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Dirrect to a VOR??
- Thread starter cmarbach
- Start date
- Joined
- Mar 23, 2005
- Messages
- 13,226
SkyView has a neat algorithm to help you search for places. It auto-fills the rest of the name with the closest item that matches what you have already spun in. But it also prioritizes airports over VORs, NDB's, and fixes.
So, if you are in our office in Woodinville, WA, and you spin in "K", it chooses "KPAE" for you since that is the closest airport that starts with "K". You'll notice in using this, it makes spinning in things a lot faster than when you do it on other equipment. Spin in "K" on most GPS units and you get "KAAA" in Illinois, no matter where you are. Or you might get the NDB "EDIZ HOOK" which just has the ID of "K".
This continues when you hit the second letter. Spin "K" and you get "KPAE" but move to the "P" and spin it to "S" and now you get "KSEA", not "KSAA".
Since we prioritize airports over VORs, what is happening is that when you spin PHK, it sees that there is an airport PHKO in Hawaii. If you want just PHK the VOR, you need to go over to the "O" and spin the knob. Now you can clear the "O" and you will have PHK the VOR in FL.
The reason we prioritize airports is that it's what you are looking for 90% of the time, and if we don't do that, there are tons of NDB's in the world that have names like "K", so there's no point in doing the neat nearest lookup if you let NDB's and VOR's interfere since they will usually trump airports since their IDs are shorter.
If there were no airports starting with PHK and just the VOR PHK, then it would have come up when you entered PHK. We don't ignore them, they just come second in the search.
So, if you are in our office in Woodinville, WA, and you spin in "K", it chooses "KPAE" for you since that is the closest airport that starts with "K". You'll notice in using this, it makes spinning in things a lot faster than when you do it on other equipment. Spin in "K" on most GPS units and you get "KAAA" in Illinois, no matter where you are. Or you might get the NDB "EDIZ HOOK" which just has the ID of "K".
This continues when you hit the second letter. Spin "K" and you get "KPAE" but move to the "P" and spin it to "S" and now you get "KSEA", not "KSAA".
Since we prioritize airports over VORs, what is happening is that when you spin PHK, it sees that there is an airport PHKO in Hawaii. If you want just PHK the VOR, you need to go over to the "O" and spin the knob. Now you can clear the "O" and you will have PHK the VOR in FL.
The reason we prioritize airports is that it's what you are looking for 90% of the time, and if we don't do that, there are tons of NDB's in the world that have names like "K", so there's no point in doing the neat nearest lookup if you let NDB's and VOR's interfere since they will usually trump airports since their IDs are shorter.
If there were no airports starting with PHK and just the VOR PHK, then it would have come up when you entered PHK. We don't ignore them, they just come second in the search.
The reason we prioritize airports is that it's what you are looking for 90% of the time.
I disagree with your premise. Take a normal VFR pr IFR cross country flight: You only go to one airport, but probably use several VORs, ATC rarely tells you to go to an airport, but often sends you "LBV VOR then V17.....". It is even more likely on an IFR flight to use many VORs and only one airport.
Of all the GPSs I have ever used, this is the only one that "prioritizes" airports. It is not a good idea in the real world of flying (IMHO).
I disagree with your premise. Take a normal VFR pr IFR cross country flight: You only go to one airport, but probably use several VORs, ATC rarely tells you to go to an airport, but often sends you "LBV VOR then V17.....". It is even more likely on an IFR flight to use many VORs and only one airport.
Of all the GPSs I have ever used, this is the only one that "prioritizes" airports. It is not a good idea in the real world of flying (IMHO).
Carl has a very good point. I only fly to one airport per flight plan but in a cross country airplane could have many intermediate points which all need to be loaded. If Skyview is planning to add flight plan input utilizing T routes, RNAV routes and airways, perhaps we could have the option to choose which navigational element is the default for search purposes.
I agree with Dynon on this.
Flying VFR I use mostly airports and a few user waypoints.
Once in a while I use a VOR but not often.
On cross country flights my legs are usually 5 to 7 hundred miles and I always have some checkpoints.
Most legs I am rarely able to go direct due to active MOAs, Class B airspace, Terrain, etc.
Flying VFR I use mostly airports and a few user waypoints.
Once in a while I use a VOR but not often.
On cross country flights my legs are usually 5 to 7 hundred miles and I always have some checkpoints.
Most legs I am rarely able to go direct due to active MOAs, Class B airspace, Terrain, etc.
- Joined
- Mar 23, 2005
- Messages
- 13,226
The idea of a "priority" may be a little bit strong. This sorting method works even with VOR's and fixes.
Say I'm in Seattle, and I want VOR PDX in Portland.
