I'm starting on a new project/add-on for Andropilot. I'd like feedback on this idea, but I'm not quite ready to announce it publicly (I want to have something working first).
Proposal
But then as I thought about it a bit more I realized that the web 'reflector' that would be needed to do this the 'right way' could actually have broader appeal than just as a 3G mavlink repeater. Though the thing I describe could quite handily enable/standardize 3G based control of vehicles.
So I considering making my next project the following:
- Make a webapp to share & visualize tlog files
- Include map view, kml download and plotting (to eventually provide the same sort of visualization folks can do with mission planner - but in a collaborative/public framework)
- Add an option to Andropilot to optionally upload flights to this webapp (include some client side data reduction to keep the file size reasonable). Make 'real time' upload optional.
- Allow sharing links so users can share their flights/post them to diyforums, facebook etc...
- Include a top level map that gets updated 'live' based on flights it is receiving.
Does this sound like a useful thing? Does it duplicate any functionality you are aware of? The server would accept uploads as simple REST PUTs so it would be easy to add an upload option to mavproxy and mission planner. Or I could provide a java (scala) library/command line app to upload arbitrary tlog files.
The inspiration would be cross between the paragliding/glider leonardo: http://www.paraglidingforum.com/leonardo/tracks/world/alltimes/brand:all,cat:0,class:all,xctype:all,club:all,pilot:0_0,takeoff:all and http://aprs.fi/#!mt=roadmap&z=11&call=a%2FKI6GII-1&timerange=3600&tail=3600
I'm sending this proposal to ya'll rather than as a public post because I didn't want to get buried with 'It would be great if it also poached eggs etc...' posts... If I do this I suspect it will be a few weeks before I have something approximately usable.
