Mission Analyzer

README revision 2026-10-30 · describes Mission Analyzer 1.2.0 (latest published release: 1.1.1 — see Releases)

A Windows desktop application for preparing ArduPilot / Mission Planner fixed-wing missions (.waypoints, QGC WPL 110): it analyzes a mission before flight, fixes the route around populated areas, and lets you fly it in a simulator — with a nose camera, HUD, terrain, forest, buildings and power lines — before the real aircraft leaves the ground. Everything runs offline from a USB stick once the map data for the area has been collected.

What it does

Mission analysis

• Critically low altitude — from the mission file itself and from SRTM terrain, along the whole flight line between waypoints, not only at the points.
• Turns that are too sharp; climb/descent angle (flight path angle) out of tolerance.
• Landing approach glide slope — distance, bearing and angle over the final legs into LAND, accounting for DO_CHANGE_SPEED.
• Route proximity to populated areas (OpenStreetMap), measured from every route leg to the nearest settlement, with a left/right marker relative to the direction of flight.

Route optimization

If the route passes too close to a populated area, the app builds a detour — geometrically optimal (tangent visibility graph around circular exclusion zones + Dijkstra), checked against the fuel budget (ICAO Annex 6 reserve), the waypoint-count limit and the turn the airframe can physically fly (turn radius from airspeed and maximum bank). The result is a before/after map and a separate .waypoints file — the original mission is never modified. Method writeup: route_optimization_community_post.md.

Simulation (new in 1.1.1, extended in 1.2.0)

The mission is flown by ArduPlane SITL (real ArduPilot firmware running on the PC); Mission Analyzer connects to it over MAVLink like a ground station and draws everything SITL does not know about — the world around the aircraft.

• Nose camera — forward (FPV) and down views; colour view from satellite imagery draped over SRTM terrain; thermal imager (white hot / black hot / Ironbow) with a day/night ground-temperature model, cold sky, atmospheric contrast loss, sensor noise, vignetting and automatic gain control.
• HUD in the X-Plane style — airspeed, ground speed, climb, altitude, AGL, heading tape, attitude, distance — with limit codes TER / SPD / BNK / PIT and audio warnings.
• Collision detection — terrain (SRTM), forest canopy (real tree heights), buildings, OSM obstacles (power lines and pylons, masts, towers, chimneys, cranes, wind turbines) and your own 3D scene objects (.glb / .gltf / .obj in the models3d folder). Over forest the HUD shows AGL TREES — height above the canopy, which also drives the TER warning.
• Control — joystick or RC transmitter in USB HID mode (e.g. RadioMaster / EdgeTX) with channel calibration (CH1…CHn, as on the radio), flight modes (MANUAL, FBWA, AUTO…), SITL launch with mission upload.
• Fly-by video — MP4 export of the flight around 3D objects, encoded on the GPU when available (NVENC / Quick Sync / AMF) and on the CPU otherwise.
• HUD in a separate window — the same camera frame and HUD on a second monitor.

GPU rendering. If the PC has a suitable graphics card (OpenGL 3.3), the camera view is rendered on the GPU in a separate process: 3D terrain with three levels of detail, forest canopy, buildings, power lines, 3D objects and the thermal imager. Without a GPU (or if the driver misbehaves) the same view is rendered on the CPU — the program checks the hardware itself and falls back automatically; collision checks work the same either way.

Map tab (new in 1.2.0)

Map data is tied to the area you fly, not to a single mission. It accumulates on the USB stick with every flight; the Map tab shows on a map what is already stored for each layer (green), what the loaded mission is missing (red outline), and downloads what is missing — for the mission or for a region you select with the right mouse button (with a size estimate before downloading). The summary line shows how much space each layer takes.

Installation (ready-made .exe)

You don't need Python to use the program — a portable Windows build is published on the Releases page.

1. Download the latest .zip archive.
2. Unpack it into any folder — a USB stick works fine: the app is portable and keeps its settings and data next to the .exe.
3. Run the .exe inside the unpacked folder.

