Changelog

Changes to handle Pegasus v2 livery reporting

• Adjusted Log Line Parser to accept/understand Aircraft, Aircraft Type, Addon and Livery

• Adjusted Livery Name detection autoreject to store new values, integrate with (as much as possible) existing liveries whilst not throwing them for new review and converting to new format

• In Liveries table in Orwell:

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• In Livery View page in Orwell:

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• Changes to Livery Review Process:

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• PIREP Review Changes:

• Removed PIREP ID from Phoenix Dashboard PIREP/Booking boxes; It’s not really needed and sometimes causes linebreak issues.

• Added a new Discord Notification for when a Badge is awarded.

• Added a new DIscord Notification for when a PIREP goes into Review.

• Fixed the missing youtube link introduced in Pilot Profile in 5.2.16

• New: Social Links can have ‘Discord Integration’ enabled - provided VA has set up vAMSYS Discord Bot; Users who have linked their Discord accounts with vAMSYS will be able to join VAs discord (with correct username) by clicking the Social Icon/Link; In other cases, the specified discord URL is shown;

• Fixes to PIREP View Pages for some old PIREPs where the Airline Airport has since been deleted

• Added PIREP ID and Simulator to the Pending Livery Review Table

• Discord Activity Notifications now include Activity Image

Release focused mainly on internal optimizations:

• New Flight List/Map Generation

  Reworked how Flight List/Map is generated to be more efficient

• New Weather System

  Reworked how our Weather system works - METARS and TAFs fetched, saved and served.

• Dispatch Table optimizations

  Reworked expensive database queries, added local caching and more to drastically improve Dispatch Table load times

• Orwell PIREP Table optimizations

  Heavily optimized Orwell PIREP Table to extract every ounce or performance via query optimization and data loading limits

Other Tweaks, Fixes and Improvements:

• Added Peter to Airline Staff generator for new VAs

• Fixed incorrect ACARS Sound descriptions for Landing and Unloading stages

• Fixed extra “ in youtube link in Pilot Profile

• Fixed ‘unresolved’ Aircraft Types in Available Destication Map

• Added Landing Rates as an optional activity restriction

• Fixed VA Routes page issue when page has rank limited components

• Fixed timeout errors when generating VATSIM Partner Compliance Report

We are treating vAMSYS 5.2.14 as ‘unstable’ and will be deploying hotfixes throughout the day as needed if issues crop up - this is due to the nature of many small changes needed for 5.2.14, some of which we may have missed.

✨ New and Updated Features

Real-time Callsign Availability Checking

• Callsign fields now show improved live availability status for VATSIM and IVAO networks

• Works during flight dispatch and booking modifications

• Includes timeout handling to prevent hanging on "Checking..." status

Staff Tools

• Added booking cancellation option for VA Staff in Orwell → Flight Centre → Bookings

Dashboard Customization

• Added option to open URLs in the same tab for Image Component items in Phoenix Dashboard

🐛 Bug Fixes and ↗️ Other Improvements

Flight Booking and Destination Maps

• Fixed filter logic where airports showed if they matched ANY filter instead of ALL filters

• Map filters now update dynamically based on other selected filters

PIREP System

• Added success notifications for PIREP accept/reject/invalidate actions

• Fixed activity registration method calls

• Fixed percentage based bonus points not correctly applying to claims due to already existing bonus point entry with 0 points

Route Importer

• Fixed airport cache query preventing proper airline scoping

• Fixed SimBrief fuel field mapping (sb_extra_fuel -> addedfuel)

• Added proper fleet validation for import operations

• Improved time parsing to handle both H:i and H:i:s formats

⚡ Performance Improvements

Database Optimization

• Eliminated N+1 queries in statistics loading and position reports

• Standardized aircraft relationship references across the system

• Added strategic eager loading to prevent redundant database calls

Flight Booking Maps

• Improved loading performance for large airport datasets

• Added 1-hour caching for event airports

• Optimized favorites handling with faster lookup methods

🔧 Technical Changes

Code Refactoring

• Consolidated duplicate callsign checking code into reusable service

• Normalized aircraft type/fleet relationship naming throughout application

• Updated 65+ files to use consistent relationship patterns

Permissions

• Moved activity email access under airline settings permission

Impact Summary

• Faster flight booking due to map performance improvements

• Reliable callsign checking across all flight dispatch scenarios

• Better user feedback with success notifications for PIREP actions

• More accurate filtering in flight booking maps

• Improved system stability through database query optimization

🎯 Route Management

Copy Route Functionality

• Added route copying in Orwell with intelligent date handling (past dates → now, future dates preserved)

