New Database

[GregP]

Hi Paolo,

So when are we going to get the new databse?

I volunteer to add aircraft and hlep maintain it.

Not pushing you, just asking ... :)

[Paolo Tagliaferri]

Hi
well ... it's still far from being ready. The main problem is the "infrastructure" to have it filled... I'm still evalutating what's the best language to use in order to achieve a good result in a fast time.

But I'll keep you informed :)

[GregP]

Thanks for the update.

If I can help, let me know, and I'm there.

[Paolo Tagliaferri]

Well ... I have to win my battle with code before I can let you help :D Anyway I've begun working ... I've chosen PHP as the final language ... now is just a matter of time to get up the basic infrastructure [8D]

Once it's up, we can begin inserting some test data to see if the DB structure fits the work: we'll have the opportunity to change the structure early on if we see that is not good...In any case no information will be lost (and we won't need to enter it back again from start)

[Paolo Tagliaferri]

Heavy coding work is under way :D
Soon we'll have a "pre-alpha" version for the 'lil Santa's helpers [:p]
Obviously the back-end will be completed before the front-end ... no need to have a shiny new site with an empty database [:o)]

More news are to come ...

[GregP]

Hi Taglia!

I volunteer to put in data. I have corrected my database considerably since I sent you a copy, and it is now over 1500 aircraft, with more accurate data.

Let me know when to start.

I'd suggest we need aircraft manufacturer, type, nickname, aircraft type, date of first flight or service date, span, length, height, wing area, calculated effective aspect ratio (wing area divided by span), empty weight, engine mfg, engine type, engine power, number of engines, normal loaded, maximum gross weight, calculated power loading ([number of engines * engine power] divided by normal ,loaded weight unless you want air combat loading, which is about halfway between empty weight and normal loaded weight, calculated wing loading, calculated span loading, max speed, crusie speed, sea level rate of climb, service ceiling (or absolute ceiling, with a way to differentiate), normal range, max range, armament, weight of bombs or cargo, number built, text description, room for pictures, and whatever else.

Power loading and wing affect rate of climb, turning ability, and span loading offers an insight into several aerodynamic factors including the somehwat vague term "agility."

Best of luck, and let me know if I can help! :)

[tenmmike]

sweet

[simon]

In addition to armament the rounds per gun carried is also useful to know since this can have as much of a bearing on the aircraft's effectiveness as bombload. For example the Whirlwind's 4 cannon seem less impressive once you work out that they only had about 5 seconds worth of gunfire.

[Paolo Tagliaferri]

Well any suggestion for the data model now is GREATLY APPRECIATED.

I list the actual fields schema. Consider that derived (calculated) infos does not need a field once we have the starting data and the formula to calculate it (es. Power Loading).

Aircraft (example P-51)
`name`
`role`
`country`

Model extension of Aircraft (example P-51B,D ...)
`name`
`height`
`length`
`wingspan`
`wingarea`
`empty_weight`
`max_weight`
`top_speed`
`ceiling`
`roc` (rate of climb)
`rot` (rate of turn)
`first_flight`
`service_entry`
`num_built`
`crew` (# of crew)
`description`

There are then separate tables for weaponry (guns,bombs and special weapons) and engines (with power in HP and then we can easily convert to KW with a formula). I could easily add the "ammuntion per gun" info and I will do it.

If you think we need more "base" fields (even to calculate more useful derived measures) just tell and I will take it into account :)

[GregP]

How about, "Allied Nickname" and "Axis Nickname"?

It might or might not be nice to add a few fields for the old aircraft this new aircraft was supposed to replace, but that might be a fight all in itself.

As long as we're talking about armament, I have a suggestion.

