A simple script that converts FlightGear log file to KML file that can be imported to Google maps to visualise the flight path.

Setup your FlightGear so that it logs the position of the aircraft during the flight. Then provide the path to the created log file as a parameter for the fgkml.py script and redirect the output to a KML file. Import the file into your Google map. Enjoy!

python fgkml.py <file>
python fgkml.py --trackname="KSFO to KLAX" <file>
python fgkml.py --longpos=1 --latpos=2 --altpos=3 <file>

--trackname, -t     The name of the track in the map
--longpos, -n       The position of the longitude value in the log file row
--latpos, -e        The position of the latitude value in the log file row
--altpos, -a        The position of the altitude value in the log file row

Longitudes and latitudes must be in degrees written in decimal format like -122.3735887 and 37.61883421, obtained from /position/longitude-deg and /position/latitude-deg values in the FlightGear property tree.

The altitude is the altitude above sea level in feets, obtained from the /position/altitude-ft property.

The default values for longpos, latpos and altpos are 1, 2 and 3 respectively. Note that the position counting starts with 0 so the longpos is supposed to be the second column in the log file by default.

Look at the examples/logging.xml file. It defines the format of the CSV file that the FlightGear creates during the flight. Run fgfs with the following parameter

$ fgfs --config=/home/mudrd8mz/fg/logging.xml

After you exit from FlightGear, you will find a file profile.csv created in the current directory. To generate the KML file from it, run

$ python fgkml.py profile.csv > profile.kml

See examples/profile.kml for an example output. Then create a map in Google maps (or edit some existing map) and import the KML file to it. See examples/profile.png for an example of the result.

Note that you can open profile.csv in a spreadsheet processor like LibreOffice Calc or MS Excel and generate other useful charts like altitude profile or fuel consumption chart.

(c) 2012 David Mudrak [email protected]

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.