On a 696:
P -> Nothing
D -> 3 NDB's listed
X -> Portland VOR
On a SkyView:
P-> PANT in AK
D-> PDX
Say FIX FFMTR in N. Cal:
696:
F-> 3 NDB's
FF-> 3 NDB's
FFM -> 2 VOR's
FFMT -> FFMTR
SkyView:
F -> FA99 in WA
FF -> FFU VOR in UT
FFM-> VOR in MN
FFMT -> FFMTR
Airport KTUS, 1500 miles away:
696:
K-> KAAA in IL
T-> 3 ndb's
U-> Intersection
S -> KTUS
SkyView:
K-> KPAE
T-> KTIW
U-> KTUS
So, you can see that it makes things no worse in the vast majority of cases, and also finds things quicker in lots of cases. There are a very few cases like PHKO and PHK, where an airport name overlaps a VOR name. In that case, yes, there is one more character to enter. However, on average there are less. SkyView has had this nearest-sort feature for almost 2 years now and this is the first time it has come up.
Also note that on the 696, where I say "2 VORs", the user still needs to pull down a list and choose the right one. So if you want the FFM VOR, in MN, SkyView is faster than the 696 because it prioritized the closer one. If you want the other FFM, it's still one click faster.
We have to prioritize something. If we don't, all the A, B, C, D, E, etc NDB's will always win when you choose the first letter. I think for our market, which is a lot of day VFR sport flying (including a lot of users outside the USA), prioritizing airports over VOR's is the right decision, particularly since there is very little overlap between VOR names and airport names, and this method makes both airports AND VOR's quicker to enter.
If what you want is a highly featured IFR FMS, we're not ever going to be that. If you want to use a GPS to be IFR legal, you need a certified IFR GPS, so there isn't a huge reason for us to proritize our design towards heavy IFR users. We think doing strong interfaces with IFR GPS units is a better way to achieve that.
I did look up how may times a VOR will collide with an airport. In the FAA's USA database, there are 14,270 Airports and 2,231 VOR's.
There are 24 collisions where the first 3 letters of an airport are the same as a VOR. So only 1% of the time will you have an airport show up when you wanted a VOR. This is more than made up for by the speed of entry in the other 99% of cases.
We could make VOR's trump airports, but there is one KAV VOR, and there are 7 airports that start with KAV. So if we allow KAV the VOR to trump, it blocks all 7 KAV airports, whereas if the airports win, it only blocks the one VOR, so on average airports are still a win. If we do VOR first, 83 airports are blocked by the 24 VOR's.
--Ian
Say I'm in Seattle, and I want VOR PDX in Portland.
On a 696:
P -> Nothing
D -> 3 NDB's listed
X -> Portland VOR
On a SkyView:
P-> PANT in AK
D-> PDX
Say FIX FFMTR in N. Cal:
696:
F-> 3 NDB's
FF-> 3 NDB's
FFM -> 2 VOR's
FFMT -> FFMTR
SkyView:
F -> FA99 in WA
FF -> FFU VOR in UT
FFM-> VOR in MN
FFMT -> FFMTR
Airport KTUS, 1500 miles away:
696:
K-> KAAA in IL
T-> 3 ndb's
U-> Intersection
S -> KTUS
SkyView:
K-> KPAE
T-> KTIW
U-> KTUS
So, you can see that it makes things no worse in the vast majority of cases, and also finds things quicker in lots of cases. There are a very few cases like PHKO and PHK, where an airport name overlaps a VOR name. In that case, yes, there is one more character to enter. However, on average there are less. SkyView has had this nearest-sort feature for almost 2 years now and this is the first time it has come up.
Also note that on the 696, where I say "2 VORs", the user still needs to pull down a list and choose the right one. So if you want the FFM VOR, in MN, SkyView is faster than the 696 because it prioritized the closer one. If you want the other FFM, it's still one click faster.
We have to prioritize something. If we don't, all the A, B, C, D, E, etc NDB's will always win when you choose the first letter. I think for our market, which is a lot of day VFR sport flying (including a lot of users outside the USA), prioritizing airports over VOR's is the right decision, particularly since there is very little overlap between VOR names and airport names, and this method makes both airports AND VOR's quicker to enter.
If what you want is a highly featured IFR FMS, we're not ever going to be that. If you want to use a GPS to be IFR legal, you need a certified IFR GPS, so there isn't a huge reason for us to proritize our design towards heavy IFR users. We think doing strong interfaces with IFR GPS units is a better way to achieve that.
I did look up how may times a VOR will collide with an airport. In the FAA's USA database, there are 14,270 Airports and 2,231 VOR's.
There are 24 collisions where the first 3 letters of an airport are the same as a VOR. So only 1% of the time will you have an airport show up when you wanted a VOR. This is more than made up for by the speed of entry in the other 99% of cases.
We could make VOR's trump airports, but there is one KAV VOR, and there are 7 airports that start with KAV. So if we allow KAV the VOR to trump, it blocks all 7 KAV airports, whereas if the airports win, it only blocks the one VOR, so on average airports are still a win. If we do VOR first, 83 airports are blocked by the 24 VOR's.
--Ian