vAMSYS 5.2

5.2 is our milestone release and incorporates changes made in v5.1 which was not publicly released.

Changes for Pilots

Navigraph Integration

5.2 Features extended integration between Navigraph and SimBrief. We use new API provided by SimBrief to generate OFPs as well as some data from Navigraph to further enhance the experience.

To enable SimBrief Dispatch Integration, as well as map overlays for some Airports, users must link their Navigraph Accounts. This can be achieved via Phoenix → My Profile → Account Settings → Social, Online & 3rd Party. Whilst there also make sure you have your network IDs set up - dispatching to VATSIM, IVAO or POSCON requires network ID set up.

All users with linked Navigraph account will have the option to use SimBrief Dispatch.

Users with Navigraph Unlimited subscription will additionaly receive improved maps for some airports showing more detailed airport layout.

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New Flight Dispatch Page

We have added ‘Flights From’ page which lets you book a flight without the map and rewrote the Dispatch page.

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• Aircraft - a new, streamlined way to select the aircraft. Default picked aircraft will be one of your favorites, quickly change in the dropdown or use the Aircraft Picker.

• Callsign - if configured by VA, a generate callsign option will be available; Callsigns can now be restricted to pilot username or aircraft registration.

• Departure Time has a Time Setter to help you pick your departure time based on your timezone.

• Routings - Virtual Airlines now have the option to provide multiple routings to pick from for any given route.

• Payload section has improved, especially for Container use.

• SimBrief Settings has the option to pick the SB Airframe Profile - be it SimBrief Default ones, profiles provided by the Virtual Airline or your custom ones.

• Alternate Finder will help you pick best alternates based on the prevailing weather

• SimBrief Flight Plan preview lets you have a quick look at the generated SB OFP to see if you need to make changes to your payload or fuel load.

Most importantly, SimBrief dispatch is now done in the background; Any changes made to the OFP at SimBrief.com after the dispatch will be automatically synced back to vAMSYS

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Booking Page Changes

• Booking Page now includes SimBrief OFP details as well as the OFP itself - these are preserved for months and you or VA Staff can always refer to them.

• Do you hate having to go to Navigraph Charts -> Flights -> Import Flight -> Import from SimBrief then select the entry? We do; We’ve added ‘Open Navigraph Charts’ button in View Booking page to save you from all these clicks.

Changes to PIREP Claims

If enabled by the Virtual Airline, claims in 5.2 are virtually indistinguishable from PIREPs. Claims are handled just like PIREPs needing review. There is no separate Claim review like in 5.0 and claims inherit all PIREP functionality like comments and need reply flag. You will see your claims in your PIREP List;

PIREP View received a facelift

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Altitude/Groundspeed chart from v3 is back and better! We’ve added some events like engine starts, pushback, gear up/down, touchdown etc.

Also, as mentioned in Navigraph/Simbrief section above, we now persist OFP data; Furthermore, once 5.2 starts processing the PIREPs, we will note down the landing runway, landing location from runway start and LDA (the precision will improve with upgrades to Pegasus).

Changes for Virtual Airline Staff

There is a lot, lot more for VA Staff - we have summarised all the changes below; On the way to 5.2 we have also rewritten all our Documentation - all systems and functions have a docs page where they are explained.

Orwell Changes, Farewell to VDS

Orwell is now the one-stop-shop for VA Management and VDS has been retired in 5.2. All VDS functions related to Airports, Aircraft, Routes and Load Management have bbeen moved to Orwell.

Orwell itself has changed a lot - it is worth to take some time and explore all the pages to see what is new and what has changed.

Staff Permissions

Where? Orwell → HQ → Staff

There are two new Staff Permissions for managing Load Factors and Containers. You need to enable them for relevant Staff, including VA Owners.

PIREP Point and Comment Presets

Where? Orwell → Settings → Presets

This functionality has changed quite a bit in vAMSYS 5.2 and is no longer compatible with 5.0. Presets can now also be used when reviewing Pilot Registrations

Virtual Airline Timezone

Where? Orwell → Settings → Basic Settings

New to 5.2 is VA Timezone. vAMSYS executes some tasks on a schedule - for example, at midnight UTC we run checks to put pilots on grace and remove inactive pilots. Midnight UTC could be noon in your operating environment - but if you were to set Timezone to Australia/Brisbane, the same task will be executed at midnight Autralia/Brisbane time, not UTC.

There is no exaustive list of tasks affected yet, but anything to do with Pilot activity, pilot removal and statistics is affected by Timezone setting.