• Copies all data: load factors, fleets, containers, and SimBrief overrides

Service Days Filtering

• Made service days column sortable in dispatch tables in Phoenix

• Made service days values filterable in dispatch tables in Phoenix

Route Exports

• Added AND/OR logic selector for departure and arrival airport filtering

🏢 Hub Selection Improvements

Automatic Selection

• Auto-selects hub when airline has only one hub or one airport

• Streamlined user experience for single-hub and single-airport-in-hub scenarios

🔍 Activity Improvements

Tag Filtering

• Changed tag filters from AND to OR logic in Activities and Curated Rosters in Phoenix

• Items now appear when matching ANY selected tag instead of requiring ALL tags

✈️ SimBrief Integration

Centralized Aircraft Favorite Logic

• Unified SimBrief profile selection across aircraft resource and view booking pages when favoriting aircraft

• Automatic profile preselection when favoriting aircraft based on priority: Airline → Pilot → Default profiles

🎨 VA Rules Page Improvements

Branding & SEO

• VA rules page now shows VA logo instead of vAMSYS logo

• Page is no longer indexable by search engines

📋 Dispatch Information

Enhanced Route Information Infobox

• Added route departure and arrival times

• Shows available fleets for the route

• Displays operator and ATC callsign information

• When dispatching for an Activity with Fleet Restrictions, said restrictions will show in Route Information

Aircraft Selection Improvements

• Activity fleet restrictions now properly carry over to aircraft selection in dispatch

• Added new setting in Orwell to force aircraft selection even when only one fleet is available

• Added taxi-in/taxi-out time calculation and sending to SimBrief when using Manual SimBrief from View Booking page

Load Factor Management

• Added "Enable Loaded Amount Editing" setting to load factor profiles

• When disabled, passengers, luggage, and cargo fields become read-only in dispatch

• Generated load data is still displayed to pilots for reference, but cannot be edited - only regenerated

🏆 Badge System Enhancements

PIREP Count Requirements

• Added PIREP Count field to badge types: Landing Rate, Landing Rate Between, Landing Airport, Departing Airport, and Airport badges

• Badges now require a specific number of PIREPs to be earned (default: 1 for compatibility); Editing these badges will ask you to enter the amount - you can still add 1 if that's what you desire

🚫 Autoreject System Improvements

Duplicate Message Prevention

• Fixed duplicate autoreject messages for landing rate rules

  System now shows only the most severe autoreject message when multiple landing rate rules trigger

  For excessive landings: shows heaviest (most negative) landing rate violation

  For soft landings: shows softest (most positive) landing rate violation

🔐 Authentication Improvements

Enhanced Logout Experience

• Logout now redirects to VA-specific login page and maintains VA branding consistency throughout login/logout flow

⚡ Performance Improvements

VA Select Page Optimizations

• Dramatic performance improvements for users with multiple pilot accounts

• Added Star/Unstar functionality so you are in control

• Added Search functionality

Fixes and hotfixes applied during development holiday:

• Tweak to midnight jobs dispatcher to better handle congested times - like midnight UTC

• Updates to Discord Notification dispatcher to not attempt to send discord messages to VAs which no longer have a linked Discord Server

• Fixes to internal METAR fetcher and processor to improve handling of some edge cases

• Fixes to custom Page when component width was somehow not provided

• Prevent showing Activities in Phoenix if the setup contains airports which no longer exist - in these cases, the Pilot will be returned to dashboard with a notification prompting them to alert VA so they can fix the Activity

• Attempted a fix for rare cases when Profile page will fail due to lack of Pilot Statistics

• Improved handling of 'departure_time', 'arrival_time' and 'flight_length' fields in Route Import so the import does not get stuck in a loop in edge cases where the input bypasses initial validation.

