XPlane Linux and AAVrecorder format for check flights

[Robert Simac]

Hi all,

Technical question, related to training...

Does anyone know the specifics of internal format of the '.dat' file recorded by our official AAVrecorder program?

I am asking because my simulator is XPlane and is running on Linux platform where AAVrecorder program is not available.

However, XPlane does natively provide lots of data ('Data Output') , including and exceeding what is recorded by AAVRecorder and can save such data on the disk during the flight.

It is my hope that such native XPlane data can be converted and formatted (by means of additional program) to the exact same format as AAVrecoder, and that will allow all of us non-Windows user to provide clean check flights data files when required to do so.

Any help is appreciated, format details, program author, source if available, any detail may help...

Thanks

Robert

[Michael Blakely]

I would record a short flight and send that instead of sending an entire checkride file.

I'll look at this when I get some time, but it won't be for a least 8 days.

[Robert Simac]

Thanks guys, appreciate the replies.

I already do have the AAVrecorder .dat file sample, and unfortunately it was not of much use. It is so called 'binary' file where data is already baked/encoded in (as not readable text), and , without the program source, or other detailed description, it is rather difficult to figure out the actual 'format' by just analyzing/looking into the file...

This all is not a showstopper for me, just an interesting project/challenge, nothing to rush about...

[Robert Simac]

One more kind request, if anyone has any additional info on the software (program) used to read and visualize the .dat files produced by AAVRecorder.

If by any chance such software has open source, it may reveal internals of the .dat file.

Again, not a big deal. Thanks.

[Michael Blakely]

I took a loot at the binary file.
Not enough clues to figure out the data encoding.

The software we use to read the files is 15+ years old. If you Google it, all you find is a couple college research papers on flight analysis tools.

[Robert Simac]

Thanks Mike for looking into that.

Absolutely no issue here, I think for my next checkride when/if it happen I will put on my digital paranoia hazmat suit and reboot into windows and fly it from there...

On the related note, do you know the format the regular flights are received/logged? The thing that the 'fsacars' program sends from windows OS to (this?) server...

Maybe that is something it can be improved / figured out for non-windows users.

Again, not a big deal, the current alternative of filing the flight frep manually takes <1 min and is absolutely not a show stopper.

Thanks