I ran across this old 2015 RAS conversation about OGN and FLARM after I Googled "does FLARM pick up OGN".

With the current work by the SSA to finance OGN receivers around the US (my club near Chicago just installed one) the number of receivers in the US is growing ... but nowhere near the density that I see in Europe (200:1?).

So back to the original question. Basically, does FLARM and OGN get along? Around my club we have some ships with FLARM ($$$), some with ADS-B ($$$$). FLARM can display both FLARM and ADS-B traffic. In the spring some more ships will have OGN transmitters - basically only to track on the ground where our ships are.

OGN trackers (https://live.glidernet.org and https://glidertracker.org/) shows OGN and FLARM traffic. FLARM tracks, and displays, ADS-B and FLARM.

But what about in my cockpit? I can see FLARM and ADS-B. I cannot see OGN as this needs cellular reception which is dicey at best while at altitude. I have not read that my FLARM receiver pick up OGN. Are FLARM receiver(s) capable of doing so? If so, will FLARM someday make the software changes to do so? I imagine that there is a classic case of (expensive) commercial industry in direct conflict with (cheap) grass-roots open-source engineering.

Expiring minds want to know.

Thanks,
John (OHM)

The OGN trackers installed in the gliders receive OGN and Flarm, in addition to sending to ground stations. You do not need cellular to see OGN aircraft. The trackers can connect to most moving map displays and provide traffic info for OGN and Flarm aircraft. Optionally you can install A SoftRF SkyView for around $50 that provides a radar and voice alert for traffic.

Charlie

Charlie is correct.

For the purpose of this thread, OGN = FLARM. More generally, OGN is the network of ground stations and air transceivers that send and receive positions of gliders to then be sent to the internet to be viewed on various websites.

The OGN Trackers based on softRF (LILIGY TBEAM and the like) can be configured https://github.com/lyusupov/SoftRF/wiki/Settings to run in "Legacy Mode" which is the FLARM protocol. OGN Trackers configured as "Legacy" will see and be visible to other FLARMs as well as ground stations.
OGN Trackers configured as "OGNTP" will not see or be visible to other FLARMs and only be visible to ground stations.

I am not sure of the history of why the difference exists but if configured your OGN Trackers will be just as visible as FLARMs while in the cockpit.
You do not need an internet connection in the cockpit to see FLARM or OGN aircraft, although it can be helpful to use a webpage to see the progress of gliders that are outside of the 915mhz tx/rx range.

On 1/10/2023 2:17 PM, Charlie Finn wrote:
> The OGN trackers installed in the gliders receive OGN and Flarm, in addition to sending to ground stations. You do not need cellular to see OGN aircraft. The trackers can connect to most moving map displays and provide traffic info for OGN and Flarm aircraft. Optionally you can install A SoftRF SkyView for around $50 that provides a radar and voice alert for traffic.
>
> Charlie
>

Somebody last year or so decided to call those things "OGN trackers",
and that choice is still causing confusion. Yes there are "OGN
trackers" in existence. About 100 of them in total, worldwide. They
are used in world-level competitions, mostly to transmit the real-time
locations of the aircraft ENCRYPTED. They are retrieved from OGN,
decrypted (in a device on the ground) and re-posted with a 10-minute
delay, so that the spectators can enjoy the show. Those "OGN trackers"
use a radio protocol that is NOT FLARM-compatible, but that can be
interpreted by the common type of OGN ground stations.

The devices mentioned around here recently as "OGN trackers" are
something else entirely. They are two-way-communicating
FLARM-compatible devices, visible to other aircraft with FLARM or
FLARM-compatible equipment. (But, unlike PowerFLARM, they do not
receive ADS-B.)

Some clarification of terms:

OGN: The Open Glider Network. These are servers on the internet that
accept data in certain formats and pass the data on to clients that ask
nicely. This system does not directly use any sort of radio communications.

OGN ground stations: these receive signals from nearby aircraft (by
radio), interpret them, and pass the data on to the OGN servers (via
internet connection). Most such stations receive FLARM (or
FLARM-compatible) signals. There are thousands of such stations in
Europe. Still a rather small number in the USA.

There are other types of OGN ground stations. E.g., in the UK some
light aircraft use a system called "Pilot Aware", and the ground
stations that receive those can pass that data to OGN too.

There are many other data sources for OGN. E.g., Davis Chappins and
others have arranged systems whereupon you can register your SPOT or
InReach and have the data show up on OGN. Some ADS-B data is also
harvested (directly by receivers on the ground, or from the internet
servers those are feeding) and sent to OGN. Some other systems use the
cellphone data networks to feed data into OGN. E.g., the IGCdroid app
can do that.

OGN viewers: anybody can send requests in the right format to the OGN
servers, and receive selected data. But mostly people utilize the
existing web sites that do it for you and display the data nicely on
maps etc. Those are NOT the OGN servers, those are third-party clients.
For example: live.glidernet.org glidertracker.org gliderradar.com
glideandseek.com (and others)

OGN data (once it's been sent to the OGN servers) is NOT available to
aircraft, unless an internet connection is arranged in the aircraft.
E.g., one can run a web browser on a smartphone with a data plan and
connect to an OGN viewer - when and where cellphone data connection is
available. This is not the best way to get real-time data on aircraft
around you. FLARM (or FLARM compatible) devices that communicate
directly with each other over short range (up to several miles or km)
are much better suited.

The equipment recently mentioned:
* it is not off-the-shelf, you need to put the boards into cases of some
sort, install the software, etc. But the hardware is cheap and the
software is cheaper (free and open source).
* the FLARM-compatible devices run the "SoftRF" software. I recommend
the version that knows how to project the paths of circling gliders.
* the SkyView device is a FLARM-radar type system. I think it's better
to see the FLARM traffic in your navigation computer. Even the free
XCsoar and Tophat give voice traffic warnings too. If you want to use
the standalone SkyView, I recommend the version of it that offers
traffic warnings related to present collision danger - the original
SkyView software only gives traffic advisories about farther-away traffic.
* you can find all that software here:
https://github.com/moshe-braner/SoftRF - including source code,
executables, and documentation.