• Added more timezone fixes when using Time Helper in Dispatch to match between outdated and new timezone names reported by browser;

• Backend changes to how Public Name of the user is stored to facilitate future improvements to Flight List generation bottleneck

• Added 3 information columns in Airport export - Airport ID, ICAO and IATA;

• Fixes to ‘midnight’ job dispatcher for Activity detection, Holiday entitlement reset and Removed Pilot Digest to take into account timezone differences

• Tweaked various job dispatch times and delays as well as worker amounts to better split the load at the start of the hour when many various jobs are dispatched; This ought to lead to better database performance and decreased/eliminated timeout issues related to it;

• Pegasus CSV Generator - fixed instances where airport names will have double quotes causing issue with the CSV format;

• Fixed Route Importer not saving departure, arrival and flight length times,

• Fixed Route Importer/Exporter column names noting hhmm when the format is hh:mm;

• Added the option to remove Permanently removed flag from deleted pilots via Pilot table actions in Orwell

• Restoring pilot account will remove Permanently Removed flag from all pilot accounts

Changes as part of 5.2.13 proper:

• Added Booking Type indicator in book flight map and Dispatch Route pages;

• For special route/booking types with scoring restrictions, notice saying so has been added to Dispatch page;

• Fixed point multiplier percent not showing correctly in Activity View page in Phoenix - it will now list 200% as Points: 2x instead of Points: 200;

• Fixed Airport Importer lower-casing preferred alternate codes; Adjusted logic to handle lowercase codes in the Diversion Airport Picker;

• Fixed SimBrief dispatch referring to the old fuel units entered prior to 5.2

• Fixed Claims not moving Pilot to intended destination airport

• Fixed Claim PIREPs not showing in Phoenix Dashboard component

• Adjusted Can see Airline Statistics permission to affect Orwell Dashboard components

• Fixed incorrect permissions check on Holidays and Routes pages in Orwell

Last maintenance release - Team vAMSYS is on development holiday till 3rd July.

• Orwell and Phoenix PIREP View now lists Route ID and Booking ID

• Route Exporter will not empty out ‘AUTO’ Cost Index entries in exported CSV

• Fixed Claims not always registering as completing logbook or adding to the leg complpetion of activity logbook; For any outstanding cases, recycle claim by Rejecting and Accepting;

• Added ‘Activity Logbooks’ section in Orwell and Phoenix PIREP Review - it lists all activities this PIREP is crediting towards completion.

• Potential fix to Callsign Generator parameters throwing an error when swiching to Turbo mode in Route Create/Edit

Maintenance release.

• Fixed User Profile editor so that same online network IDs cannot be used by multiple users.

• Fixed per-leg awarded bonus points not showing up in the PIREP table

• Fixed a bug where reprocessing a PIREP which completed the activity would not add back the activity points;

• Fixed SimBrief dispatch looking at the wrong fuel values for minfob and minfod

• Fixed Custom Pages Headless components not having all components

Rank Scorer Change

Rank Point scorer added in 5.2.8 has been changed - previously created scoring rules using this scorer have been removed; Rank Point scorer now takes in multiple rank groups and associated points per rank group.

Phoenix → View Booking Updates

View Booking page received a facelift thanks to feedback of Virtual Airlines and Pilots which found it’s way to Featurebase - we thank you for your input!

Layout of how information is presented has been fully revamped and should make it easier to take in the important bits without your eyes darting from one section to the other.

Phoenix → Tour and Roster Table

Tour and Roster table, showing the activity legs has been improved and now takes into account current bookings

• Status column will show ‘Booked’ if the leg is booked; Book Flight replaced with View Booking.

• Clicking ‘Book Flight’ on next ‘Incomplete’ leg when previous leg is ‘Booked’ will not show out of sequence warning.

Orwell → Bulk Full Route Edit

A bulk action added to Orwell Route Management where one can select up to 20 routes to be edited;

The familiar route edit page will open for the first selected entry (will Turbo Mode as it’s more lightweight than the non-turbo)- once you save the edits, it will take you to the next selected route and so on;

Other Fixes and Changes

• Orwell Rank Management - fixed rank edit issue relating to using ‘Space’ as the abbreviation separator;

• Orwell Rank Management - removed Delete button from the Cadet and Staff ranks in the Rank Edit page;

• Added a safeguard in Profile views to guard against null badge images;

• Phoenix - Dispatch Table has these additional columns hidden by default:

• Route Importer - added missing route parsing

• Route Importer / Orwell → Routes → Routes - significantly improved route parser speed.

What is next?

