SPOT and Inreach on the OGN

[Davis Chappins]

All,

SPOT and Inreach locations are now visible on websites that use OGN data (glidertracker.org and similar). I am running a script on my pi from 9a to 8p west coast time 7 days a week that parses a list of SPOT and Inreach users for valid locations, then sends that location to the OGN with the glider's ICAO code.


Why am I doing this? To concentrate glider location/activity into a single place, to raise awareness of who is flying, to increase safety of those flying, and I thought it would be a fun project to do.

Ramy pointed me in the direction of the SSA SPOT and Inreach database https://members.ssa.org/login.asp?p1=/MyHome.asp?mbr=6867486834 , so I started with that. If you have ever uploaded your info to there, then your SPOT or Inreach data is already being published.
List of SPOT https://github.com/DavisChappins/SpotToOGN/blob/main/Spotuser.csv
List of Inreach https://github.com/DavisChappins/InreachToOGN/blob/main/Inreachuser.csv


If you want to make sure you are visible, or you are not on the csv list, or you want to be removed from the csv list, or your information is incorrect, fill out the google form and I'll add/remove/modify you:
SPOT https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSccPXV0oodK61ykTkbtIV9yJK3A1VTwv2Me4Ng4COK_zUXKYg/viewform
Inreach https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfi-6IN45EE0BnSlbjVK16uslzCu5jTAY6eRxpdazYoedRzEg/viewform


More information about it:
SPOT https://github.com/DavisChappins/SpotToOGN
Inreach https://github.com/DavisChappins/InreachToOGN

[RR]

On Thursday, November 4, 2021 at 12:57:54 PM UTC-4, davis.c...@ wrote:
> All,
>
> SPOT and Inreach locations are now visible on websites that use OGN data (glidertracker.org and similar). I am running a script on my pi from 9a to 8p west coast time 7 days a week that parses a list of SPOT and Inreach users for valid locations, then sends that location to the OGN with the glider's ICAO code.
>
>
> Why am I doing this? To concentrate glider location/activity into a single place, to raise awareness of who is flying, to increase safety of those flying, and I thought it would bea fun project to do.

Davis, this looks great. It seems that extending this to use adsb data would be straightforward, with the caveat that it would cost money to do so. Would it be posable to investigate what those costs might be to add adsb data to your system? Another question does the ogn network already have duplicate detection? It seems like it must to eliminate issues when ogn networks overlap?

Rick

[Davis Chappins]

Rick,
I'm already doing that with this https://github.com/DavisChappins/ADSbToOGN and it's also been running for about a month. The data source is an issue though, there is no good free source of ADSB data.
Read the readme for how I am managing duplicate aircraft targets.
If you look on glidertracker sometimes you'll see aircraft with ADSB as the station.

[RR]

> Rick,
> I'm already doing that with this https://github.com/DavisChappins/ADSbToOGN and it's also been running for about a month. The data source is an issue though, there is no good free source of ADSB data.
> Read the readme for how I am managing duplicate aircraft targets.
> If you look on glidertracker sometimes you'll see aircraft with ADSB as the station.

That's great, I went to the OpenSky site and saw that they made mention of Flarm aircraft as well as ADS-B. Do the "standard" receivers for OpenSky also receive flarm, or is that another receiver network, or do they patch into OGN?

[Davis Chappins]

No on all accounts, at least not that I've seen.

[Jason Leonard]

I find my Spot to be horrendously unreliable and ultimately unusable. I've done everything from pointing it towards the sky to mounting it on top of the dash. I get maybe 2 pings a flight at best. I'm fairly certain it's defective. So I got ADS-B out to do away with tracking problems. Now my club can track my tail number on Foreflight or Flight aware, etc. Anyways - how can I get my device added if I can get it working?

