Build and Customise Vario UI

Ever used a Vario UI and wished it had some better features or was in someway better than what it was? We feel your pain and we've also been wondering why would anyone want to buy another needlessly heavy electronic device so we've created a framework that allows pilots the flexibility they need to create their own customised UI using their existing device.

How does it work?

The new generation of BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy) enabled devices allow for easy pairing with neighbouring devices such as phones and tablets. Building customised apps which pair with specific devices and present readable UI is a slow and time consuming process. We've taken the hard work out of knowing how to pair with a device and communicate with it and built out an easy to use UI interface which allows developers to focus on presentation using development tools we all already know... Javascript. Finally pilots can leverage the power of the super computers we all carry around in our pockets, that being our IOS and Android devices.

Pilots and software developers can build personalised UI for their own use or to share with others using common Javascript based build technologies and leverage virtually any web technology in building their UI. Building presentations using Node, NPM, Gulp, Google Maps, ES6 etc. is a snap. To get started developing, download the Open Source GitHub Vario project.

Supported Devices

The Spedmo App support both Android and IOS devices. There are some technical differences between the 2 platforms but developers can write their UI once and have it work on all devices which support the Spedmo App. Mobile devices include GPS features as standard in almost all new phones. The GPS chips within phones are not quite as sophisticated or specialised as Vario devices however and for this reason we recommend using a dedicated Vario where possible.

We intend to support a range of BLE devices however the Spedmo App currently only supports XCTracer BLE Varios.

If you have a BLE device or you manufacture BLE devices and you would like to add support please contact us to arrange sending a device to allow support in future releases. When doing so, please also let us know the data format (eg. LXWP0) and any other notable characteristics or device signatures.

Open Source Development

To help pilots and developers build their own UI interfaces compatible with the Spedmo App, we've built out an Open Source test harness which is freely available for anyone to download and get started. Get the open source project from our GitHub repository and then upload it to the Spedmo App Manager.

Spedmo Javascript Vario API

For Developer specific information on how to hook into BLE events and functionality refer to the Javascript Vario API documentation.

Reporting Bugs and Issues

The framework we've built is currently in Beta stages and as such there may be functionality issues with the current release. If you feel you have an issue that warrants attention, feel free to log it on our GitHub project.