5.2.10 finishes our first pass at clearing out ‘Could be Improved’ suggestions and is the last ‘meaty’ update;

We will continue to release hotfixes for any bugs as they come up but we do not plan on having any more updates of the size of 5.2.7 - 5.2.10 for at least 3 weeks (5th July 25) - team has some holiday time booked and we want to start chipping at v5.3 to-do list and work on Hangar 1.0;

Phoenix → Route Changes

A v3 return - but instead of pairs, we show routes - routes starting, ending, started and ended in 14 day period.

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VAs can enable it at Orwell → HQ → Settings → vAMSYS Modules

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Orwell → Route Update Guidance Change

In

Route Import/Export

we’ve updated the guidance on how to best delete routes, so they still play nice with the Route Changes in Phoenix.

Phoenix → Airline Statistics Component

Just like Pilot Statistics, VAs can now configure their Phoenix Dashboard to show Airline Statistics:

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Orwell → Staff Actions

v3 Favorite - Staff Actions log is back in PIREP Review in Orwell. It tracks PIREP state changes - be it directly in PIREP review or via Livery Review, comment additions/removals, point and bonus changes. It will only start tracking these on 5.2.9 launch and you will not see actions which took place beforethen in the action log.

VA-wide holidays

With the summer coming up, 5.2.9 added an option to set VA-wide holidays. It allows VAs to specify various date ranges when activity requirements do not apply, but pilots can still fly during it;

To be able to set it up, VA Staff, Owner Included, need Can Manage Airline Holidays permission. The holidays are managed at Orwell → Operations → Airline Holidays

More information about Airline Holidays here.

Other Changes and Fixes

• Fixed badges not awarding for completing Activity; Issue resolved and missing badges awarded;

• Manually awardable Badges can now be awarded to pilot from their Orwell Profile page;

• Phoenix Dashboard component for Events - added option to exclude tags;

• SimBrief OFP PDFs are now stored at vAMSYS enabling a much longer retention period than SimBrief.

Phoenix → My Profile

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Added Rank progression Tracker;

Phoenix → View Booking

After changes in 5.2.7 to Dispatch page, we’ve added some goodies to the View Booking Page:

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Change Booking Details

Pilots can now change their Callsign (with IVAO/VATSIM checker, like in Dispatch page), Flight Number (if changes are enabled) and the Network booked without having to redispatch the entire flight.

Manual SimBrief

Manual SimBrief option is making a return, if enabled by the VA in Orwell -> HQ -> Settings -> Booking & Dispatch -> Enable Manual SimBrief.

Manual SimBrief is the inferior option when compared to full fledged SimBrief Dispatch via Dispatch Page as it is severy limited on what information can be passed via URL; It will never be as good as the our primary integration.

There are further tweaks to make in future vAMSYS 5.2 iterations, but the initial return of this function does work and - manual SB dispatches will sync up to vAMSYS automatically, just like the changes made to the OFP when Dispatching via SimBrief.

For Manual SimBrief to be available, it needs to be enabled by the VA and the Pilot needs to have Navigraph Account linked.

View Booking Page Future

We are planning to tackle a bigger overhaul of the View Booking page, courtesy to some great feedback and sketches provided by Stu - a pilot in one of the VAs. We thank him for the effort to put this to us and you can look forward to View Booking page being a bit more organised and easier to follow.

Phoenix - Event Map Markers

Added the option to color Event and Focus Airport activity type airports red, like in v3.

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Virtual Airlines may enable it in Orwell → HQ → Settings → Booking & Dispatch → Show Event and Focus Airport Marker on Maps. The marked airports are Departure Airports only for visible Activities in Event and Focus Airport type.

Orwell → Rank Scorer

Added a new PIREP Scorer - Rank Points. When enabled, will award set points for pilots having selected ranks.

Orwell → PIREPs Count Badge

Added two more fields - Callsign and Route Tags to further narrow down who the badge is awarded to.

Orwell → Booked Aircraft Highlight

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Added additional options in Orwell → HQ → Settings → Booking & Dispatch for highlighting booked aircraft in Dispatch.

Orwell → Discord Settings

Added Discord notifications for Activities - similar to how Alerts and NOTAMs work.

Phoenix → Other Changes

• Event Page for Tours/Rosters - remove ‘Airport’ and ‘International’ from airport names from legs table so it all fits into table without sideways scrolling; For international ‘Airport’ and ‘International’ equivalents VAs should remove them from their airport names as they are superflous and just take up the space.

