BlinkAero DM: the Direct Messaging bot

Direct messaging bot

improve your operation

We’d like to introduce you to «BlinkAero DM», the Direct Messaging bot, a project that we developed lately, which could improve operations in your company.

In a general way, remote communication as of today can be summarised around few main platforms, with many interactions and hybrid solutions emerging from there:
• Web browsing
• Email messaging
• Direct messaging
• Audio and video conferencing

Now if we consider the way airlines work, we observe that emails are very often overused and misused, while direct messaging is on the contrary the preferred and most convenient communication means for private matters.

The BlinkAero Direct Messaging bot project is about bringing direct messaging up to speed in the professional environment, making information easily, securely and instantly accessible.

The starting point was to choose a direct messaging service compatible with our specifications and expectations: it has to be secure (Aviation business), Open Source on the client side, available on all platforms, free of charge with no ads, modern and alive. It also has to embed an API with bots and channels.

The choice was Telegram Messenger, keeping in mind that some great features such as multi-peer mesh connectivity, or specific adaptation to aviation, might come later.

It works on iPadOS, Windows Phones, iOS, Android, MacOS or Windows, very securely, using the official Bot API, developed in a modern and promising language, Swift. It also creates benefits from iOS notifications displaying information in a very non-intrusive way.

Direct messaging

direct system connection

It was developed to communicate with various systems, such as flight planning, rostering system, FlightRadar24, SWIM (NOTAMs and weather), local weather, Weather for continental China.

The result is quite pleasant/efficient to use, and we get access to most information sending only few characters via BlinkAero Direct Messaging bot.

Find hereafter a non exhaustive list of existing features. Developing new features can be done very quickly, it is anticipated that many additional ideas will come later.

The /start /help /news commands give all information to use the platform

FEATURES

Monitoring weather & NOTAMs

Pilots are used to reviewing various sources of information between each flight. Reading is fastidious, content is often poorly formatted, not updated.

With the monitoring function, crew members instantly receive weather and NOTAMs when they become available, inside the messaging app, or as a discrete notification.

The latest METAR with a new QNH, VIP movement and important updates appears without having to initiate some more complex operation when focus should be on some more important matters.

A full web interface to filter/highlight NOTAMs has also be developed for Dispatch teams.

Monitoring flights

With this function, crew members can receive information about new published flight plans instantly.

Some additional operational information such as underload and payload are also calculated.

The system is linked to another program receiving and analyzing Flysmart+ loadsheets: it then notifies both crew members about the successful reception and archiving of .lds files, confirming passengers on board.

The system creates some virtual chat rooms for each flight, enabling discussion between crew members without having to exchange login or phone numbers.

Fuel requests

Registered users can send fuel requests using Telegram. It makes it very easy, straight forward, and safe.

The requested quantity is analyzed against the current operational flight plan, and some additional elements are sent back to the crew: Underload, topup fuel, flight plan fuel, flight number, departure and arrival

The pilot has to confirm the request before it’s sent via email to the departure fuel station. The other pilot receives a confirmation via DM.

Cabin Distribution

Crew members and ground staff can use this feature to establish the cabin distribution, sharing with others the number of passengers for each aircraft zone. Each zone can be entered separately with males, females, children and infants, using only a simple message.

Information about passengers load is transmitted paperlessly and instantly, with no physical contact, in a clear and simple message to both pilots, while retaining the facility to make some corrections.
This function improves operation by reducing errors and delays.

Flight Crew Notices

A full workflow and web interface was developed to handle flight crew notices, and the integration was done with the bot platform.

When a new notice is published, all crew members receive a DM notification asking them if they want to read the content. The reading acknowledgement is then recorded.

Pilots have access to the list, and can display a notice by using its reference

Flight status

While waiting for a flight, crew members can check information based on aircraft registration or on flight number. Data is fetched from FlightRadar24, and merged with the operational flight plan to give a synthetic view.

Smart chat rooms

The platform creates chat rooms based on monitoring, making possible the communication between crew but also ground staff. Special accounts for OCC, Rostering Team or ground handlers will be useable, displaying automatically flight and crew information.

Some chat rooms are also available for layovers or per base.

Some other function are available, and some more are coming.

Check-in & Roster display

People receive an automatic notification 45 minutes before the check-in time, then can check-in by just replying.

Roster constraints can be displayed, for today, with critical items, or for multiple days as a list. Simpler and faster access than the web interface.