Navigation for Beginners
This wiki shows you how to edit Navigation using a forked copy.
- Github Desktop
- Notepad or Notepad++
- Visit this URL: https://github.com/InfiniteFlightAirportEditing/Navigation and click the "Fork" button.
- Click your username. This will create a forked copy of InfiniteFlightAirportEditing/Navigation to your account.
Wait.
- Once the repository has been forked to your account. copy the URL boxed to someplace safe, you will need it in the future. Click the Clone or Download and "Open in Desktop"
Give the necessary permissions and it should automatically open the github app.
- Clone the repository in to suitable directory of your choice.
- Wait! This will take a while depending on your internet connection.
- Go to the folder where the forked copy was cloned.
- Edit the files as per the data you'd like to edit.
Before opening anything, make sure to click sync in the GitHub desktop app to avoid interfering with others.
Open WED and create a Navigation Editing folder.
Open it up and import the desired airport. Go to view and change from meters to feet.
Open the LOC.json and Glideslope.json files in your text/code editor. If your program supports working in split-view, do so.
Search for the airport’s ICAO (use command/ctrl + F). In this tutorial, I’ll be editing MMGL. Please note there are no longer any duplicates thanks to Val's code.
Go in your standard web browser and search for ILS charts for your assigned airport. If you don’t find any, feel free to ask in Slack.
Each runway which is ILS equipped should have a chart. On the chart, look for three things:
- Identifier
- Frequency
- Glideslope angle
Compare this data with the files. It is already correct most of the time, but if it’s not the case, correct it. While this data isn’t used in Infinite Flight yet, it may come in the future. The fields you would need to edit are “identifier”, “frequency” and “glideslope” Make sure the data is the same on both files.
Repeat this process for all ILS equipped runways.
Now, come back in WED and copy the elevation of the airport. Make sure it is indicated in feet.
Paste that data in all “elevation” fields of the airport in the navigation files.
Afterwards, go back in WED and select the runway. Copy the heading. In this example, runway 10 has a heading of 114.14. To get the heading of the opposite side of the runway, simply add 180. In our example, we then get a heading of 294.14 for runway 28.
Switch back to your text/code editor. Paste the headings in their respective “bearing” fields as seen below.
Before we continue, let’s have a look at the “glideslope” field. It is composed of two different things:
- The glideslope angle (mostly 3.00)
- The bearing without a dot
Replace the last six digits with the bearing without a dot.
Now, open up your file explorer and search for the airport’s apt.dat file.
Open the file in your text/file editor. At first, it might be a bit scary to see all that data. Luckily, we don’t need to inspect the whole file.
As seen above, we only need the coordinates of each runway. Replace the data of the navigation files with these from the apt.dat. Don’t forget to do that for all runways in both files (glideslope.json and LOC.json). Here’s how it should like now:
Now, go ahead and save the files.
Before you add missing fixes to the database, make sure to create an issue. Remember that our database uses the decimal coordinates system. If your source isn't using this system, use an online converter like this one.
Afterwards, open the fixes.json file in your text/code editor. As you may have recognised, the fixes are in alphabetical order. Search for the fix (using command/ctrl + F) and make sure it isn't already there. If not, you can add it. Copy the code snippet below and paste it in the right spot (alphabetical order) of the file.
{
"Latitude": 0.0,
"Name": "00000",
"Longitude": -10.0
},
Replace the three fields with accurate data. Repeat these steps to add other fixes.
Once you're finished, go ahead and save the files.
- Airways: Airways.json (editing paused for now) - VOR/NDB: VOR.json or NDB.json (editing paused for now)Today I will be adding fix ADPOP over the Arabian Sea.
- Open Github Desktop. The files you changed should appear under the "Changes" column.
Type a quick summary and paste the link of your source.
Hit commit to master and hit "Push Origin".
- Remember the site I told you to save? It is time to open that up again.
"This branch is 1 commit ahead of InfiniteFlightAirportEditing:master." means the commit mentioned is the change we made to the files. (ADPOP in this case)
- Hit Pull Request.
Make sure you are comparing like this. The base and head fork should be same as in the picture.
The changes and commits you made should be visible.
Hit "Create Pull Request" and "Create Pull Request Again"
- Tada! You are done.
Let's wait while Travis works on this to find any errors
Great Travis, just approved it!
If not approved, please wait for another editor to correct and suggest changes. Go to Step 6, and make the changes. Following the same steps.
Made by @dushyants19, snippets of tutorial made by @Adrien-Z used.