• Fixed Curated Rosters not expiring.

• Added ‘Only where I am Registered’ toggles in Event and Curated Roster filters.

Orwell → Other Changes

• Added Badge description in the table in Phoenix when viewing badge recipients.

• When Accepting PIREP Claims, it will no longer override any manually entered points or bonus points

• Point and Bonus Point presets were using Preset name in points, not the ‘Content’

Next Up

5.2.8 has a bit shorter changelog than 5.2.7 and there are many things which did not make it to 5.2.8 today. You can see a full list of things we want to tackle for 5.2.9 onwards here.

Clearing out Could be Improved backlog today with small tweaks to iron out some rough edges and improve existing functionality.

Phoenix → Flight Dispatch

5.2.6, as requested by our VA Customers, added foolproof way to ensure the correct fleet/aircraft is selected when making a booking - this is to protect pilots against disappointment when they book wrong aircraft and then get their PIREP rejected/invalidated.

5.2.7 adds the option for VAs to revert back to how 5.2 was prior to 5.2.6 and let the dispatcher select a random aircraft. Setting is located in Orwell → HQ → Settings → Booking & Dispatch → Dispatch Functions → Require Explicit Aircraft Selection.

Aditionally, Users who feel confident and don’t want the extra handholding, can enable bypass setting in Phoenix → My Profile → Account Settings → Global Preferences → Bypass Explicit Aircraft Selection.

Furthermore, Explicit Aircraft Selection functionality is further improved - when only 1 fleet is available, revert to old logic and pick aircraft from favorites, then at random;

Other Changes:

• Dispatch via SimBrief toggle moved to Dispatch Details section in Dispatch

• SimBrief Airframe Profile and Update Airframes sections moved to Dispatch Details section in Dispatch

• SimBrief settings fieldset moved out of parent Flight Options

• Flight Options moved above Payload

Phoenix → Pilot Profile

• Changed it so pilot profile link cannot be opened when logged in at another VA.

• Removed PIREP Comments section from public profile to be in line with public PIREP view where we do not show comments and treat them as private.

• Added Copy Profile URL to pilots profile page so they can get a shareable link should they wish.

Phoenix → PIREP Comments

• Migrated 5.0 PIREP comments to 5.2 - something we forgot to do after 5.2 launch;

• Removed all PIREP comments made prior to 5.0; Migration issue to 5.0 caused comments to be incorrectly attributed and there is no way to fix that now.

Phoenix / Orwell

PIREP Processing

• As part of PIREP processing, if booking was made to be flown on VATSIM/IVAO and no flight activity was found on the network, the booking network will be force set to offline. Similarly, if booking was made offline and we detect IVAO/VATSIM activity - it will set the appropriate network.

Badges

• Badge sections in profile edited to that images fall in the middle

• Badge sections in profile now show Badge Name in addition to when it was awarded

• Badge items in profile now link to the badge page in Phoenix

• PIREPs - Count in Fleet badge type is now retired

• PIREPs - Count, PIREPs - Landing Rate, PIREPs - Landing Airport, PIREPs - Departing Airport, PIREPs - Arriving or Departing Airport, Flight Length and Flight Distance badges have additional, optional options:

• PIREPs - Landing Rate badge has additional, optional Airports field. If entered, badge will look for the specified landing rate at the specified airports.

• PIREPs - Landing Airport Runway Badge type added. Rewards set number of arrivals at specified airport and specified runway. Can only have 1 airport, but multiple runways are allowed. Do note, that runway tracking started with PIREPs filed in 5.2 - previous PIREPs do not have this information.

• PIREPs - Landing Rate Between Badge type added. Will award badge if landing rate is between min and max specified.

Orwell → ACARS Sounds

• Sounds are only played when route type is Scheduled or Charter.

• Sounds can be uploaded on Fleet. Fleet sounds will selectively override default ACARS Sounds - i.e. if default sound for Unloading exists in Airline and one is uploaded on Fleet - the fleet sound will play; If default sound for unloading is not set in Airline and one is uploaded on Fleet - fleet sound will play; If default sound for unloading is set in Airline and no unloading sound is set on Fleet - Airline sound will play.

• Multiple sounds can now be uploaded for each type - one will be selected at random.

Orwell → Staff Permissions

Important - please re-check and reapply ‘Can See PIREPs & Claims’ and ‘Can Manage Callsign Parameter Settings’ permissions, as some staff may be missing it as of 5.2.7.

