Useful Websites and Tools for Flow Pro
This is a collection of websites and tools that I have personally found useful throughout my time flight simming. I put these together for myself, but then thought that perhaps others might find them useful as well, so I'm sharing them with you! More may come later, but I make no promises.
Below is the current list of what's included (sites/tools requiring accounts or subscriptions to use are marked):
Flight Planning:
Airmate: Open Airmate's flight planning map (requires free account). Great tool for flight planning. Even better for free worldwide charts!
SkyVector: Open SkyVector's map. Great for planning flights in the US.
SimBrief: Open SimBrief's Dispatch page (requires free account). The ubiquitous flight planning tool. Optional Navigraph subscription required if you want to use the latest AIRAC cycle.
SimBrief Quick Route Search: Use Otto to very quickly get a route for your flight (requires free account)! This button opens Otto with the prefix "route ". Simply enter two ICAOs and hit Enter to get some route suggestions between them! The first ICAO is the departure ICAO, and the second is the arrival ICAO. For example "route EGLL LFPO" will open SimBrief with suggested routes from EGLL to LFPO. If you edit the wheel button, you can set whether it searches for routes relevant to GA/Prop aircraft. If the option is unchecked, it defaults to the Jet aircraft type instead. I honestly don't know what difference it makes, but it's there just in case it matters! Valid Otto prefixes for this function are "route", "sbroute" and "qr".
Flight Plan Database: Opens Flight Plan Database website. Good for quick-and-dirty route planning.
FlightAware: Opens FlightAware. Great for getting detailed real-world routes in the US and world-wide airline flight numbers.
Fuel Planner: Opens FuelPlanner.com. If all you want to know is how much fuel you need for your flight in some of the most common aircraft, this no-frills site has you covered.
Charts:
Airmate Info & Charts: Opens Airmate's airport information and charts search page (requires free account). If you're looking for free worldwide government-issued charts, look no further. Most countries are covered. It's my go-to site for charts.
Search Airmate: Use Otto to search Airmate for airport information and worldwide charts (requires free account). Alternatively, you can type the prefixes "airmate" or "charts" into Otto to search Airmate as well. Highly recommended!
SkyVector: Opens SkyVector's search page. Great for finding reliable, detailed information for airports in the US, as well as less detailed but still reliable information for many airports world wide.
FltPlan.com: Opens FltPlan.com (requires free account). Free Canadian airport charts? Yes, please!
Navigraph Charts: Opens Navigraph Charts (requires subscription). If Jeppesen charts are more your style, look no further.
ChartFox: Opens ChartFox (requires free VATSIM account). Great tool for getting and viewing charts world wide. Coverage isn't as wide as Airmate, but the UI is much cleaner.
Search ChartFox: Opens Otto ready to search ChartFox for charts (requires free VATSIM account). Simply enter a single ICAO code after the prefix and hit Enter to bring up any charts that ChartFox has for the specified airport! Alternatively, you can manually open Otto and type a valid prefix to call up the search function. Valid prefixes are "chartfox", "cf", and "fox".
Weather:
Windy: Opens Windy.com to your current location. This particular widget will grab your current aircraft location and open Windy.com to those coordinates, allowing you to quickly look at the weather around you.
Windy Airport Info: Search Windy.com for airport weather using Otto. This widget opens Otto where you can search for any ICAO for that airport's information, METAR, TAF, NOTAMs and nearby weather cams. Alternatively, you can manually open Otto and type "windy " instead.
NOAA Aviation Weather: Get world-wide METARs and TAFs from AviationWeather.gov using Otto. This widget opens Otto, allowing you to specify one or more ICAOs to get up-to-date weather information for each one. Separate each ICAO with a space or a comma if searching for more than one. You can set whether TAFs are included in the search and whether you want the METARs and TAFs to appear in a tabular view. These settings are changed using the checkboxes when editing the widget. You can also set the number of hours of past METARs to appear along with the most recent one. Alternatively, you can manually open Otto and use one of the valid prefixes (noaa, nws, awc, or weather) to call up the NOAA search feature! For example, you could type "noaa KBOS" or "nws EGLL EHAM EDDH" or even "weather YSSY, YBBN" to fetch the latest weather for each ICAO.
METAR-TAF.com Search: This Otto search widget allows you to search METAR-TAF.com for any ICAO to get that airport's weather information. Alternatively, you can open Otto manually and use the prefixes "metaf" or "mt" followed by a single ICAO code. You can also set whether this widget opens the Livestream view instead, and the zoom level of the Livestream view (default is 100).
SimBrief WX & NOTAMs Search: Use Otto to get weather and information, including METARs, TAFs and NOTAMs, for the specified ICAO(s) (requires free account)! This button opens Otto with the prefix "sbwx " ready to go. You can enter one or more ICAOs to open SimBrief's Weather & NOTAMs page with those airports displayed. Alternatively, you can manually open Otto and enter the prefix to get started. Valid Otto prefixes are "sbwx", "sbweather", "sb", "notam" and "notams".
Other:
VATGlasses UK: Opens VATGlasses.uk where you can view who's online on VATSIM around various regions of the world. Added by request.
DISCLAIMER: These buttons and functions link to various websites. As such, I am not responsible for any of these websites' contents. Additionally, this pack of buttons and widgets is free and requires no account or subscription to use or download. The aforementioned accounts/subscriptions are ONLY required by each of the respective services, if they require one to use. Not that this wasn't already clear, but if you find this pack available elsewhere, DO NOT submit any account credentials or payment info!
Note: Most of the icons that are displayed on the wheel are simply links to images on the web. If you suddenly find that the icons are no longer appearing, there's a good chance that image link has moved. You can change them if you wish. Otherwise, just let me know and I'll try to provide an updated download which points to a new/different icon.
Requirements:
Flow Pro
Free accounts or paid subscription, as required for each of the sites/tools.
Installation:
Extract the contents of the ZIP file to your MSFS Community folder, just like you would any other addon.
We still need simple Widgets for Cameraviews like Chaseplane oder Streamdeck. the Camlist is to long. I need my favorite camviews in the Wheel. That would be nice....
1 years ago
Headi
I noticed the default toolbar is hidden when using this mod, even if I don't like to hide it
1 years ago
There shouldn't be anything in this mod that causes the default toolbar to become hidden. You can change that option in Flow's settings by bringing up the wheel and then clicking the settings button in the top-right corner of your screen. The only thing this mod does is provide buttons that link to various websites and uses Otto to provide a quick way to search for a few things.
1 years ago
Clorix
edpatino
For some reason I can't seem to get this widget to show. Enabled via Addons Linker (like all my other P42 widgets) but I can't get to see it. What am I doing wrong?
1 years ago
I'm not sure. I've exported these buttons as just buttons rather than a wheel preset, so be sure to look in the categories along the left side of Flow for Useful Tools when editing your wheels. There should be four categories, each starting with "Useful Tools". Then you can drag them onto the wheel wherever you would like them.
1 years ago
Clorix
AdamskiNZ