This Wiki is designed to help you with Bev's great Plane Plotter program.  To answer your first question - yes, you must register to access the shared data!   The Wiki is to help you, and welcomes your input.  Authors are wanted here!  See if some of the other topics further down the page help with your other questions.  If something isn't covered, please ask in the Plane Plotter Yahoo group.  Mike Cogan's Personal PP Getting Started guide is available as "Anmer's guide" in the Yahoo group's files area.  You need to join the group to get these resources.  Some maps, FAQ, and other resources have kindly been provided by the Manchester TMA group.

Want to see Plane Plotter in action? - take a look here!

Installing Plane Plotter

You can download Plane Plotter here, save it to your PC, and just double-click the .exe file you downloaded to install it.  Simple, eh?  Before your trial period expires, be sure to register the program here.

• Do I have to pay twice if I install a second copy of PP on another computer at home?  No, for one individual user just register the extra copy by completing the form here, using same name and e-mail address, and the serial number for your second PC. See this video to find out more.  But if that copy is for a second person, they must pay for their registration using their own name and e-mail address.
• Do I need to pay again if I upgrade?  No.
• I upgraded my PC and now I need a new key.  Register the new PC by completing the form here, using same name and e-mail address as when you first paid for Plane Plotter, and the serial number for your new PC.
• I paid for the program, but now its says I'm back on the trial!  Why?  Serial numbers and registration.
• Is installation on Windows-7 or Vista any different?  There are some hints here
• There is a new version out, do I need to uninstall first ?  No, you can just install the new version on top of the old, but you may need to tell your Firewall [e.g. Zone Alarm] that the version number of the program has changed to restore shared-server connectivity.  Be sure to stop processing, and close down Plane Plotter with the File, Exit menu or click the "X" icon at the top right before running the e.g. planeplotter6_2_2_3.exe which you downloaded from the Web site and saved to your hard disk.

Using Plane Plotter

• Common error messages and problems
• Using Plane Plotter with the SBS-1, RadarBox, PlaneGadget Radar, microADSB, and The Beast receivers
• Using Plane Plotter with ACARS
• Why do some aircraft not show?  As yet, not all aircraft transmit the full ADS-B data, so position is missing, and hence the aircraft is not plotted.  Here is one source of information about ADS-B and the Radio Frequency side (anyone have better links?)
• Using Plane Plotter with Internet sharing
• Using the Mlat (multilateration) feature of Plane Plotter
• Using the Beamfinder and Beamfinder Plus feature
• Using Plane Plotter with Google Earth
• Using the Save and Load configuration feature
• Databases used by Plane Plotter
• Using Plane Plotter with Windows Vista and Windows-7 - recommended directory locations - some hints are here
• Using Plane Plotter on more modest PCs - minimising resource usage
• Customising the display.  What do those different colours mean?  Why do aircraft disappear and then re-appear?  How can I display routes?  Why are some aircraft stuck at 33,333 feet?  How can I use flags with Plane Plotter?  How is QNH derived?
• How do I get routes displayed?  Install one of the add-ons listed below - Flight Display or Find Flight.
• Creating and using Conditional Expressions
• Keyboard shortcuts (accelerator keys)
• Troubleshooting Mlat
• Why can't it be easier to set up as a Ground Station and Master User?
• Glossary

Some great Add-ons for Plane Plotter

• AirportAlert from the late W. Curt Deegan - monitors plane origination/destination routes for any Airport Codes on a user defined list and issues an alert when received, and watches for emergency squawk codes and issue descriptive message - see the Yahoo Group Files area.
• AutoZoom from the late W. Curt Deegan - automates zoom/pan to planes designated through Plane Plotter by the user or by Find Flight in its automatic modes - see the Yahoo Group Files area.
• Combi Plotter - provides you with a low-overhead means of displaying the aircraft data known to Plane Plotter on another chart view. It will plot simultaneous data from Ship Plotter, Plane Plotter, Orbcomm Plotter and Sonde Monitor on a single chart.
• Find Flight from the late W. Curt Deegan - allows look-ups of multiple databases when an aircraft is selected by double-clicking - see the Yahoo Group Files area.
• Flight Display from Allan Bird - automated lookup of routes from flight numbers and display on your Plane Plotter screen.  Flight Display home page. 
• MyCircles from the late W. Curt Deegan - a tool for determining Plane Plotter sharer range circle scale factors.  It steps through the Plane Plotter aircraft list displaying the sharer range circles for each.  Includes multiple share code support, circle labels, dynamic analysis, scanning for designated planes, sharer Locate function, sharer status display, aircraft selection by share code, sharer info display, and enhanced GPX waypoint support.  Now with experimental positionless tracking. - see the Yahoo Group Files area.  Screen-shot of MyCircles at work.
• Plane Plotter Report - David Taylor's compilation of programs and a command-script to produce daily logs from the Plane Plotter daily reports database.  Has been extended by Dave Giffney to enhance the format and provide a Web output.  See: Plane Plotter Report.
• PP2GM from the late W. Curt Deegan - shows your Plane Plotter aircraft on a Google Map display. - see the Yahoo Group Files area.
• PPDataGrid by Keith Tallent - requires .Net Framework 3.5SP1 and Plane Plotter 5.3.3.3 or later. This add-on is an interactive data grid that runs alongside Plane Plotter. Clicking on either the data grid rows or Plane Plotter screen highlights aircraft in both applications. PPDataGrid enables sorting of columns and and filtering of aircraft data. Drag the columns to required position, choose columns to be displayed, double click on an aircraft entry to zoom in on that aircraft in the Plane Plotter view. Also enables additional Aircraft Images, Operator Logos, Country Flags, Climb and Descent indicators - see the Yahoo Group Files area or use the web based installer here.
• PP Outline Navigator by Keith Tallent - a simple one click navigation toolbox that enables you to pan, zoom save and restore in Outline or Chart View with just one click - see the Yahoo Group Files area.
• PPZoom from the late W. Curt Deegan - allows defining all ten Plane Plotter Quick Charts as chart or outline views, and retains zoom and position while switching between the Quick Charts - see the Yahoo Group Files area.
• TellMe from the late W. Curt Deegan - runs unattended, matching user defined search patterns against aircraft known to Plane Plotter and issues alerts when a match is found. Matches can be on any of the 19 different aircraft details Plane Plotter provides.  Regular Expressions are used for alert definitions ranging from simple to sophisticated.  A daily log of alerts issued is maintained. Includes viewer/editor functions and RegEx definition testing script.  Now with Email notification - see the Yahoo Group Files area.

Many thanks to the folk who spend their own free time to write these add-ons and then offer them free-of-charge.  One or other of these add-ons will enhance your enjoyment of the program.

Routine maintenance of Plane Plotter

You may want to purge the log files produced when you are using Plane Plotter with a data source like an SBS-1/BaseStation.  David Taylor has written a free, unsupported program named TrimTree which can do this for you.