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Furthermore, clarified some permission descriptions and names; added granular permissions for each importer/exporter combo - all users with Can Use Exporters/Importers permission have access to all Importers/Exporters enabled to replicate functionality of vAMSYS prior to 5.2.7. VA Owners and other staff with revelant permission can now change what access each Staff member has.

Orwell → Bookings → VATSIM VA Partner Compliance Export

Fixed how this exporter works - it would hang if it cannot produce 60 flights from 20 different pilots. It will now more reliably output the data we have, even if it is not enough to meet VATSIM requirements.

Orwell → Rewards → Ranks

Made some additions to combat creative ways VAs keep finding to delete initial ranks; Added rank change sync to Hangar.

Orwell → Discord Notifications

Ever since 5.0, there were issues with @everyone mentions as is not a real but contrived role, yet Discord treats it as a regular role and provides a unique role_id for each server; To mention @everyone we cannot pass @ , yet for every other role mention - we do; We had issues identifying whether the role is everyone or not. This has now been addressed and the notification messages will mention everyone without double @@ .

Orwell → CSS

Booked Flight Flag classname change

If you are overriding booked-aircraft-flag CSS class, 5.2.7 renames it to bookedAircraftFlag as it was causing an issue with search and was the cause of this issue.

Unordered list

Added default CSS to add bullet points to unordered lists resolving this issue.

Orwell → Activity Edit Bug

Fixed an issue when editing an existing tour it would expect aircraft id, resolving this issue; And this issue regarding award type.

Orwell → Navigation Tweak

As requested in Discrod, Phoenix and Hangar links in Orwell were moved to the bottom of the navigation, closer to what we had in 5.0 and replicating Phoenix layout.

Orwell → Activity → Order of Operations

Changed when Removed Pilot Digest is sent - it is now sent after that days pilot removals, not before - removing the 24 hour delay of email data.

Phoenix → Other Tweaks

• Clicking on event in Phoenix Dashboard will no longer open a new tab.

• Removed all dynamic labels - that’s Show/Hide Jumpseat in Booking Map, Show/Hide Flight Paths in Profile → Map, as well as all privacy toggles in Account Settings → Global Preferences. The label clearly indicates what happens when it’s toggled on as opposed to the status it has.

• Changed how pilots profile is accessed by simplifying the URL

• Added ‘Share my profile link’ to profile page

Orwell → Other Tweaks

• Added hidden by default ID field in Aircraft table, so search can be done by ID.

• Removed all dynamic labels, There was only 1 in Orwell → Activity Unlimited Participation when working on Activities.

• When creating Route, ‘Start Same’ and ‘Start Return’ save options will pre-populate route type field.

• Added option to mark PIREP as needing reply when leaving a comment in Orwell.

• Alerts now have a selection to display in Phoenix or Pegasus - both or either.

• Added Staff Action Count in Select VA Page next to Orwell button

Dispatch Changes

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Dispatching a flight now requires pilot to actively select the aircraft they are booking; This will eliminate all the cases of ‘I did not check what I was dispatching’ and ending up filing a PIREP against wrong Fleet.

As with the Aircraft Picker available previously, the selection can be quickly made from Favorited Aircraft or all available aircraft for the route, optionally narrowed down by fleet.

Other Changes

• Fixed Activity Image showing up erroneusly on Curated Roster Activity Type

• Fixed Container synchronisation on Route Importer

• Added dark image to Activities

• Added missing Whitelist action to pilot table when only initial activity requirements are enabled

• Adjusted PIREP View page when Diversion has been detected to disable the comment field and improve message directing users to Submit Diversion Report

• Made providing Focus Airport required when creating Focus Airport Activity

• Made selecting aircraft mandatory when dispatching

• Experimental change in Route Exporter to see if issue with fleet IDs not populating sometimes is fixed

• Changed Created At column format in Routing Exporter

• Fixed Focus Airport Activity not rewarding points on PIREP

• Fixed custom Fleet/Aircraft images in Flight Map showing a link to null when attribution link is not provided

• Fixed to Livery Review permission not enabling said access in Orwell

• Added link to Hangar in Orwell for VAs which have it enabled and Staff has permission to manage it

• Added Registered Pilots indicator in the Activity List in Phoenix

• Added SayIntentions as a Default Network option in Pilot Preferenes in Phoenix

• Changed when Delete button shows in Orwell → Pilots → Holidays. Holidays can only be deleted before they start and presence of disabled button was confusing to VA Staff

A smaller change to wrap up our launch week.