[Davis Chappins]

Fill out the form below and I'll add you
SPOT https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSccPXV0oodK61ykTkbtIV9yJK3A1VTwv2Me4Ng4COK_zUXKYg/viewform

[Davis Chappins]

A number of pilots outside of the USA have reached out to me about this so I have updated the script to support all lat/lons globally as well as run the script 24/7.

If you want to take advantage of this fill out the appropriate form

SPOT https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSccPXV0oodK61ykTkbtIV9yJK3A1VTwv2Me4Ng4COK_zUXKYg/viewform
Inreach https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfi-6IN45EE0BnSlbjVK16uslzCu5jTAY6eRxpdazYoedRzEg/viewform

Or, see the top post for more info.

[John Foster]

I would advocate for running this 24/7, if possible. The whole point of using SPOT or Inreach is to assist in locating you if you get in trouble. If this service suddenly turns off at 8pm while someone is out looking for you, it could cause some problems.

[Martin Gregorie]

That would be good, simply because globally there's likely to be somebody
going XC during a local summer day pretty much 24/7. However, there's no
reason this cover shouldn't follow the sun since nobody should be flying
XC before official sunrise or after official sunset due to having no
navigation lights.

Once you've landed out your retriever should be able to get your landout
coordinates from a phone call/text message or off a system like SPOT/
InReach/OGN and, once they know that they're done with the tracker. All
they need then is to put the coordinates into a car or phone navigation
system, hook up your trailer and head out.

As a side comment, I suspect that almost everybody who isn't a pilot,
sailor or walker doesn't know that you can enter location co-ordinates on
a car or phone's navigation system because they've never needed to do it.
Why should they know, when normally they just enter a postcode or search
for a town name or street address, hit 'go', and follow the saynav's
directions.

[Davis Chappins]

Both of you will be happy to know that the script has already been running 24/7

[Ramy]

Glad to hear we now can track spot and I reach on OGN 24/7.
That said, Is there a better OGN viewer than glidertracker which no longer works on iOS since September as far as I know? It is puzzling that with the growing popularity of OGN if there isn’t yet half decent viewer, such as glideport (aka SSA tracker).

Ramy

[Davis Chappins]

Ramy,
Last month I got a new iphone 13 running IOS 15.1.1 and visiting glidertracker.org via safari works just fine. No issues.

[Ron Gleason]

There are various but I prefer https://glideandseek.com/

[Davis Chappins]

If anyone wants to see this in action look at https://glidertracker.org/#lat=39.317&lon=-122.661&z=9&id=3DA831C0 and see Ramy's Inreach position to continue to update even though he's out of FLARM range.
If you want to sign yourself up to be visible see the top post of this thread.

[Eric Greenwell]

On 1/21/2022 9:20 AM, Davis Chappins wrote:
> If anyone wants to see this in action look at https://glidertracker.org/#lat=39.317&lon=-122.661&z=9&id=3DA831C0 and see Ramy's Inreach position to continue to update even though he's out of FLARM range.
> If you want to sign yourself up to be visible see the top post of this thread.

Is there any way to get Ramy's track on Skysight? Or get the Skysight forecasts to display
on GliderTracker? I'd love to see if his flight and the forecast align, without waiting
for him to post it to OLC.

--
Eric Greenwell - USA
- "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation"
https://sites.google.com/site/motorgliders/publications

[Simen Eide]

great initative! I guess this is the way to get my inreach to OGN? How often do you push these messages, and is it possible to extend your rpi to also work for european flying times? :)

[Davis Chappins]

Currently, any other service only publishes your inreach to their own closed ecosystem. This script submits your inreach position to the OGN directly so its viewable on any compatible OGN viewer.
Anywhere between 5 and 10 minute update rates. The script just iterates down the list, it could be smarter.
It's currently running 24/7 so should work just fine in EU.

[Davis Chappins]

All,
Instead of working last Thursday I updated my SPOT and Inreach scripts to update active users more frequently so position updates should be available as often as 1 minute instead of 10 minutes previously.