Runway Finder gone for good.
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Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: Daventry UK
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Runway Finder gone for good.
I was shocked just now to find that the wonderful Runway Finder is closed for good.
Runway Finder was a free flight planning tool that worked in any web browser and allowed flights within the US to be plotted with the greatest ease. The interface was completely intuitive and it made a joy out of the previously agonising process of spreading numerous sectionals across a small hotel table while trying to manoeuvre a curtain rod or something in order to draw a line.
A notice on the site points firmly at a software patent issue that must affect a great many 'mash-up' sites that integrate overlay data with Google maps or some other base. There was never better evidence that software patents are a bad idea.
Fortunately, US pilots have other choices including the rather less intuitive but still truly wonderful (and inexpensive) Foreflight.
Runway Finder was a free flight planning tool that worked in any web browser and allowed flights within the US to be plotted with the greatest ease. The interface was completely intuitive and it made a joy out of the previously agonising process of spreading numerous sectionals across a small hotel table while trying to manoeuvre a curtain rod or something in order to draw a line.
A notice on the site points firmly at a software patent issue that must affect a great many 'mash-up' sites that integrate overlay data with Google maps or some other base. There was never better evidence that software patents are a bad idea.
Fortunately, US pilots have other choices including the rather less intuitive but still truly wonderful (and inexpensive) Foreflight.
I use FltPlan.com Flight Planning & Flight Tracking. for all my planning. It's free, although there are paid services available too. Fltplan can submit plans to ATC and, if you wish to pay, provide an eAPIS alternative which makes Customs & Immigration notification a doddle compared to using the miserable government website.
Fltplan has charts available to download, and the ability to show a GC route overlayed the IFR airways with weather & airspace.
I haven't used anything else here since 2005.
Fltplan has charts available to download, and the ability to show a GC route overlayed the IFR airways with weather & airspace.
I haven't used anything else here since 2005.
