Case Study:

Dynamically Assembling Flight Operations Based on Aircraft Configuration

The customer, a manufacturer of passenger airplanes, delivers their aircraft in the configuration ordered by a specific airline. Moreover, the airline may have different configurations of the same aircraft as part of their fleet. Therefore, the aircraft’s flight and maintenance documentation has to be assembled differently not only for each order, but also for different airplanes the airline owns. The customer was looking for a solution that would enable them to automatically assemble the flight operation documentation based on the aircraft configuration.

Deployment type: On-premises

DITAToo's users locations: Europe

Integrations: Electronic Flight Bag

Goals

Ensure that pilots have interactive access to the flight documentation (flight ops, check lists, maintenance documentation, etc.) of the specific aircraft they are flying.
Provide pilots with complete relevant actionable information during all phases of the flight, especially in emergency situations.
Ensure regulatory compliance with the international and national industry regulations.
Ensure that no modification done in an aircraft is left undocumented.
Improve the efficiency of the entire content production process.

What We Did

Customized DITAToo DITA CCMS for the needs of aircraft builders.
Customized DITA to mimic the features of ATA2300, an industry standard for flight operations.
Automated the process of documentation assembly based on complex product configuration.
Integrated DITAToo DITA CCMS with an electronic flight bag, including export to ATA2300.
Integrated DITAToo DITA CCMS with the customer’s system that stored information about possible aircraft failures to provide pilots with complete actionable information.
Provided DITAToo with DITAToo Web Editor that allows the content authors to write flight documentation fully compliant with ATA2300.

Results

The entire flight documentation is now assembled automatically based on the complex aircraft configuration.
Content authors without any knowledge of XML or DITA can now write flight documentation using DITAToo Web Editor.
The content process and resulting documentation are fully compliant with international and national regulations.
Pilots have now interactive access to the flight documentation using an electronic flight bag in the cockpit.
The aircraft documentation cannot be released for an official publication until all the modifications in the aircraft are actually documented.