Hi all,

 

I have been involved in VATSIM for a long time, have enjoyed the services, and also put in work when it comes to administrative tasks and general paperwork development task, never have I ever wondered how VATSIM/IVAO or any other online network actually functioned technically.

 

Simply put, what we see have two sides, the input (FS, XP, Squawkbox, FSInn etc.,) ----> [bLACK BOX] ----> (Radar clients, servinfo, VATSPY etc.,).  What I would like to know how from the point of input to the point of output, what goes on in the BLACK BOX?  What kind of data messages have been received from the input end?  Where do they get stored?  How are they stored?  What else goes on inside?  What's the output like?  How does radar clients get these information etc.,

 

I'm asking for something like a general systems architecture on these networks as it really intrigues me how it is done.

 

If anyone has any ideas directly, or have some search terms I may be able to look up, please point me to the right directions.  I have some knowledge on coding but very limited when it comes to networking/database related.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Brendan

I suggest you look at the source code for the IVAO plugin for X-Plane http://x-ivap.svn.sourceforge.net/ -- which is basically a fork of an ancient SATCO FSD protocol which Vatsim is also a fork of. 

So this is more a virtual FS network specific architecture and it's not a kind of project that is usually opensource?

There was quite a long thread on forums.vatsim.net a few years ago about how things work (if I recall the topic).