Feature request: drawable maps + text notes

[Pavel Brodsky]

I have worked with various real-world radar clients and all of them had one feature (I believe it is required by the aviation authority for certification of that software) which we are missing : drawable maps and text notes. It works in a very similar way in all of them, but the user interface is slightly different in each of them.

 

The "private map" or "draw map" tool is like:

select required drawing type (either circle, rectangle, polygon or line), left click by mouse on the screen to define it (just like mspaint - but during each click you see actual GPS coordinates at the cursor, so you were able to draw a like from point to point if you had coordinates of those points for example from NOTAM), right click to confirm when finished. Then select the object colour (red, yellow, gray...) and if filled with colour or not filled.

 

The "text note" is like:

select text note, write text (up to 3 lines, each line max 15 letters)

hit enter, use mouse to place the text on the screen, right click to confirm position

 

It is used VERY often and ATCos love it. On ground radar GND controllers use it in real-time to mark closed parts of taxiways, on radar positions for example to draw a custom airspace restriction which is issued today as a NOTAM and thus not part of pre-defined radar maps inside of that client, etc. The text notes are extremely useful just for everything: ILS failure? Write "RNAV APPROACH" next to your FAF and you will never ever say again "cleared for ILS...errr...sorry...RNAV approach runway 24", or if next sectors gives you a coordination "all traffic approved dirext to xy waypoint for today" you simply write "DCT xy" and place it somewhere into your departure sector...

 

All the drawings (not text notes) could be saved and just turned off for a while. So for example if you draw a nice closed taxiway and they decide to open it for one day before closing again, you just uncheck this map for a while and check it again later, without having to draw it again.

 

I would LOVE to see this in ES. And if possible, saved into a temporary file somewhere, so that users can exchange their drawings and notes...

 

Pavel