Welcome to the Mac Flight Planner web site

What is Mac Flight Planner?

Mac Flight Planner is the only flight planning software designed for use by real pilots for real flying on Mac OS X. All other flight planning software on the platform is designed for use with X-Plane, in my opinion, the best flight simulator around, but still a sim.

Current Version: 1.25

To download the current version of Mac Flight Planner, go to the Mac Flight Planner Download Page. You can view my other downloads by going to the site downloads page. You can also use Extended Software Updater from AlphaOmega Software to get Mac Flight Planner updates.

What's New in version 1.25?

Yes we skipped another version number. Most of the changes to MFP this time are to do with the Database Utility. First the bug fixes. I've improved the ability of MFP to detect if database and plan failes are valid. In the past a lot was assumed about the file which could lead to a crash if you went to the trouble of naming a file so that MFP would try to load it.

There was also a bug with heading calculation in plans. It essentially had to do with adding or subtraction magnetic variation. Under some circumstances the plan would display headings greater than 360 degrees or less than 0. Since those headings are considerably harder to fly than regular ones, I fixed the bug.

The changes related to the Database Utility are adding the ability for MFP to launch it and fixing the code that makes sure DBU quits when MFP is launched from within it. Why include these with this release of Mac Flight Planner?

Database Utility Public Beta release

Yes it's finally here, well sort of. DBU is fully functional with the exception of the plugin system I've talked about. I figured you'd all like to make use of it as it is while I build the plugin system and a few plugins. It can export to XML and a native WAY file format. It can also import from text files and WAY files and if you have OS 10.3 or greater, it can import XML files.

Please keep in mind that this is beta software. If you find bugs or have suggestions please email me. There are some limitations of Apples XML parser that I'm stuck with for the time being but hopefully they'll fixed soon. If the problems persist though, I'll look into some other means of reading XML files.

Have at it!

Other items to take note of

Mac Flight Planner is not meant to replace you're existing flight planning system. It was designed to supplement it. I'm not a mathematician. The formulae I've used are freely available on the internet and I have no ability to vouch for their accuracy in all situations. They've worked in the tests I've done so they should be pretty good most of the time but you should always check any computer generated flight plan against your maps. Even if the formulae are perfect and MFP is bug free, if you computer has a problem, it might cause calculation errors which could have dire consequences in the air.

Always check your plan and if there are any differences,
Assume MFP is wrong!

Then email me your flight plan file and details as to what was wrong with it so it can be fixed.

Happy Landings!