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flight posts

Filed under: Fun, Games, Kids, Time-Wasters, Web

Learn to Fly - Time Waster

Learn to FlyThere's a certain style of time waster that I find incredibly addicting - those in the "see how far it can fly" genre. Two previous favorites include Shopping Cart Hero, and Air Voltare. If you like those games, you're going to love today's Time Waster, Learn to Fly.

In Learn to Fly, you play the part of a penguin who is not happy to be a flightless bird. Your job is to research the best way to achieve flight, which in this case involves sliding down a ramp and flying through the air with a glider strapped to your back and rockets strapped to your sides.

There are 4 increasingly harder levels to master in Learn to Fly, but as you go you can purchase power-ups for your equipment and your abilities. To beat each level, you must exceed set goals for height, distance traveled, length of flight, and top speed. To win the game you must travel at least 6000 feet, and you then receive a rating based on how many "days" (test flights) it takes you to get there. It took me 25 days to achieve flight.

I have to say, this sort of time waster often does not have an end goal, but rather continues on ad infinitum. It's nice to know that once you hit the 6000 foot mark, you've won the game. How many days will it take you to achieve flight?

Filed under: Developer, Fun, Internet, Web services, Google

Track flights with a Google Maps Mashup

Track flights with a Google Maps Mashup

Have a friend that's coming in for a landing and want to see exactly where they are at the moment? Or if you just like watching planes, check out the GMaps Flight Tracker. This Google Maps mashup tracks the status of inbound flights scheduled to land in Atlanta, Boston, New York's JFK, LA, Miami and San Francisco. Pick your city, and a list of the arriving flights are displayed. Click or mouse over the airline flight number of plane icon and the altitude, speed and heading coordinates are displayed as well as flight trail waypoints so you can check out the travel path.

The inbound flight schedule refreshes every 40 seconds so flight statuses are ensured to be at their most accurate. Data is provided from fboweb.com and based on the position reports for each aircraft once per minute, and sometimes once every 20 seconds in high traffic areas. Want to check things out in 3d? Download the GE kml file and check out past flights and height profiles in Google Earth.

Filed under: Business, Web services, Google

Flight info care of Google

google flight statusFlying with Google has never been this easy. Your favorite search engine is now offering everyone a way to easily check the status of flights through SMS while running down the halls of the airport.

Users can simply text flight numbers to 466453 (GOOGLE), and the status information, provided by flightstats.com, will be relayed back to you. If you want the want to get in touch with a specific airline by phone, text the airline name to the same number, and Google will shoot you back the main telephone number you can call for inquiries.

Even though the Google flight info service is currently only available for departing or arriving flights in the US, flightstats.com the supplier does offer international stats, so Google could be releasing this service worldwide.

The Google Flight Status gadget can also be added to your personalized homepage.

Filed under: Internet, Utilities, Web services, Social Software

Trip planning and organizing with TripHub

TripHub makes it easy to plan and organize your next trip and collaborate with your travel party. The TripHub dashboard is comprised of Trip Tools, MyTrip Hub, and a Shop. The Trip Tools section comprises of your event schedule, accommodations, flight, guest attendance, and a trip blog. You initially start off the planning by entering a trip name, and destination with start and end dates. You then move to your guest settings with an RSVP by date, and send out invitations to people who you would like to attend the trip. The Trip Tools section help you set up plans for the flight, accommodations, and trip details.

TripHub is a nice little online social application that lets your travel party stay in touch and collaborate when planning a trip. Collaboration, is in my opinion, the best part of TripHub. Being able to make suggestions to your travel party on accommodations and flights helps make travel planning a nice group effort.

Featured Time Waster

The World's Hardest Game 2.0 - Time Waster

So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do. Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game. The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...

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