Understanding User Preferences for Flight Plan Loading

[Dingle]

Hi Nick,
to give you some feedback of a rookie-sim-pilot. For me SimBrief support is really nice to have, because I fly only IFR on Vatsim, mainly because I wouldn't have any clue how to do VFR on Vatsim and its hard to find good tutorials on it. Simbrief makes it easy to create a route fast and file it with ATC.

The other flights I do are after work, when I do not have a lot time. So planning a VFR flight with maps and then manually add them to the FMS is usually just taking too long. So also for this I regularly use SimBrief.

I also have to say, that with Starships FMS I do not really mind to much to enter it, as it is really nice to use. But I also like to fly out of areas like Innsbruck where I want to use the GNS and that thing is just not that user friendly with a mouse.

So at least for me (and I am not sure if I should be saying this) Starships FMS is good without any integration, but for these quick flights a GTN650/750 (I know you probably don't even want to read that ) would solve everything.

The MSFS Planner options I have not used much, so I cannot really say how well that works.

I have also seen aircraft with "SimBrief Integration" that prompt you to enter your SimBrief ID. How does this differ from from saving a flight plan or copying a string? Just sparing you an extra step?

Yes, for me that is only convenience, having to copy the Simbrief route string to MSFS Planner and then import it in an aircraft, would not bother me, if it makes your life easier.

I hope this does not sound like complaining, because Starship is great as it is.

Cheers

[Sunake]

Frankly, I prefer to go the most realistic route possible. I love programming the FMS myself, it's a refreshing change from say for example the airliners which all have the ability to up link or download the flight plan (as they do in the real world). The star ship and most GA aircraft don't have this ability so I'm fine with it as is.

I fly IFR mostly so I use simbrief to plan the route and fuel required, even if I'm taking full tanks, and then manually punch in each waypoint into the FMS (which gives me an idea, I'll make a separate post with a request)

Anyway, if you wanted to integrate simbrief, ie the ability to download the flight plan to the starship so the lazy people don't want to spend the time manually entering each waypoint, then might I suggest expanding on the floppy disk.

So, let's say we enter our simbrief ID into the tablet (a one time affair), the the floppy would act as the "import simbrief flightplan" known to many people and used by many addons. So you insert the floppy, and then you load the flightplan found on simbrief (usually the latest one dispatched by simbrief) via the fms and that drops all the waypoints into the FMS. Not sure how you would handle the airways, but I assume you'd have to program the software to only grab the waypoints and put them into the FMS.

[jmarkows]

I like @Sunake idea regarding the floppy usage. I use Simbrief for the fuel planning; using Simbrief to generate the route is just going to give me a bunch of SIDs and STARs I can't use anyway, and I enjoy plotting the route out, myself.

I'm sure the Simbrief API will spit out the full list of waypoints, whether or not you use airways. It lists them all in the generated OFP as it is.

Simbrief does currently have a format it can spit out (.flp) that MSFS can load and use, if that shortcuts anything.

I might use the feature if you pulled it from Simbrief or was able to modify a local text file, but I'm more than happy to just plug stuff in myself.

[Stein357]

I currently use the Simbrief Dispatch tool to create a flight plan, and then import it in to World Map Flight Planner. This is great for me, the route is loaded into the Starship's flight computer and for routes without complicated departures or approaches this is all I need.

I know you said that you're not planning on implementing it, but I would love to see support for the TDS GNS750. This unit allows direct Simbrief import for users that wish to use it and the GNS430 is very hard to manipulate by mouse. In my use case this would make flying procedures the Starship incapable of much easier.

[Marionettework]

The only way to get ATC in MSFS 2020 and 2024 (without paying a sizable monthly fee) is to setup a flight plan using the World Map or EFB, so that's what I do. For all its flaws, I like interacting with ATC and having lots of chatter from other aircraft when using FSLTL traffic.

I think it's table stakes to be able to AT LEAST not have a World Map / EFB flight plan not break anything in the Starship FMS. I think given that the Starship does not and may not ever support full approaches with SID/STAR, a partial flight plan imported to the Starship FMS is OK, with optionally a full flight plan imported to the GNS 430 (or GTN650 - wishlist item). If the flight plan is partially imported, make sure it's possible to edit it after in the Starship without breaking navigation (it may not be identical to what MSFS ATC tells you after but that's fine).

I've used Simbrief for large aircraft and Little Navmap for smaller aircraft like the Velocity XL (https://albar965.github.io/littlenavmap.html). You could support BOTH at the same time by allowing importing plans from the World Map / EFB because both SimBrief and Little Navmap can export to a flight plan file, and then MSFS simply opens the flight plan. Direct SimBrief import from your SimBrief account is an extra feature and I don't think it's required since you can just import using the existing World Map / EFB Simbrief plugins.

