After many months of planning and working out the project details, the project has finally launched.

The need for a common, shared storage solution for IGC files became particularly obvious on the last paragliding trip to Spain. Many people struggling to view and discuss their flight logs. Multiple web portals that require manual file uploads. No quick way to identify and share common lift areas for the current trip. Not able to view tracks of others until days later. Why not?

There must be a simpler way for sharing and distributing IGC files.

The goal of the IGCFS project is to provide the gliding community with an easy, open and extensible set of tools for sharing IGC files. The project core element is the shared distributed filesystem specifically designed for storing IGC files. It is a purpose-built modification of IPFS project, that became the inspiration and provide technical foundation for IGCFS.

There are so many interesting things that public sharing of IGC files enables. Just think about the possibilities!

  • No need to upload your flight IGC to multiple website, contests and log books. It just happens automatically. All portals can use the same, consistent view over your own flight log book.
  • Never need to worry about your IGC logs. They are persistent and replicated on multiple computers. They will never disappear.
  • Ability to run analytics and statistics by various research groups. The data set is open, accessible, and replication-enabled. Easy!
  • Ability to generate data for autonomous gliders.
  • Quick and updated shared info on lifts in a current area.
  • Possibilities are endless.

The project has been initiated by the Computer Science department of Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU). We hope to attract paragliding enthusiasts and researchers studying autonomous gliders, to help with the developments of the project.

The initial modules for the distributed filesystem are all based and inspired by IPFS. The initial prototype of the Logbook has been provided courtesy of students working towards their MSc degree.