Contributing
We have had a lot of requests by excited & helpful people who want to contribute and help the project. Here are the ways you can help Airframes.
Feed Data
The most impactful way to contribute is to set up a feeder station and feed ACARS data to Airframes. Every feeder fills in coverage gaps and improves the data available to the entire community. See Why should I feed? for more on why your contribution matters.
Help the Community
Provide others in the community with support and tips/tricks. Answer questions in the Discord, the Community Forum, or elsewhere on the net. Outside of the duties of moderators, you can help keep people positive and excited to explore the hobby.
Contribute Documentation
We have several documentation efforts. The first is this site you are reading right now. The second is researching and documenting the ACARS message text payload, so that we can further fine-tune and develop the ACARS message text decoders.
- Airframes Documentation — This site. Click "Edit this page" at the bottom of any page to submit improvements.
- ACARS Message Documentation — Research and documentation of ACARS message label formats and text payloads.
Development
We are progressively open-sourcing the tools and libraries we've built. If you are a developer and want to contribute a small fix, a feature, or take on a larger role, here are the active projects:
- ACARS Decoder Typescript — ACARS message text decoder library in TypeScript
- ACARS Decoder Rust — ACARS message text decoder library in Rust
- Airwaves OS — Custom Debian-based OS for receiver stations
- Airframes Data — Centralized source data for Airframes/ACARS projects
Financial Support
Patreon
By becoming a Patron, you help provide funds for servers, hosting, design & dev time, and maybe a coffee or two.
Visit the Airframes Patreon to help out. If you're on the Discord, send a moderator a message and you will be rewarded with a special Patreon role that grants access to additional channels.
Buy From Our Shop
Visit the Airframes Shop to purchase SDRs, SBCs, cables, antennas, and swag. All purchases directly support the development and server costs.