Runways

[Guest]

Hi all,I'm presently working on the logbook add-in for Fly! II and am struggling with a problem. I want to record the runway that is used when taking off (just in case a runway is actually used!). However, I don't see in the SDK where I can easily determine this information. Does anyone have experience with this bit of the SDK?Cheers, Tony

[Guest dajackman]

Sure don't sorry. But I like your idea! I would really like to have something like that. Good luck with it.

[Guest]

For anyone who is curious...I figured out a way to determine whether or not a plane is on a runway. Using some formulae for a general triangle, proceed as follows:The distance between two points (using lat and lon as rough approximations of x and y) is sqrt( power( p1.lat - p2.lat, 2 ) + power( p1.lon - p2.lon, 2 ) )Using the runway ends and the position of the aircraft, we have a triangle (we'll worry about the aircraft being on the centerline of the runway in a minute). So, ...The distance between the base runway end and the aircraft is a.The distance between the reciprocal runway end and the aircraft is b.And the distance between the two runway ends is c.Using Heron's formula, we can find the exact (perpendicular) distance from the centerline of the runway as...

[b][i]	2h = -  * sqrt( s * ( s - a ) * ( s - b ) * ( s - c ) )	c[/i][/b]

where

[b][i]	1s = - ( a + b + c )	2[/i][/b]

If h is less than or equal to half the width of the runway, then the plane is directly over that runway. Now, if the plane is exactly on the center line, h = 0 (as it should) because the last term of h, i.e., ( s - c ) will be 0 because s will be equal to c. So even when the triangle is a straight line, the formula gives the correct result. Anyway, happy head scratching...Cheers, Tony

[Fall_guy 1]

Hi Tony,Out-standing.......I'm sure this formulu can be used by many developers.Good LuckJohn

[Guest]

Addendum:In the formulae that I gave for determining whether or not an aircraft is on a given runway, I forgot to put in a crucial step...Since we are calculating distance using lon/lat for x/y, the distance computed is actually a measure of arcseconds. This turns out to be not entirely useful. What us needed is a conversion from arcseconds to feet, so that comparison to the runway width is meaningful. As such, the following code snippet gets the job done correctly:

double distance( SPosition a, SPosition b ){	return sqrt( ( ( a.lat - b.lat ) * ( a.lat - b.lat ) ) + ( ( a.lon - b.lon ) * ( a.lon - b.lon ) ) );}bool oncourse( float rmh, float umh ){	float rmhl = rmh - 10.0;	float rmhh = rmh + 10.0;	if( rmhl <= umh && umh <= rmhh )		return true;	if( rmhl < 0.0 )	{		rmhl += 360.0;		rmhh += 360.0;		if( rmhl <= umh && umh <= rmhh )			return true;	}	else if( rmhh > 360.0 )	{		rmhl -= 360.0;		rmhh -= 360.0;		if( rmhl <= umh && umh <= rmhh )			return true;	}	return false;}bool heron( SPosition a, SPosition b, SPosition c, float scale, double rw2 ){	double da = distance( b, c );	double db = distance( a, c );	double dc = distance( a, b );	double tscale = scale / dc;	da *= tscale;	db *= tscale;	dc = scale;	double s = ( da + db + dc ) / (double) 2.0;	double hc = 2 * sqrt( s * ( s - da ) * ( s - db ) * ( s - dc ) ) / dc;	return hc <= rw2;}void computeRunway( SAirport *airport, SFlyObjectRef *user ){	SRunway *p = airport->runways;	SPosition c;	float umh;	APIGetObjectPosition( user, &c );	APIGetObjectMagneticHeading( user, &umh );	while( p )	{		if( heron( p->base.pos, p->recip.pos, c, p->length, (float) p->width / (float) 2.0 ) )		{			//found it!			if( oncourse( p->base.magneticHeading, umh ) )			{				strcpy( m_runway, p->base.id );				return;			}			if( oncourse( p->recip.magneticHeading, umh ) )			{				strcpy( m_runway, p->recip.id );				return;			}		}		p = p->next;	}	m_runway&l;0&r; = 0;}

Simply call computeRunway() passing the airport and aircraft in question, and a global string m_runway will be filled with either a runway or a null string.Cheers, Tony