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Map POIs
Avitab can load user fixes from a CSV file, which can then be overlayed on the map.
The format of the CSV file is the same as that used by both Little Nav Map and Plan-G. At the moment, this is limited to POIs, VRPs and Markers. Other Categories/Types of user fixes may be in the CSV file but will not be loaded into Avitab and overlayed on the map.
Category/Type, Name, Identifier, Latitude, Longitude, ...
The first Category/Type field should be :
"VRP" (LNM) or "11" (PG VRP) or
"POI" (LNM) or "8" (PG POI) or
"Marker" (LNM) or "9" (PG User1) or "10" (PG User2)
The second Name field will be displayed in the Avitab map overlay. This may include commas, provided the field is "quoted"
An Identifier is sometimes provided for VRPs, but the field can be left blank. Latitude and Longitude are decimal values. Any subsequent fields are ignored by Avitab.
For further information on format, search for the online manual for Little Nav Map and read the section on "CSV Data Format". It may also be useful to refer to the Plan G User Manual in the Help section inside Plan G itself.
VRP,Heads Of Ayr,EGHEA,55.432778,-4.713056,30,0,*EG - VRP,AIRAC: 2010,EG, 60
11,Irvine Harbour,EGIRV,55.610833,-4.698611,3,0,*EG - VRP,AIRAC: 2010
POI, Stonehenge,,51.178882, -1.826215
POI, "St James Park, Exeter",,50.730736, -3.521068,,,,TEGB SOUTH 20190701_kmz\doc.kml
8, Star Wars Canyon,,36.354766, -117.545814,,,,MyPlaces_kmz\doc.kml
The CIXVFR website is a good source of VRP data, and an excellent resource for flight-sim VFR flying in general. Go to the Downloads area, but look in all flight sim areas, not just XPlane. There are a few VRP CSV files easily downloadable which can be imported as-is into Avitab.
CIXVFR also hosts a free VRPSelect tool, written by Peter Sanders. VRPSelect can export VRPs from many countries worldwide to a variety of formats, including the LNM/PlanG formats accepted by Avitab. Downloading this tool requires CIXVFR registration, but this is both free and worthwhile. (Aside from Avitab, VRPSelect also enables, with a little extra work, export of VRPs to XPlane scenery as e.g. water tower markers.)
Look in the Avitab and Orbx forums for a few example POI CSV files to get started.
A good approach is to derive from .kml files. Google Earth Pro can be used to search for places, add them to MyPlaces, and export all places to a .kml. The .kml can then be converted to CSV with a scripting language like Python - something like FlightSimCSVTools.
Orbx often posts, on its forums, POI .kml files that relate to a specific True Earth release. Both California regions, Washington state and GB regions have POI .kml files available on forum signin.
These are another flavour of user fixes that have a different overlay style from POIs and VRPs. They also have a separate enable checkbox. They can be used, for example, as waypoints for a specific flight.
Too large a CSV file may impact performance of Avitab. Don't be tempted to maintain one large global file. Prefer keeping several smaller local files.
The Load button adds user fixes to those that have already been loaded. The preferences file keeps a record of the last user fix file loaded, which is then auto-loaded on next startup.
Look in the Avitab.log file in the Xplane Resources/plugins/Avitab directory for hints on any issues with auto-loading at startup, manual loading, and parsing. If this doesn't help, please post on the forum, attaching both the Avitab.log and the CSV file.