• Fixed payload fields showing when dispatching Repositioning or Training flights

• Improved scoring rule creation by pre-populating default values

• Workaround to SimBrief ignoring bagwgt when paxwgt is not provided has been added

• Changed how activity logbooks recreation is triggered when updating Activity - changing leeway and start/end times will trigger it.

• Added a weekday checker to Route and Routing Imports, so non-weekday names cannot be entered

• Updated Route Create/Edit Turbo mode to remove fleets which do not exist

• Added invisible Timezone override system for users whose browser reports their timezone as Asia/Calcutta when using Time Setter in Dispatch. Correct timezone now is Asia/Kolkata

• Flight Dispatch page will now remember your ‘Dispatch via SimBrief' toggle setting

• Various changes and tweaks to Route Importer

Beta Branch

With the initial flurry of activity behind us, we will move back to utilising a Beta branch in some way, shape or form as we start working through some of the items in Featurebase for improvements and smaller feature ideas.

We’re not huge fans of keeping it under a separate subdomain - like beta.vamsys.io so will spend some time exploring the options on how to bring ‘experimental’ features to vAMSYS proper via a user toggle.

Stay tuned - we’ll be sure to let you know more when we have something in place.

Scorer Changes

• Change to Online Network scorer - it now bases connected % from blocks off to blocks on, as opposed to Pegasus tracking start/end.

• Online Network Scorer will update booking network if it was different to what was tracked

• New Multiple Flights Per Day scorer - it will add extra points or bonus points for each subsequent PIREP (including the PIREP number provided); i.e. if you put in 2 - second, third, fourth etc PIREP of the day will get extra points.

Other Changes

• Added VATSIM and IVAO callsign availability checked in the Dispatch page - it will check if the callsign is available on these networks (i.e. is not prefiled or currently in use)

• Changed SimBrief stock Aircraft Profile sync to include some of the missing profiles due to how SimBrief categorises some of them

• Fixed an issue with logbook tracking for Curated Rosters

• Fixed an issue with events edited in-between 5.0 and 5.2 Activity updates - the issue manifests with an error when opening an Activity one is registered for - the fix VAs can apply is by opening the Activity in Orwell and saving it - it will rebuild the Activity Logbook for each registered pilot.

• Fixed Route Importer not importing Pax and Bag weights

• Fixed Route Edit page not always having pre-populated fuel units - there should always be a default value

• Improved Estimated Time value in Flight Details section in View Booking

• Added Delete Routes bulk action in Routes table in Orwell - it will set end_date to now for live routes and will remove routes not yet started

• Changed Delete button visibility when Editing Route to only show when editing Route which has not started yet; Added End Route button

• Fixed an issue when creating a Scenery for an Airport via the View Airport Page

• Changed the ‘Completions’ table to ‘Logbooks’ when viewing Tour/Roster based Activity - it now lists all logbooks for you to view.

• Adjusted how the Table when booking a flight is filtered to show only routes from your departure airport, so that custom-created views can be re-used between your VAs.

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.

We are pleased to share the latest updates featuring several improvements and fixes within the vAMSYS ecosystem.

What a busy day! 24 code pushes today to production to solve some of the issues discovered on 5.2 launch. Code changes are very disruptive - for the ~5 minutes it takes for them to go live the CPU use explodes, vAMSYS.io gets unhappy and will sometimes throw errors or timeouts, our Pegasus servers will also be upset and take just a bit longer to store those position reports. All in all, our fast pace with pushing out fixes contributed a little to the overall headache experienced by our servers. Moving on - unless it’s an emergency - we will do a much better job in batching the updates so it’s a bit easier for everyone.

Overall, it went way better than expected without too many dramas or offline period.

PIREP Processing Issues

One thing which we could not really test in 5.2 Beta is how the newly created PIREPs are handled - this caused empty landing rates and autoreject issues. Behind the scenes it was caused by:

• Unusual timestamp formatting coming from users - hh.mm.ss instead of the usual hh:mm:ss

• PIREPs getting processed faster than the Position Reports get updated. One of the new features in 5.2 is touchdown evaluation - for that to work, we need the position reports stored and assigned to the PIREP. The way we scheduled the tasks meant PIREP processing started before position reports got assigned to PIREP.

