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Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

jameshard.ing

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Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#81

Post by jamesharding »

silasdavis wrote: post #67

There seems to be some crossover between the software and flying 'communities'. Perhaps this is rather unsurprising given some of the shared prerequisite skills? Is it your experience there are many commercial pilots who code? Do you expect to get 100% of the way to the sun over your career?

There are quite a few ex-engineers who fly (though anecdotally, most seemed to have studied aerospace engineering. At this rate, I think I am on track to make it about 10% of the way there by the time I retire (unless supersonic travel comes back in a large way!)

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#82

Post by halilkoklu »

Inspiring profile with beautiful charts.

Glad to have found someone else with a similar background who decided to fly jets.

I had a good run as a software engineer and executive for the last 20 years. I have just completed my Airbus 320 type rating waiting for my base check. I will be flying for a national flag carrier.

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#83

Post by lucasban »

Wololooo wrote: post #21
oulipo wrote: post #9

[flagged]

Oh come on, lighten up a little, it's Friday, it's kinda cool as a display tool. should we reduce the number of flights and CO2 released? Of course. But no need to be rolling in on a guy that just did something neat...

I’m also not sure how much sense it makes to talk about the personal carbon footprint of a pilot flying for their job, in terms of “could they make decisions that would change how much is released”

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#84

Post by jamesharding »

halilkoklu wrote: post #82

Inspiring profile with beautiful charts. Glad to have found someone else with a similar background who decided to fly jets. I had a good run as a software engineer and executive for the last 20 years. I have just completed my Airbus 320 type rating waiting for my base check. I will be flying for a national flag carrier.

Congratulations, and thank you!

I moved from the A320 to the A350 just over two years ago, and they are remarkably similar to fly (by design)! I would go so far as saying that you could hop in the A350 sim with zero training, and you would be able to operate it to a safe standard.

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#86

Post by im_down_w_otp »

jamesharding wrote: post #38
ok_computer wrote: post #18

Cool visualization for your personal logbook. How is the raw or display data stored? The globe map reminds me of this hexagonal grid article from my bookmarks I’d found on here or reddit. https://www.redblobgames.com/grids/hexagons/ As an airline pilot, I am curious, have you watched the season 2 of Nathan Fielder’s Rehearsal on HBO, that comically addresses the topic of pilot-copilot communication? If so what are yo…

The data is all in a sqlite file from my logbook software! I wrote a little post about extracting the data here: https://jameshard.ing/posts/querying-logten-pilot-logbook-sq... I have only seen a few clips from The Rehersal (the bit with Sully listening to Evanescence), so I don't have much to go on. Pilot communication is definitely something that we spend a lot of time talking about and training (under the larger b…

Hey! I used to work for the company that makes that logbook software. That was a great job. The CEO was an amateur pilot himself and really, really loved software product design.

It's been over a decade, but it's cool to see that software still being iterated on and pilots still loving it.

Even cooler to see someone such as yourself extending its usefulness by leveraging the data. Cheers!

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#87

Post by bschwindHN »

walthamstow wrote: post #33
jamesharding wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the long flights where we carry more than two pilots, we have allocated break time away from the cockpit. During those breaks, you can do whatever you like (sleep, watch a film, read a book, etc). I tend to try to sleep on the plane, but I always bring my laptop on trips to work on projects while downroute. Especially on west-coast trips with the 8 hours timezone change, I am usually awake at 2am which is great fo…

I am insanely productive when programming on flights without wifi, provided I've cached what I needed to beforehand. Something about it just works

I'm jealous - all that time sitting around to get something productive done, and I can't concentrate at all because I can't relax, the plane suddenly shakes and distracts me, and it feels like I'm lacking oxygen and am not thinking clearly. I remember trying to code some stupid iterator thing in Rust for a few hours and couldn't crack it. On the ground it was solved in like 10 minutes.

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#88

Post by dylan604 »

collinvandyck76 wrote: post #32

This is inspiring me to collect more of my own data -- great job!

Just map your device's location services. It'll be telling just how much someone that gained access to your device could tell about you. Or how much theGoog is making from knowing that data

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#89

Post by gavmor »

supportengineer wrote: post #58

Here I am having accomplished apparently nothing in my life.

Your handle is "supportengineer". Presumably you outrank OP if you count assists, or a share of others' successes.

Do the developers of the libraries he used count this site as a personal accomplishment? Do the airplane mechanics? Do their support engineers?

We participate in a circulatory economy, but we haven't yet adopted a perspective of circulatory attribution. Maybe we never will. Maybe we never should.

Maybe you should recognize your piecemeal contributions as a sort of ikigai, or maybe you should see this as a wakeup call to carpe diem.

Thanks for the opportunity to pontificate!

Re: Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights

#90

Post by Mawr »

shawabawa3 wrote: post #74
18172828286177 wrote: post #64

Being a professional pilot while also being able to put together such a polished software project like this is incredibly impressive

do pilots get to mess around on a laptop while flying? My understanding is that most of a flight is just sitting there waiting for landing to start, could mean a lot of spare time to pick up programming

Sure: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Airlines_Flight_188 (video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzmeGS29nu8)
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