Planning Portal

About the Planning Portal

Version 4.2 of Simfest's scheduling, dispatch and flight operations platform.

SIMFEST PLANNING PORTAL

Built for PSX operations

The Planning Portal brings schedules, SimBrief planning, aircraft, crew, BACARS and operational history together in one place. It is free to use for the flight simulation community.

Current release Version 4.2 Updated 6 September 2026

Plan the operation

Create individual flights or complete aircraft tours, assign aircraft and crew, then produce SimBrief briefing packs individually or as a queue.

Fly with BACARS

Connect PSX to dispatch data, route and wind uplinks, eFuelling, aircraft Tech Logs, loadsheets and live operational reporting.

Operate alone or together

Use a private workspace or share schedules, fleets, gates, crew and FICO information with a team.

Review every flight

Explore previous flights, aircraft activity maps, landing scores, crew statistics and the planning audit trail.

VERSION 4.2 CHANGE HISTORY · 6 SEPTEMBER 2026

What is new

New downloadable documentation and connected-app ground-handling improvements, alongside the briefing and replanning updates in Version 4.2. Earlier release history remains below.

Previous releases

Version 4.2 · User guides and reference material

Added a User Guides section on Downloads with revision dates and direct document downloads.
Published the Orchestration and Ground Handling user guide with a trigger flowchart, automatic and manual workflows, equipment states and troubleshooting.
Updated the Workspaces, Fleets and BACARS PDF and Planning Portal slide guide to explain INIT DATA, Global Aircraft loans and the hand-off to Orchestration.
Added the WorldFlight 2026 ground-handler reference report, separating researched operators from simulator branding and generic fallbacks.

Connected apps · Turnaround and handling defaults

Orchestration owns turnaround stages while BACARS supplies flight context and handling-company selections, with EFB controls for progress and close-up.
Ready to Depart starts door closure and passenger-access release after boarding and loading meet the close-up requirements; equipment clearance remains separate from work reaching 100%.
Matching Orchestration and BACARS builds now contain fixed handling defaults for all 43 WorldFlight airports, including five researched operator corrections and 17 generic fallbacks.
These are companion-application changes and require updated application builds. Catering, fuel and saved operator overrides remain unchanged by the WorldFlight handling update.

Connected apps · Quieter state synchronisation

Matching Orchestration, EFB and BACARS builds exchange compact changes instead of repeatedly broadcasting complete turnaround snapshots.
Full state is recovered on synchronisation requests and authority or cycle changes, with dedicated heartbeat messages for freshness.
BACARS reconstructs the complete turnaround view for the existing portal relay. Reduced network traffic is not proof that every simulator responsiveness issue is resolved.

Version 4.2 · Briefings and SimBrief

Added an at-a-glance briefing summary showing saved block fuel, passenger numbers and assigned crew.
Made Edit in SimBrief larger, bold and white, positioned at the far right of the briefing header.
Kept the revised-plan workflow accessible from the briefing so changes can be made in SimBrief and imported back into the portal.

Version 4.2 · Plan validity and replanning

Flagged outdated briefing packs when relevant flight details change, with the reason and time of the change.
Added Replan required indicators to the schedule and a direct route back to Planning for affected flights.
Added replanning prompts after schedule changes so an old briefing is not mistaken for the current plan.

Version 4.1 fixes

Added explicit confirmation for deliberately overlapping aircraft schedules while retaining clear overlap warnings.
Fixed schedule deletion when flights have related fuel orders and other operational records.
Fixed VATSIM prefile remarks so current MyVATSIM links include each user’s saved flight-plan remarks.
Removed obsolete SimBrief and legacy TCAS remark placeholders without discarding meaningful operational remarks.

Stand Ops and BACARS telemetry

Restored the public Simfest Stand Ops display and added an authenticated compact display for the EFB.
Associated live doors, services, fuel and event times with the exact scheduled flight selected in BACARS.
Added resilient refresh, freshness indicators and end-to-end diagnostics for delayed or rejected telemetry.
Added a sanitized public turnaround API for approved Simfest flights.

Live Flight and operational reporting

Expanded Live Flight with current flight context, route, position, aircraft state and operational reports.
Added arrival estimates, diversions and structured in-flight reporting without exposing private workspace data.
Improved flight selection so deleted or obsolete telemetry cannot become the current public flight.
Kept unavailable and malformed optional data controlled rather than allowing it to break the live display.

Fleet ownership and aircraft safeguards

Made Team aircraft checkouts remain valid until returned while retaining timed loans for Global aircraft.
Added ownership-aware availability across planning, BACARS, Tech Logs and aircraft synchronization.
Automatically repaired Team aircraft incorrectly grounded by the former expired-loan workflow.
Strengthened registration, workspace and Fleet ID validation before operational data is accepted.

Scheduling, briefings and crew

Preserved ATC callsigns correctly when adding and editing scheduled flights.
Improved aircraft assignment checks, schedule deletion cleanup and defensive handling of malformed planning values.
Added a public Simfest crew directory with display names and nicknames where configured.
Kept briefing packs, routes and crew assignments aligned with the selected workspace and exact flight.

WhatsApp crew operations and public APIs

Added managed WhatsApp crew reminders and operational messaging with administrator visibility and delivery tracking.
Added public endpoints for Simfest flight status, turnaround information and crew presentation.
Applied public rate limiting and response sanitization while keeping existing public flight interfaces compatible.
Separated public operational information from private Team membership and workspace details.

Application downloads and releases

Rebuilt Downloads as a release catalogue with current and retained previous versions for the PSX.NET application family.
Added staged package review, editable release notes, compatibility warnings, checksums and controlled publication.
Added multi-package releases for the MSFS WASM Aircraft variants and standalone modules.
Added personalized, dismissible update notifications for applications a signed-in user has downloaded before.

Administration, diagnostics and auditing

Added administrator release review, publication history, rollback controls and package-specific download reporting.
Audited authenticated and anonymous download starts without storing raw IP addresses or private request data.
Added clearer BACARS turnaround, API and operational-report diagnostics with safe correlation information.
Improved administrator tools for investigating rejected updates, stale telemetry and delivery failures.

Reliability, security and data integrity

Made live polling recover after individual database, network or parsing failures instead of silently stopping.
Added cleanup for orphaned flight telemetry and dependent operational records during flight deletion.
Hardened release uploads, archive validation, download authorization and public data boundaries.
Retained compatibility paths for older BACARS clients only where a flight can be resolved unambiguously.

SUPPORTING INFORMATION

Resources

Workspaces, Fleets and BACARS Learn how aircraft and operations move through the portal

Video guide Watch the portal walkthrough Privacy policy How Simfest handles portal data