The good, bad, and ugly in ths app

GOOD: The format/functionality of the app is great; the different learning modes for aspiring/beginner pilots preparing for their written FAA exams could almost serve as a direct replacement to many expensive ground school courses intended to help an aspiring pilot pass the **written** exam. If your goal is to just (barely) pass the written exam with the minimum amount of time invested, and you have no aspirations to become a professional pilot where those test scores actually reflect on you personally, GREAT!! Especially if you love your iPad/iPhone and hate reading through those troublesome books with all that extra stuff actually explaining why things work the way they do in flight, and prefer the brute-force method of just learning the correct answers to specific questions for the most(*) part. *(see ugly)

BAD: When in "Learning Mode" and you touch "Show Explanations", it would be generous of me to say that half the questions actually have explanations helpful in building your knowledge rather than just brute-forcing you through to the correct answer for when you take the written test. Questions involving "see figure XX" are at best sufficient on the simple questions (e.g. taxi w/x-wind, basic guages, etc.), but much more likely require you swap back & forth between the question and figure so often that its easier to just write down the question on some scrap paper while you look at the figure. Given that a good 10-20% of the "see figure XX" questions require plotters and measurements impossible to accomplish accurately on your iDevice, you can mitigate this by simply printing off all the "figure XXs" on paper, in the correct scale, and referencing those instead of touching the "see figure" button. Would still be nice to have the question stay on the screen while viewing the figure for those 80% of questions accurate plotter measurements arent required.

UGLY: So far on this app, Im about 250+ questions into what looks like around 800 programmed into the app, and have already encountered flat-out incorrect/out-of-date answers. Not little things, either.. serious stuff like causing a runway incursion that could result in (at best) ATC instructing you to file a mandatory report and maybe getting your license pulled/reviewed, or (at worst) even contributing to a ground collision on an active runway.. This is an example of a regulation that went into force in mid-2010, the Sportys app v1.0 was released in early 2011. Here we are, 3+ years and a bunch of app updates later, and Im still getting taught how to ignore the aviation equivalent of "STOP" or "RR X-ing" signs. Maybe all the other 800+/- answers are correct, but once you hit one so wrong that it puts your license & life in jeopardy, it kinda shakes your confidence in the app to teach you the rest.

END RESULT: Still a great and helpful app to *help* you with the written exam, when used in concert with actual flight training from a CFI and ground school curriculum.. NOT any kind of substitute to save $$ unless you just dont care about your record showing a barely passing score and are just getting your license for fun.. ;-)

driukas about Private Pilot Test Prep