So in summary, I think if you make sure that loading/creating World Map / EFB flight plans is 1) harmelss 2) partially imported to Starship or 3) fully imported, that will cover pretty much every use case.

Using the floppy, importing direct from Simbrief, those are nice to have UI features but not as important as having SOME option to use external flight planners and ATC in the first place.

[Black Square]

Thanks for all the responses so far. Allow me to ask a few targeted questions, but please keep in mind that I have never explored the world of flight planning software in modern times.

• Am I correct that there is no way to inject a flight plan live into MSFS 2020, other than SimBrief integration?

• Is there any other way to inject a flight plan live into MSFS 2024 other than the EFB and SimBrief integration?

• Is the only way to inject a flight plan live from SimBrief into the simulation live via SimBrief integration?

@Marionettework said in Understanding User Preferences for Flight Plan Loading:

You could support BOTH at the same time by allowing importing plans from the World Map / EFB because both SimBrief and Little Navmap can export to a flight plan file, and then MSFS simply opens the flight plan

This is the route I would like to choose, since it seems relatively similar between 2020 and 2024, and it means everything can be handled at startup. The problem is that people will still try to inject a flight plan live via the 2024 EFB, which seems to be where the problems lie (because Asobo did things like violate the ICAO fix code format that everything else is predicated on by creating faux ICAO codes to suit their immediate needs.)

[ProfCrash]

I would really like some avionics based way from the CDU route menu to load an msfs flight plan file even if it doesnt include the floppy disc

[HadronFlux]

@Black-Square I think some use LittleNavMap to make a .pln file that they import using the EFB but I don't know how popular it is vs Simbrief. I'm in 2024. Navigraph does have their app that works in the game a lot like the EFB but it and Simbrief are related (cousins I guess). I have successfully planned a flight using Navigraph Charts and then "exported to avionics" with the in-EFB app and button they provide and it has worked. I have also planned a flight with Simbrief, gone to Navigraph (which sees the simbrief flight), imported that to Navigraph to mess with departure and approach procedures then push to the avionics. Finally, I have an app called Sky4Sim that I got when I was trying Neofly and it has a web and tablet interface where you can do flight planning and I think (I haven't tried but I see icons for it) you can push that plan to the plane, but my guess is it is less common than LittleNavMap.

[Marionettework]

@Black-Square said in Understanding User Preferences for Flight Plan Loading:

• Am I correct that there is no way to inject a flight plan live into MSFS 2020, other than SimBrief integration?

• Is there any other way to inject a flight plan live into MSFS 2024 other than the EFB and SimBrief integration?

• Is the only way to inject a flight plan live from SimBrief into the simulation live via SimBrief integration?

I don't know other ways of injecting live into MSFS 2020 or 2024 other than SimBrief and EFB. I think the vast majority or users use Simbrief, Little Navmap, SimToolkitPro or even Volanta to create a flight plan and then load it as a .PLN file. A subset of 2020 aircraft support loading the plan from SimBrief after you started a flight. Personally, I think that's a nice to have, and I would first implement loading a plan from the World Map / EFB, and then allowing the user to edit whatever got loaded using the Starship FMS from then on. You should cover 90%+ of use cases like that. To add to that, Starship will never have Navigraph chart integration due to the old school CRT screens, so there's little point in adding Simbrief live loading and nothing else instead of just pre-flight loading.

@Marionettework said in Understanding User Preferences for Flight Plan Loading:

You could support BOTH at the same time by allowing importing plans from the World Map / EFB because both SimBrief and Little Navmap can export to a flight plan file, and then MSFS simply opens the flight plan

This is the route I would like to choose, since it seems relatively similar between 2020 and 2024, and it means everything can be handled at startup. The problem is that people will still try to inject a flight plan live via the 2024 EFB, which seems to be where the problems lie (because Asobo did things like violate the ICAO fix code format that everything else is predicated on by creating faux ICAO codes to suit their immediate needs.)

So what you do is say clearly upfront somewhere prominent (e.g. the manual), "injecting a flight plan after starting a flight using EFB or SimBrief is NOT SUPPORTED and will result in unpredictable behavior". If you just set the expectations upfront and give people a workaround, that's sufficient IMO until some day you get around the MSFS bugs and support live loading. I would have saved myself a lot of frustration and second-guessing if I had just know not to do that.

I actually didn't know about the Simbrief plugin for MSFS 2020/2024 until a couple of days ago and I just used it for a flight. It's really nice being able to have all the Simbrief stuff in the EFB: you don't even have to import it so you don't mess anything up, you simply fill in the flight plan and fuel values from the EFB into the Starship, it's quite usable if you just know what NOT to try.

