a
manufacturer can choose from, for its technology.

Personally, I think the little butterfly is such a nice device to
have, and

so simple to use...!
But people want more gadgets and beep machines aboard..

paolo

On Saturday, October 6, 2012 12:11:32 PM UTC-4, bumper wrote:
For those of us who don't relish the "opportunity" to dive in and experiment with config files and such . . . Butterfly has a free config file builder that does it for you using a multiple choice format that even I can figure out.



http://www.butterfly-avionics.com/in...core-config-en



bumper

Bumper,

thanks for the pointer. I used this site just now to generate a config file, and it works GREAT!

TA

On Friday, October 19, 2012 5:08:09 PM UTC-7, pcool wrote:
That's how LK8000 is actually doing since two years, and maybe LX8000/9000

(the Big brother).

You enter a list of traffic ids, you can keep this list sorted by distance,

direction, lift.

You choose the traffic you want to monitor (we call it target)

Target is now available as a normal "goto", already selected as destination.

You can flight to the target always looking at it in a sight, telling you if

(at your current glide ratio) you will get there higher or lower.

Or you look at the target on the map, just like a waypoint, with an arrival

altitude relative to it.



But apart from user interface aspects, there is an important issue here to

be kept in mind, if you are thinking about improving traffic monitor for

non-safety purposes.

Flarm traffic will not be always broadcasted, even if in range.

And even if in range, your antenna might not be in view with the other

antenna, resulting in a perfect "invisible" traffic maybe a few miles away.

This is normal, as we have experienced so far in europe.

So the concept of "traffic" on display is misleading, a lot! In fact, I came

to conclusion that it is better to have 3 kind of traffic objects:

1- Live traffic (data received in the last 10-20 seconds for example)

2- Ghost traffic (data missing since up to a minute, or two.. dont remember)

3- Zombies. Traces of old traffic that disappeared.



Experience shows that zombies or ghost can reappear as live anytime, maybe 1

second after they were elected non-live.

It depends on the above factors.



Now if you log the nearby trafic data, for showing a trace of objectes, like

we do, in different colors to show where they actually climbed or sinked,

this trace will be held valid even if it belongs to an object that it is no

more visibile, for any reason, but still a ghost or a zombie.



I know this might sound funny, at least, with all these ghosts and zombies

going around, but this is like it is really happening in the air when you

transmit with small antennas at 10mw, and the antenna is not placed

externally to the canopy, with lots of carbon fiber around..



It is actually very fun to think about the infinite approaches a

manufacturer can choose from, for its technology.



Personally, I think the little butterfly is such a nice device to have, and

so simple to use...!

But people want more gadgets and beep machines aboard..



paolo







wrote in message

...



David,



that's a good idea and we'll keep it in mind when it comes

to further development decisions!



Best

--Gerhard

My solution to that is simple. The third party app or device can as



easily keep track of all thermalling/climbing gliders withing Flarm



range at all times and present them to the pilot in some order of



preference such as some smart combination of distance and climb rate.



Then all the struggling pilot needs to do is, for example, tap on the



first one on the list (~1 second) and voila, he gets the voice vector.







All am saying is that it would be highly beneficial to keep a forward



looking approach because it has been shown again and again we don't



really know what the killer app is going to be that will stimulate the



widest adoption. And the widest adoption is what the Flarm concept



(and we all) needs for it to really succeed.







Best,







David



(proud early adopter of many many devices, including a Brick



PowerFlarm).

This is a very impressive capability of LK8000! And pretty much what I had in mind, although I indicated speech output to reduce head-down time.

The classification of targets (Live, Ghost, Zombies) is sensible given the constraints of the system (10mW power output) which limit the continuous visibility of targets (which is rather unfortunate). Recording the location of another glider in the recent past and it's climb rate at the time can be very useful information for those that like team flying.

Combined with some good audio alerting capability is there really a need for a dedicated Flarm display (ie, Butterfly)? Assuming of course the Collision Alert capability on the app is as fast as it is with the Butterfly display. Wouldn't want any further delays on that.

Although I keep recommending pilots to "fly your own flight and not someone else's flight, make your own decisions, good and bad", team-flying is fun once in a while and actually the preferred modality for some pilots. And besides, a friend's thermal can be quite handy at times. Plus, if it cuts down on radio chatter, then everyone wins.

There is another thread on leeching. The fundamental question is: should one rely just one's own capabilities to find all lift or is it a collaborative effort? Should one use technology to find lift (ie, thermal detectors, in the not too distant future). Each pilot should answer this question for themselves depending on what their goals are. Also this question has different meaning depending on the context (ie, competition vs recreational)

What is pretty clear is that the widest adoption of Flarm is beneficial to all soaring pilots as a group, regardless of the individual's main motivation to use it. So casting the widest net of adoption is what we should be aiming for.


David