It is nice to know the gun type and number (rememebr to include space for up to 3 or 4 gun types), and rounds per gun, but it would also be VERY neat to have fields for muzzle velocity, weight of projectile, cyclic rate of fire, and range. Many sites about fighter armament use the Russian "Figure of Merit" for guns. They calaculate the "weight of fire per second along with a multiplier for muzzle velocity to come out with a number to compare guns. It is surprisingly useful when comaring gun armament, and I have never seen a site that shows the data needed to look at the airframe characteristics as well as the armament characteristics. Remember to include a field for "Figure of Merit," and we can work out the formula later.

Thanks for creating this site and taking personal time and resources to maintain what is the best WWII site on the web. I know I speak for many other s when I say we REALLY enjoy the site, the discussion, and the personal effort you have given the world.

I almost don't want to add this, but it might be very nice to have both metric and English units, side by side. Speed, dimension, distance,and aircraft weight would be obvious but what might NOT be obvious is the number of people in world who calculate projectile size in grains instead of kg. There are 7000 grains in a U.S. avdp. pound incase anyone is wondering.

[simon]

Perhaps the details for aircraft armament could be included on a seperate database at a later date, otherwise you're going to get a lot of unnescessary repetition.

I would also suggest the "figure of merit" be included as a separate article rather than on the main database (I am not a great fan of it in any case, weight of fire is not always a useful indicator of the usefulness of weapons*).

Range of weapons in WW2 was also largely dependant on the pilots, the maximum range of any WW2 fighter gun was IIRC about 400 metres since that was the furthest a pilot could see and aim at a target with any chance of hitting.

Nicknames could be included in the main narrative text, since many will have multiple nicknames and also Soviet Allied nicknames will differ from Western Allied nicknames, which will differ from Chinese Nationalist nicknames, etc. Rather than include a large number of fields that may largely be left blank the main nickname could be included as part of the type's name (i.e. Petlyakov Pe2FT "Peshka") and any other nicknames in the narrative.

In any case, I'd like to volunteer my services as a Proof reader once the Greg's started adding to the database, or if Greg would care to share the load a bit, I can help with the Data entry.

* = Edit, sorry, just re-read, but it still leaves out rate of fire which is important too.

[Paolo Tagliaferri]

Well, actually Weapons and Engines are SEPARATE tables: this means that in every plane page there will be a link to weapon' separate page with all the statistics we like. The same will happen for engines. (and one will also query those databases indipendently from the aircraft main database). Every item will have his page and info (or just a "stub" page until info is committed by someone).

As Simon said, very "heterogeneous" data (as the various nicknames) is better to be included in the "Description" field, cause it's very difficult to fit very variable data in a database field and then accessing it with a unified script.

I'm thinking also about a dynamic chart generation (for example, to compare various statistic of a user selection of planes with histograms), but this is already an "extended" feature that will be designed and completed when the *mandatory* ones are already completed. Just telling you to see if, in your opinion, it will be worth implementing it.

And last, the time and resources I put in this are because there are people like you who are interested in this work, so this is definitely not a waste of time (and it's even a nice way to raise my programming skills :D ). In fact, I think that the database will grow if we all add our little bit of knowledge in it ... and while I'm laying out the base structure I will surely have little time left to fill the raw data.

[Paolo Tagliaferri]

Just an update: I've currently reverted my work to use JSP technology instead of PHP. This means delay (I think you're all expecting this from me :D), but I'm forced to do this because I'm also working on many Java projects for my studies so it will be easier for me to focus only on one program language instead of switching continuously between two different languages (that also have very differents "application styles").

So ... just pray for me (well I'm agnostic but maybe will work the same [:p]) and SOMETIMES I will manage to deploy the long-waited release :D

BTW, does any of you know about a good JSP hosting with MYSQL support? Maybe with Java 1.5 support and not too expensive? No problem where is it located, I think a USA server will surely work well for most of the people here (the one we are using now is located in Italy)

[zweitenweltkrieg]

hi Paolo
I am new to your forum but I am interested in how far you got with your database
regards
David

[Lightning]

Hi Taglia,

If that data base can include all the great suggestions given above, it will indeed be a treasure trove of WWII aviation knowledge. Exciting! You do great work!

Regards,

Lightning