Activities

Where? Orwell → Operations → Activities

With vAMSYS 5.2, Activities replace the Events feature from version 5.0. Designed for easier creation, improved scoring, and enhanced tracking, Activities introduce new activity types and provide comprehensive controls for VA management.

We have added new Activity Types → Roster and Curated Roster; We’ve simplified activity creation and improved activity tracking.

Improvements Across All Activities

• Custom Sidebar Section: Add custom links such as charts, scenery, and external resources.

• Placeholder Badges: Automatically creates a placeholder Badge upon Activity Completion. VA staff can subsequently edit this badge to add images, descriptions, and further details.

• Leeway Settings: Adds configurable buffer times to activity start and end dates, ensuring slight deviations in actual departure or arrival times still earn points.

• Participation Limits: New toggle to determine if pilots can complete the activity once or unlimited times.

Orwell and Phoenix UI Enhancements

• Phoenix Dashboard ('Events' Component): Enhanced with quality-of-life features requested by VA Partners. You can now filter displayed activities by tag and type, enabling configurations such as separate event boxes for Focus Airports and Tours.

• Phoenix Events Page: Clearly lists each event with descriptions, offering filters by Type and Tags for ease of navigation.

• Detailed Event Views: Event specifics, airports/routes involved, and interactive route maps are displayed more clearly.

• Event Logbook: Tracks completions for all events, showing progress clearly for Tours and Rosters.

Customizing Activity Labels

Customize labels for Activity Types:

• Navigate to Orwell -> HQ -> Settings -> vAMSYS ModulesRename Events, Focus Airports, Tours, Rosters, or Curated Rosters to better align with your VA's terminology.

Callsign Generation

Where? Orwell → Setttings → Route Defaults Orwell → Operations → Routes → Routes

You can specify some route defaults for callsigns in 5.2 Flight Dispatch.

Options include:

• Allowing pilots to change Callsign

• Defaulting callsign to Pilots Username (Option 1)

• Defaulting Callsign to Pilot Username (Option 2)

• Defaulting Callsign to Aircraft Registration (Option 3)

When managing Routes, you will still be required to enter a callsign, but on Flight Dispatch the callsign will be forced if any of the ‘Defaulting’ options are enabled.

Another addition is Callsign Generator regex which determines the remaining 4 character generation for the callsign. Entry of [A-Z][A-Z][0-9][0-9] will generate a sample callsign EZYBL62 with 52,900 total possible options.

Booking Validity

Where? Orwell → Settings → Booking & Dispatch → Booking

By default, all bookings are ‘active’ for 24 hours. After said time, if no flight tracking has been started, the booking is cancelled.

In 5.2 you can change the validity for ‘regular’ and Diversion/Repositioning bookings.

Online Network Remarks

Where? Orwell → Settings → SimBrief Integration

We have added ‘Online Network Remarks’, ‘IVAO Remarks’ and ‘VATSIM Radar Remark’ options.

• Online Network Remarks adds specified text to all available network prefiles

• IVAO Remarks adds the specified text to Online Network Remarks when Booking is made for IVAO

• VATSIM Radar Remark toggle automatically adds VATSIM Radar compliant remark when dispatching to VATSIM.

Some examples of how remarks are constructed:

• VATSIM: Fleet/Aircraft Extra FPL Info (Item 18) + Online Network Remarks + VATSIM Radar Remark

• IVAO: Fleet/Aircraft Extra FPL Info (Item 18) + Online Network Remarks + IVAO Remarks

• Other Networks: Fleet/Aircraft Extra FPL Info (Item 18) + Online Network Remarks

Load Factor

Where? Orwell → Operations → Payload

As requested by our VA Partners, a new Load Factor generation option has been added. You can use ‘Average’ section which, if entered, will make load factor average set percentage.

Stands

Work on vAMSYS Stand Project continues and has not been finished in time for 5.2 release. As such, all stand functionality has been disabled in 5.2. All your custom stands and stand groups have not been lost, but are inactive pending new Stand feature in upcoming versions of vAMSYS.

Airport Management

Where? Orwell → Operations → Airports

With deeper SimBrief integration and Alternate Finder implementation in 5.2, Airport Management has expanded a little. This includes ‘Suitable Company Alternate’ toggle, Alternate Search parameter overrides, airport briefing URL and others.

Fleet / Aircraft SimBrief Options

Where? Orwell → Operations → Fleet

Our SimBrief integration is different than the one in 5.0 and as such - the overrides from 5.0 have not been transferred to 5.2.

