Airbus Manuals Suite Complete Revision?

[capt. solipsist]

Anybody else heard the rumor that Airbus is gonna come out with a new-look manuals suite by Oct? Word has it that FCOM 4 is gonna be scrapped altogether and integrated into the other manuals, at least for the A320.

[Thridle Op Des]

I can confirm the rumour ;) In addition it will allegedly not work with a Mac. The system is as used on the A380.

[shortfuel]

Indeed, very soon, we all will be "Going Digital"...a brand new Airbus concept for digital resources. Flt Ops documentation will be moved into a structured digital documentation (more interactivity, links between manuals, selectable level of information with 3 layers available...)

Browsing through FCOM will be made easier by using .xml format.
Indexes will be renamed and should be in line with the latest FCTM structure (NO, AO, SI...).
The first 4 FCOM will be re-arrange into a new structure: Aircraft Systems (DSC), Procedure (PRO), Performance (PER), Limitation (LIM) and FCTM.
LR manuals will be merged.

Very curious to see the final result...the FODM (Flt Ops Documentation Manager).

[Slasher]

I hope not before my next bloodey sim check!

Everyone knows Airboos (esp the engineers) just love to change
things - just for the sake of changing them. And no doubt theyll
probabley invent a whole new sh!tload of acronyms too. :hmm:

Will said new spankey digi-manuals be able to be printed so I can
read them on the toilet? Or will I have to cart my laptop in there?

[Microburst2002]

NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

[capt. solipsist]

Thridle Op Descent and Shortfuel, thnx for confirming. Next question: should I just go back to old reliable sensible Boeing...?

[capt. solipsist]

"...not work w a Mac." Hmmm... heard how good the new Samsung Galaxy Tablet is...

[swh]

"...not work w a Mac."

Is this the result of Steve Jobs Adobe's Flash "has major technical drawbacks" bias ?

Thoughts on Flash (http://www.apple.com/hotnews/thoughts-on-flash/)

Adobe flash does not work on most Apple devices as Apple refuses to support it.

[guiones]

Some info:

The Going Digital Project Team welcomes you. Since 2008, the Going Digital project has taken over the work initiated by the Flight Ops Legacy Project.
You will find all the up-to-date information linked to the AIRBUS Flight Ops Documentation migration to XML format.
The objective of AIRBUS is to provide our customers with a standardized documentation for the entire AIRBUS fleet (A320 family/A330/A340/A350/A380 and A400M) and a new strategy: Less Paper in the Cockpit.
The Going Digital project is moving the Flight Ops Documentation to a structured digital documentation for A320 & A330/A340 families Operators.
https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/cachingcontent/claflib/bullets/plane.gif Moving to digital documentation will: https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/Legacy/airbusworld/img/popup.gif Reduce operational costs,
https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/Legacy/airbusworld/img/popup.gif Reduce on board weight,
https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/Legacy/airbusworld/img/popup.gif Provide a single source of data,
https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/Legacy/airbusworld/img/popup.gif Provide smart and interactive data,
https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/Legacy/airbusworld/img/popup.gif Improve quality and operational efficiency,
https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/Legacy/airbusworld/img/popup.gif Ease the documentation access,
https://w3.airbus.com/crs/A233_Flight_Ops_GN60_Inst_Supp/Legacy/airbusworld/img/popup.gif Ease the Flight Ops Documentation management.

[Biggles78]

"...not work w a Mac."

Is this the result of Steve Jobs Adobe's Flash "has major technical drawbacks" bias ?

Thoughts on Flash (http://www.apple.com/hotnews/thoughts-on-flash/)

Adobe flash does not work on most Apple devices as Apple refuses to support it.

This off topic but included for informational purposes.

Apple are considering a change on allowing Flash apps to run on their iPhone and iPad. Don't know if this extends to their laptop range. If this is the case then you may be able to run the Digital Manual on these 2 devices. An alternative is to install XP in a Virtual Machine on the Mac and use the Digital Manual that way.

[Thridle Op Des]

It would make me cry to put anything like XP VM on a Mac - I hate to say it, the table-less Boeing is starting to look attractive!

[Phoebus]

There is also printed/pdf/rtf output available too... ... but it looks a bit different to the old ones.
:confused:

[Wazzoo]

Originally Posted by Biggles78
This off topic but included for informational purposes.

Apple are considering a change on allowing Flash apps to run on their iPhone and iPad. Don't know if this extends to their laptop range. If this is the case then you may be able to run the Digital Manual on these 2 devices. An alternative is to install XP in a Virtual Machine on the Mac and use the Digital Manual that way.


Not wishing to further the off topic but just to nip this in the bud.

Current situation is all Macs running OSX run Adobe Flash (MacBooks, Mac Pros, iMacs etc) and there's no indication/reason that they ever won't in the future. No iOS devices can run Flash (iPhone, iPod touch, iPad, iTV) and there are no indication/reason to expect Apple to back down on that in the imminent future.

However I doubt the limitation on the Airbus manuals is Flash related if indeed there is one given XML should be a very open data format, more likely some proprietry software to read the XML files that they have only built for the Windows platform.

[fantom]

Goody good. Will they have to be translated into Fr as well?

[PROBEUSMC]

I work for a small 319 carrier in China. The manuals in the aircraft are Chinese only. Not good enough for me. I thought about carrying a laptop with FCOM PDF but I really never liked it, and the company won't pay for the airbus laptop stuff. Then I started reading about the IPAD for use in the cockpit. I really didn't have any use for an IPAD, and thought it was just a toy. I do have an iphone and love it. To try it out I put it on my iphone first with a PDF reader called Goodreader. Worked really well, but the screen is too small. But I thought it would work great so I bought the cheapest IPAD. WOW. I always hated the clumsy format of FCOM and all the books. The IPAD makes it far more user friendly. You can even bookmark stuff (winter ops, deicing) for winter flying, and also common MEL's like no APU, ground air start, manual engine start, etc. AWESOME.
As far as it's legality for use in the cockpit, it is simply an extra device. The airlines OPSPECS are met by the Chinese language FCOM in the aircraft. This is just an extra fo me.

Highly recommended.