Windows will show a warning — this is normal, not a virus signal. The app isn't signed with a commercial certificate, so on first launch you'll see "Windows protected your PC" (SmartScreen). Click "More info", then "Run anyway". The entire source is in this repository if you want to check it.

Running from source

Windows, Python 3.11+ (developed on 3.14).

pip install -r requirements.txt
python main.py

The core (mission table, analysis, charts, maps) needs only the standard library; the packages in requirements.txt enable the rest — PDF reports, MAVLink, the simulator, GPU rendering, video export and the forest map. Without an optional package the related feature is simply unavailable; the program still starts.

Map data and offline use

All map data is downloaded once and stored next to the program; after that the program works without internet.

Layer	Used for	Source	Licence / attribution
Satellite and map tiles	maps, nose camera, thermal imager	Google, OpenStreetMap	provider terms; © OpenStreetMap contributors
Terrain	altitude analysis, camera, collisions	NASA SRTM via terrain.ardupilot.org	public domain
Settlements, power lines, obstacles	route analysis and optimization, camera, collisions	OpenStreetMap (Overpass API)	© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL
Forest canopy height (~10 m)	AGL over forest, collisions, camera	ETH Global Canopy Height 2020 (Lang et al., ETH Zürich)	CC BY 4.0
Building footprints	collisions, camera, thermal imager	Microsoft Global ML Building Footprints	ODbL
Occupied territories	mission map overlay	deepstatemap.live	source terms

Notes:

• Forest heights are the 2020 state; buildings without a height in the source get a height estimated from the footprint area (marked "assumed" in collision messages).
• Folders: srtm, and next to the map cache — obstacles, canopy, buildings. Copy them together with the program to keep everything offline.

SRTM tiles

Terrain tiles are not stored in the repository (gigabytes of binary data). srtm.py downloads a tile from the public terrain.ardupilot.org mirror (the one Mission Planner uses) when it is first needed and keeps it in the SRTM folder set on the Configuration page. To trim a large SRTM folder down to specific regions:

python cleanup_srtm.py "path\to\SRTM\folder" --apply

Without --apply the script only shows what would be moved (dry run).

Project structure

Files	Responsibility
main.py, app.py	Entry point and splash screen; main window, navigation, language switching
mission_page.py, mission_editor.py	Mission page: waypoint table, .waypoints load/save, route map, editing
analysis_page.py, analyzer.py	Analysis page and core analysis logic, PDF report
optimization_page.py, route_optimizer.py, populated_areas.py	Optimization: detours around populated areas
simulation_page.py, sim_*.py	Simulation page: SITL, MAVLink, control, HUD, maps, impacts, fly-by
nose_camera*.py, gl_camera.py	Nose camera on the CPU (nose_camera*) and on the GPU (gl_camera), HUD window
hud_*.py	HUD rendering, telemetry, limits and settings
scene_*.py, uav_panel.py	3D scene objects and the aircraft model
obstacles.py, terrain_impact.py	OSM obstacles, forest canopy (ETH), buildings (Microsoft); collision checks
map_page.py	Map page: data coverage map, download for mission or region
config_page.py, sim_config_page.py, aircraft_profiles.py	Configuration: analysis parameters, paths, HUD, aircraft profiles
ardupilot_link.py, sd_file_manager.py, board_ids.py	Live MAVLink connection, SD-card file manager (MAVFTP)
joystick_input.py, video_export.py, alert_sound.py, limit_sound.py	Joystick, MP4 export, sounds
srtm.py, geo.py, online_tiles.py, map_view.py	Terrain, geometry, map tiles and their cache
i18n*.py, theme.py, icons.py, settings.py, meta.py, updater.py	Localization, theme, settings, version and changelog, update check
main.spec, BUILD.md	Windows .exe build (PyInstaller)

settings.json is created by the program on first launch and is not part of the repository.

Localization

Ukrainian and English. Russian is deliberately not supported.

License

License: MIT — © 2026 Sergey Gorbachevsky