Fleet Enforced Profiles

Orwell → Operations → Fleet → Fleets → Fleet → SimBrief Integration

You can select the SimBrief Aircraft Profiles that pilot will be able to choose from. If you do not select any, all will be allowed. This includes default SimBrief Aircraft profiles as well as VA Custom Profiles.

Pilot custom airframe profiles can always be used.

SimBrief Airframe Overrides

Orwell → Operations → Fleet → Fleets → Fleet → SimBrief Integration

Orwell → Operations → Fleet → Aircraft → Aircraft → SimBrief Integration

As with 5.0 Fleet settings apply to all Aircraft within the Fleet; Each option can also be entered in Aircraft and it will override that option from Fleet. In other words - Aircraft inherits from Fleet.

Please take a second to consider if you want to use this as this is a powerful all-or-nothing option which will force the entered values for all SimBrief Dispatches.

Particular sections which you may not want to override are Empty Weight, MZFW, MTW, MLW and Max Fuel Capacity. Generally, it is best to leave this to Airframe Profile to accomodate differences in weights between aircraft addons.

Please note that Route configuration is able to override fuel and cost index values. If entered in Route, these will take over from Aircraft/Fleet configuration.

Route Management

Where? Orwell → Operations → Routes → Routes

Turbo Mode

5.2 adds ‘Tubo’ mode to route editing and disables most of handholding in terms of inputs. It’s closer to VDS 1.0 experience and is great for those experienced with vAMSYS Data patterns.

Cost Index

Cost Index can now be left empty. Generally, it is preferred option, other than the cases where you want to force a specific Cost Index. If left empty, the SimBrief Dispatch will look at the Aircraft/Fleet SimBrief Integration settings and pick the Cost Index/Cruise Profile from there. This is great for routes where you have a mix of equipment operating which have their own preferred CI/CP.

Days of Operation

New to 5.2 is Days of Operation/Service days. This is an informational field, visible to pilots on Flight Dispatch, denoting what days of the week the flight operates. As is vAMSYS philosophy, this does not restrict pilots from booking a flight on a different day and is for information only.

Callsign options

Please see Callsign Generation above details. This is the autoritative setting on callsign generation.

Relationshiop Tables

At the bottom of the page, when editing a route, you will see 3 tabs - Routings, Bookings and PIREPs. These allow you to quickly see what routings exist between two airports and see bookings made / PIREPs filed using this route.

Routings

Where? Orwell → Operations → Routes → Routings

A new addition to 5.2. Think routings as ‘Routes-lite’. Currently, routings store information about departure airport, arrival airport, route, service days and AIRAC cycle.

For Virtual Airlines who provide routes (collection of waypoints and airways), Routings is a pefect and lightweight option to update routing data for routes.

City Pairs can have multiple routings. If multiple exist, pilots will be able to select a routing of their choice.

PIREPs

Where? Orwell → Flight Centre → PIREPs

PIREP view pages have received a significant facelift compared to 5.0

A change from how 5.0 did things, where we heavily encouraged you not to look at PIREP List as it was heavy to load, 5.2 features tables of Pending, Awaiting Pilot and All PIREPs.

Furthermore, PIREP review no longer works as a ‘conveyor belt’ where you are taken from one PIREP to the next. Accepting/Rejecting/Invalidating a PIREP will not automatically move you to next pending PIREP either - we have found that VA Staff during review will sometimes go back to enter comments/internal notes. We have, however, added ‘Next Pending PIREP’ button to take you to next PIREP to review. Also - if multiple members of Staff are looking at a PIREP,

There is quite a lot to explore with the new PIREP review page - including the chart noting PIREP events, greatly expanded data shown from the flight, handly links to Livery, Aircraft, Fleet, Route, Airports etc.

When 5.2 goes live and handles PIREP processing, the ‘Touchdown’ section will be populated by default and will note the arrival Runway, Distance from threshold on landing at LDA available at the time. You can test it by rescoring any PIREP in 5.2.

Claims

Where? Orwell → Flight Centre → PIREPs

Claims in 5.2 are virtually indistinguishable from PIREPs. What we do mean by that - Claims are handled just like PIREPs needing review. There is no separate Claim review like in 5.0 - the benefit of that being - Claims inherit all PIREP functionality like comments and needing reply.

This also makes claims editable after the fact - you can return to a claim in the future and reject it if it was accepted, accept it if it was rejected, change hours and points awarded as needed.