AviationKit

Overview

The FAA provides weather reports and additional notices on a XML based server format. The FAA weather server provides METAR’s, TAF’s, AIREP, AIR/SIGMET’s, G-AIRMET’s, and STATION INFO.

The initial release of the library contains basic METAR and TAF information based on location. As the library grows, additional functionality and additional reports will be added.

In addition to the FAA documentation, there is a documentation server here on github. The documentation will continue to be updated reguarding the classes, structures, enums and everything.

Example

The pod contains a fully functional example app. To run the example project, clone the repo, and run pod install from the Example directory first.

Requirements

In order to keep the library up to date, we will develop one OS level behind the current iOS version. For example, as iOS current version is 12, we will develop this project at iOS version 11. When iOS version 13 is released, this project will update to iOS 12 and the back level.

Installation

AviationKit is available through CocoaPods. To install it, simply add the following line to your Podfile:

pod 'AviationKit'

Screenshots

METAR By Location	TAF By Location

METAR Sample	TAF Sample

Usage

The reports are created using the base report function and the proper report parameter structure. The core reporting function is:

let reports = Reports()
reports.getReport(parmStructure) { (results, error) in 
    // code here 
}

METAR

The METAR report is generated using the MetarParams structure. There are no parameter checking processes.

You are responsible for setting the correct parameters as described in the FAA weather site.

If you set incorrect parameters, the error is returned from the API endpoint in the error variable of the closure.

METAR example:

var metarParms = MetarParams()
metarParms.areaConstraint = AreaConstraints(Coordinates(location.longitude, location.latitude), milesRadius)

let reports = Reports()
reports.getReport(metarParms) { (results, error) in

    if let res = results, let resultsarray = res as? [METAR] {
        // process the METAR array
    } else {
        // process the error
    }

}

Options

This list of valid options was taken from the FAA website on 6/4/19. Please check the site and let me know if you are receiving errors while following this guide. Please review the FAA site to determine the correct options to retrieve the data you would like. I will not repeat the constraints here as they may change. This chart is describing the FAA variables to the AviationKit variables.

FAA Variable	Variable	Variable Type	Notes
stationString	StationConstraints.stationString	[String]	An array of four letter airport station abbreviations assigned by the FAA. This allows for multiple entries in one request.
startTime	StartEnd.startTime	Int	start and end times in seconds since January 1, 1970
endTime	StartEnd.endTime	Int	start and end times in seconds since January 1, 1970
hoursBeforeNow	TimeConstraints.hoursBeforeNow	Double	Any positive floating point number. Based on the METAR observation time
mostRecent	MetarParams.mostRecent	Bool	Defaults to `false`. Optional value.
mostRecentForEachStation	StationConstraints.mostRecentForEachStation	enum	There are 4 values in the `MostRecentForEachStationConstraints` enum. The default is `false`.
minLat	CoordinateRectangle.minimum.latitude	Double	Part of the rectangle bounds
maxLat	CoordinateRectangle.maximum.latitude	Double	Part of the rectangle bounds
minLon	CoordinateRectangle.minimum.longitude	Double	Part of the rectangle bounds
maxLon	CoordinateRectangle.maximum.longitude	Double	Part of the rectangle bounds
radialDistance	AreaConstraints.radiusInMiles	Int	Radius in statute miles
flightPath (radial distance)	flightPathCoordinates.maxDistanceInMiles	Double	The number of statute miles from the path
flightPath (Coordinates array)	flightPathCoordinates	[CoordinatePath]	See the CoordinatePath fir definition.
	CoordinatePath.leg	Int	The leg for this coordinate path - default 1
	CoordinatePath.endPoint	Coordinates	The end point for this path (optional)
	CoordinatePath.startPoint	Coordinates	The starting point for this path (optional)
	CoordinatePath.stationString	String	An airport station rather than coordnates for this path
minDegreeDistance	MetarParams.minimumDegreeDistance	Double	0 < any value <90. The degree distance is the distance (based on longitude and latitude) between stations. The larger the value of minDegreeDistance, the less dense the results. Duplicate stations are filtered and the most recent of duplicate stations is reported.
fields	MetarParams.fields	[String]	The fields you would like to return after processing. Refer to FAA docs for the fields available.

TAF

The TAF reports are still using the older functions. You use the Comms object to get the TAF information. There are only a few options at this time - more updates to come!

TAF example:

let location = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: 38.920898, longitude:-77.031372)
let milesRadius = 10

let comms = Comms()
comms.getTAF(location, milesRadius) { (results, error) in

    // process the results array of [TAF] objects

}

Author

Mike Silvers, mikesilvers@gmail.com

License

AviationKit is available under the MIT license. See the LICENSE file for more info.