[brettmercier]

One thing to keep in mind @Black-Square is that the MSFS 2024 EFB is also used to file and update flight plans with ATC. At the moment, this functionality is clashing with the Starship. Even if one fully re-creates a flight plan inside the cockpit and doesn't "send to ATC" or "send to avionics" from the EFB, changes in the ATC following (like requesting or terminating flight following) triggers an update that messes up the in-cockpit flight plan mid flight.

While my personal favourite option would be the ability import flight plans via the MSFS 2024 EFB (I create plans on the web-based MSFS flight planner, then import via the EFB), if that is too much trouble we would at least need a way to insulate the Starship avionics from the EFB so that interacting with the AI ATC doesn't break the in-cockpit flight plan.

I do enjoy a lot the Starship interface in terms of creating a flight plan, but the EFB is quite convenient to do things like choosing runways based on winds, finding headings between waypoints info or grabbing VOR frequencies.

[Randolf]

@Black-Square there seems to be some problem with the Starship in 2024, that in all other planes (at least those that support it), the FPL is transfered to from EFB to the plane using the Send to Avionics button, not ATC, probably that's why you see problems with it.
Anyway, I think that the EFB Send to Avionics is the most versatile option, as the EFB already supports import from SimBrief or files and is then able to load that into the plane.
See how the KLN90B does it, it even supports custom lat/lon waypoints.

[plhought]

If I do want automatic importing of flight-plans, I typically only do it with airplanes directly connected to the Simbrief API. I don't use any of the in-built or plug-in methods in MSFS2020/24 at all.

Otherwise I just enter things in manually on the applicable GPS/FMS unit.

[Orlaam]

This could be a complicated question to answer. For me, lately, I've been using SimBrief to pick routes that seem most fitting. SimBrief queries the various governmental resources for recent EuroControl and FAA flight plans. A lot of the time these are very old or simply made up depending on the airports you choose, but they make sense overall for the sake of brevity. Up until a few weeks ago I relied on ForeFlight for my flight planning and really loved the real world aspect, with terrain avoidance, weather considerations, et cetera. I just couldn't justify renewing when the price is so high and they've been bought out by a private equity firm. Their future is uncertain.

SimBrief, from what I believe, requires a bit more tuning to create accurate flight plans. It doesn't seem to avoid weather when picking a route with thunderstorms between DEP and ARR. Overall, SimBrief is rather versatile for creating routes or picking bespoke routes. You can display VFR maps, IFR low and high, and other tools that give you acceptable route selection and creation. These routes are often imported into 3rd party FMCs and EFBs for faster data-linking that save time programming a full route.

Personally, I don't find that a GA aircraft should have data-linked flight plans. A real world Garmin or something like the Starship would require manual programming of the FMS. I don't use the default flight planner in MSFS due to the fact that it is just generating a random route that is probably not highly accurate or customizable for weather or other factors. I can pull up Navigraph on my iPad and use it much light ForeFlight, while having the data I need to program the FMS. I do hope the 2024 EFB will eventually allow exporting FPs to ATC and GPS, because sometimes saving time is nice, but it's not a necessity. The 2024 EFB flight planner is nice in the sense that you can create a plan, look at charts, and customize the route, but for some reason the exporting feature is bugged.

[Orlaam]

I should add, I also use SkyVector a lot for US planning. It has a much nicer map view.

[Rhinozherous]

I would be happy if I could import the waypoints from Simbrief (without SID and STAR!) into the FMS. Downloading a file via the Simbrief tool to a folder somewhere in the aircraft files would be enough integration in my opinion.

For me it would be important that it dont imports the SID and STAR which simbrief mostly integrates. Because this is the part I build when inside the cockpit and flying with Vatsim or BATC means there could be changes between planning and executing the flight.

And as it was already mentioned here... I would love to be able to switch this default gns430 with the pms50 GTN

[RichardBoon]

I fly mission-based flights - meaning I've a destination to reach. As a dinosaur, I use PFPX. I'm creating GA-aircraft profiles based on the POH. With this accurate data, I pushed the range of the Piston Duke beyond the manual.

When I'm creating a realistic flight plan in Europe, it often has a mix of airways and directs with loads of waypoints. Although I like to load the FMS/GPS units myself, this can be tedious from time to time - especially when no airways can be selected.

PFPX can export routes in a variety of formats, including the P3D's *.pln-files. But I will be happy as well with a free text box on e.g. the tablet or simple text file, where I can paste my ATC route to be then loaded in. I think this is more future proof for other planning software.

[hughesj2]

@Black-Square Hi Nick, personally, I most commonly use Simbrief. Either the integrated tools within MSFS2020/2024EFB or with aircraft native integration as you mention like in the PMDG777...The biggest advantage for me is easily being able to send flightplan and payload/fuel to the aircraft and also the flightplan to MSFS for the inbuilt ATC. In fact I can still use Simbrief for my planning with the starship as there's a profile available, just missing the convenience of it sorting the ATC, so flying without for now.
Cheers
James