Pegasus Server high load

Pegasus servers experienced a surge in CPU use which caused some issues with logging in and getting Airport and Stand data.

We’ve moved some of the tasks outside of our 3 servers responsible for Pegasus and this has stabilized the situation. We will be exploring in days and weeks to come to further optimize this.

Other Fixes:

• Pegasus had issues looking up SimBrief Alias (we no longer store aliases as of 5.2) via SimBrief API

• Error in our ‘Error 500’ error page, where it would not produce error ID to share

• Restored erroneusly deleted loadfactor calculator from Orwell

• Fixed Navigraph User account linking - it was refering to beta when it no longer exists

• Re-enabled Discord account linking - forgot to do so prior to 5.2 launch

• Fixed recurrent activity job - it was looking at the old Events

• Fixed VA Staff seeing Pilot Registration Review page in Orwell when they were not supposed to

• Fixed an error which would occur when logging out whilst in Orwell

• Fixed route importer wrongly lowercasing route tags

• Lots and Lots n+1 query and lazy loading improvements and fixes

• Fixed Ruiting edit in Orwell where it would try to null out wrong column

• Fixed View Booking page for users with SimBrief dispatches from 5.0

• Fixed SimBrief Airline - ICAO setting in SimBrief Integration in Orwell was not being applied

• Fixed an issue with creating a Fleet in Orwell

• Fixed an issue with editing Activity in Orwell when it is Route based

• Fixed an issue of not being able to select activity when creating a Badge rewarding activity participation

• Fixed internal remarks not being applied on Route on creation or edit

• Fixed containers assigned to route not displaying correctly in Orwell

Things to Look Forward to

There are still some gremlins lurking - we will keep resolving bugs as they crop up. Keep making reports in Featurebase so we can fix them!

Once the initial bug squashing is complete, we have a list of highly requested Improvements to add - we will be dedicating some time for that before moving on to 5.3.

Bug Reporting

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When you see a message like this - please do click where it says ‘Please Click on me’ and log a bug report, describing what you were doing when the error happened.

Bugs submitted this way do not need to include VA Identifier, but we do need a description on how you got to the error so we could reproduce and fix.

It is very imporptant bugs are logged - when you get this message - please make the effort to submit a bug report - if it’s reported, it can be fixed. If it’s not reported - it will not be fixed any time soon, if ever.

Tour Logbooks

We fixed couple of issues yesterday and today with Tour Logbooks not getting the progress updated or carried over from 5.0;

Should you or your pilots experience it, first step would be to reprocess the PIREPs eligible for tour in order - leg 1, then leg 2 and so on - this should add it to activity logbook for the Pilot.

If that fails - please log a bug in Featurebase containing - Activity ID, Affected Pilot Username and VA Identifier.

Nightly Jobs - Discord Stats

For Virtual Airlines who have UTC as their timezone (new in 5.2), the midnight job and discord statistics messages did not fire at midnight UTC. We think we resolved this issue and it will run as scheduled tonight.

You may have noticed a drop in Pilot accounts - this would be because of how Frozen accounts are handled in 5.2 - they are now removed after 2 days instead of 60 - the nightly job which we ran at noon to catch up will have deleted all Frozen accounts which were over 2 days old, but younger than 60.

Other changes and fixes

• Added a fallbabck in PIREP Processing when we do not have touchdown position reports, so that PIREPs do not get rejected/invalidated with null landing rate.

• Fixed PIREPs not being logged towards Tour completion if the Tour had restrictions configured. If you have any PIREPs like this - reprocessing them in Orwell ought to add them to activity logbook.

• Fixed an issue with Airport Import unable to process SimBrief settings

• Fixed an issue where Airport Manager Bonus Point setting would not get saved in Orwell

• Fixed more lazy load issues (you don’t see it as errors, but we log occurences to improve vAMSYS as it basically reduces number of database queries we make)

• Fixed Flight Length and Flight Distance fields not auto-populating on route import

• Fixed Altitude field in import not being parsed from FL380 to 38000 and similar

• Increased the Live Flights histogram in Orwell dashboard from 2 weeks to 1 month

• Fixed an issue with ‘Flights From XXX’ table where it would not show some routes due to tag issue.