Logging FAQ's

What? You don’t want to subtract your night time from your total time with a calculator? You've already recorded both of those, so let LogTen do the rest!

Every step of the way with LogTen is designed to save you time with data entry. LogTen uses Total Time and Night as the foundation for logging your flights. Any time that isn't Night must be day, and LogTen Pro keeps track of this in the background by default, simply calculated as Total Time minus Night time. LogTen treats seat time the same way, so always remember that PIC is Total PIC, and Dual Rcvd is Total Dual Rcvd.

If your preferred logbook Report format uses separate Day and Night, or P1 Day and P1 Night columns (such as Canadian, South African, and Australian formats), LogTen Pro manages all of this in the background, calculating and displaying the appropriate day and night values when you need them.

Tip: To make logging your time even easier, just enter your Out and In times for your flights, and your Total Time and Night time will be calculated for you!

For most flights, Total Time will be equal to the total seat time (e.g. PIC, SIC, Dual, etc.), and total Night time will be equal to the seat night time, so specific seat day and seat night times are unnecessary. For example, consider a flight entered as:

Total Time = 2:00
Night = 1:00
PIC = 2:00

LogTen automatically tracks 1:00 of PIC Night in the background, and calculates PIC Day as PIC minus PIC Night.

Other Night Circumstances

LogTen does contain certain other night time fields for use in special situations. These are specific to certain times, such as PIC Night, Dual Rcvd Night, XC Night, etc. which may not always be equal to the total Night time. These special night options are for use in long-haul or military operations where multiple seat times may be logged, or where the logged time is less than the total time of the flight.

In these cases, there is no way for LogTen to know how it should allocate any Night time between these multiple seats automatically, so the different seat time and night time of each needs to be entered manually.

Consider a flight logged half as PIC, and half as SIC:

Total Time = 2:00
PIC = 1:00
SIC = 1:00

Now let's also add Night during part of the flight, and this time was flown as PIC:

Total Time = 2:00
Night = 0:45
PIC = 1:00
PIC Night = 0:45
SIC = 1:00
SIC Night = 0:00

PIC & SIC add up to the Total Time, and PIC Night & SIC Night add up to the total Night time.

Tip: Always enter Total Time and Night time first (or have them calculated from Out and In), and then the seat time. Make any adjustments to the seat Night fields afterwards if necessary!

LogTen comes with a database of thousands of aircraft Types based on ICAO aircraft type designators. This is helpful when setting up a new Aircraft. This data does not designate the aircraft as complex, high performance, or what it's gear configuration is.

You must properly set up your aircraft so that LogTen knows what equipment and configurations the aircraft has. Then you can create Smart Groups to see how much time has been logged in aircraft with those attributes.

In the following examples, a T6 Texan will be used since it is complex, high performance, and has a tailwheel configuration. Some aircraft types will only have one or two of these attributes. Complex, High Performance, and Tailwheel is used in this example because they are common times that pilots, and their insurance companies, are interested in. LogTen comes with a variety of attributes you can choose from, such as Retractible or TAA (Technically Advanced Aircraft). You can also create any custom attribute you like. The same basic principles of logging apply to all of these.

You can download these Smart Groups here.

Or, you can learn to create your own by reading How to Create a Simple Smart Group on iPhone + iPad or How to Create a Simple Smart Group on Mac.

Turbine time is easy to see in LogTen and can be viewed in a few different ways.

In order for LogTen to accurately calculate turbine time, the Aircraft Type must be accurately configured, specifically the Engine Type. Please see Types Tab on iOS for more information on setting up Aircraft Types.

Using Smart Groups

Smart Groups can also be created to view different types of turbine time. The Smart Groups can be configured to show your PIC Turbine Time, or SIC Turbine Time, amongst others. 

Other possibilities with Smart Groups include, but are not limited to, viewing your individual Jet time, Turbo-fan, Turbo-prop, etc. Each of these can also be configured to be shown as "Engine Type Time" as PIC, or SIC. For example, "Turbo-Prop SIC Time"

To find out about how to do this, please head to our Smart Group section, where you will find information on how to create a Smart Group, and our Popular Downloadable Groups section, where you will find our most Popular groups already created, and ready to be downloaded. 

LogTen on iOS uses different colors to identify different types of entries. The color of the text and background shading in the logbook flight list all have designations.

Text color

• Orange = flights on your device signify scheduled flights (flights that have not been flown).
• Light Grey = flights are locked and can't be changed without first unlocking them.
• Black = flight is unlocked.

Background shading

• White = Entry has the **Pilot Flying** field checked
• Grey = Entry is not marked as **Pilot Flying**

If you do not see all the Logbook options (e.g. Pilot Flying), please take a look at the Configuring Your Logbook article

If you are an international customer of LogTen, or if you simply prefer entering flight times in LogTen using commas for your decimal point rather than periods/dots/full stops, you may encounter some strange behavior when entering flight times or when importing other logbook data into LogTen.

In short, LogTen will accept either periods or commas as the decimal number separator, but it has to match the setting on your Mac. 

On macOS you can check your preference setting by launching System Preferences > Language and Region > Advanced and verifying your Number separators.

On iOS, this is based on the region format device setting. You can change this by going to Settings > General > International > Region Format.

Be sure to set LogTen to use a decimal Flight Time Format

On the Mac app go to the Preferences > General > Flight Time Format:

On the iOS app go to More > Settings > Display Options > Time Format:

You can now enter decimals for Flight Time in LogTen to match your Mac's Number Separator preference setting! However, please note the following:

• Only enter flight time values to match your Mac's setting. ie: if your Mac is configured to accept commas as the decimal, you will find that entering flight times with a period will not save, nor will your Total Time autofill a PIC value, etc.
• If you're importing data from a file, please verify that all flight times decimals match your Mac's setting and use the same number separator throughout all entries. ie: don't mix commas and periods.
• Although LogTenPro will accept periods or commas as flight time inputs in the Logbook list or detail view (depending on your Mac's setting), it will always display periods as the number separator in the Logbook and Reports.

Great question!

AC 120-78 was written as guidance for operators seeking to use electronic record keeping systems for operations and maintenance activities. While we believe we are in compliance, and checked with multiple FSDO's on our flight validation feature, the AC does not specifically refer to pilot logbooks.

It’s important to note that the validated flight or certificate record becomes locked upon signing in LogTen, if it is then unlocked for any reason, the associated signature will be automatically deleted and need to be signed again. Signatures are always associated with the instructor's CFI number and expiration date, just like they are in paper copy.

We would advise that if individual or operator wants to use LogTen Pro as their only means of documentation for requirements under Part 61, they should follow the FAA Approval process outlined in AC 120-78, which is simply consulting their local FSDO or the FAA Principal Inspector assigned to the operation within that FSDO.