If you're at your computer, just go to FlyQ Online (http://flyq.seattleavionics.com) and enter the ident of your favorite airports.  For more information, see our Blog entry.

FlyQ EFB version 2.2 is  major release that has already been adopted by tens of thousands of users and the verdict is extremely positive.  We've also released version 2.2.1 which addressed a small number of minor bugs. 

The rest of this section refers generally to version 2.2.

Watch the video and download the updated Pilot's Guide.

It's often said that time is money. When flying, time is fuel -- which means money -- so I guess it's true.  And this is why we put so much work into making version 2.2's mapping engine about 3X faster than for the previous version.  It's a truly incredible difference.  You might even say YUUGE depending on your political leanings.  Watch the map rendering video and see for yourself.

The difference has to do with how fast individual map "tiles" render.  In version 2.0, we made another part of the mapping engine 3x faster -- what computer graphics folks call the "frame rate" which refers to how many times per second the map updates.  In version 2.2, we made the tiles themselves render much faster.  When put together, version 2.2 is at least 5X faster than last year's version 1.5.

As mentioned above, we've been very busy cartographers crafting airport diagrams for nearly all public airports in the lower 48 US states.  Most are geo-referenced.  Best of all, you'll get names and locations for FBOs, fuel pumps, and more.

In addition to the standard aviation charts, you can now use Roads, Terrain, or even Aerial Photo as base maps.  The Aerial Photo layer is particularly terrific if you're flying Search and Rescue missions or simply like to see what you're flying over.

Note that as these new layers, especially the Aerial Photo layer, are much too large to fit in the iPad's storage space.  Therefore, you can't use the ChartData Manager to pre-download states like you can for the other map layers.  Rather, you must be connected to the Internet to see them.  That said, in version 2.2.1 we added cacheing of the tiles.  This means you can download the tiles you need for a particular flight by turing on the appropriate layer then moving and zooming around the relevant areas while online.  Then, when you're in the plane and disconnected from the Internet, those map tiles are still available.  Over time this could take up a lot of space so new delete buttons were added in the ChartData Manager for these layers.

Previously, we downloaded data from a Jeppesen system that was under contract from the FAA to provide current TFR data.  Over time, many of you have correctly pointed out that the Jepp data was, um, not always accurate.  It also lacked TFRs about sporting events.  And FlyQ EFB's display of the information left something to be desired, too.

Now all of these problems have vanished as we get the data from the FAA directly and a private company that publishes information about sporting events.  And we've completely redesigned our display.

You'll notice that the TFRS are now color-coded.  As you might expect, a red TFR is an active one.  The orange ones are TFRs that will become active in the future.  If the TFR is on the FAA's Web site or is a sporting event that starts within 7 days, you'll see it.  Incidentally, the FAA definition for sporting event TFRs applies to just MLB, NFL, NASCAR, and college Division 1 college football (apparently not enough people attend basketball and soccer games to be important).

Our ChartData Manager app provides ChartData to many apps and devices such as Dynon SkyView, Aspen Evolution, Bendix-King 770, GRT, AFS, and more.  It gets a lot of use every month and we're constantly improving it.  Version 5.2 makes updates faster, improves reliability, and (finally!) adds support for copying to multiple cards or USB flash drives simultaneously.  It also dramatically simplifies first-time use for new users.

It's technically a beta but has tested very well so far.  We plan to release it next week with just a few minor changes unless someone finds a major problem. Please send feedback to beta@seattleavionics.com