Flight Information eBL receives a list of flights from the client, in the form of an XML document, and a pair of Host Access Profile (HAP) strings, one for the Apollo system and another for the Galileo system. The request is initially validated against the request schema, then each flight is sent to the appropriate host system to request live flight information, and the results are decoded and assembled into a response XML document which is returned to the client. The response XML document contains the flights in the same order as they appeared in the request, with the flight service information included, if requested. If an error occurs for any flight, an error message replaces the flight information in the response for that flight.
Details for each flight in the response are organized around cities. For the initial departing city, only a departure section exists. For the final arrival city, only an arrival section displays. Both a departure and arrival section display for intermediate stop cities. Aircraft type and meal service indicators only display in departure sections. . When flight service information is requested (returnFlightServiceInfo="1") and the BIC is provided, meal codes and aircraft types are provided in detail. If requested, but the BIC is not provided, the meals are "yes" or “unknown” Other service codes are provided if the details are available.
The request is a list of flights that are sent as an XML document. The basic high-level detail is as follows:
Flights
Flight
Airline
Number
Origin
Destination
Date
Additional requested flights and services are listed as necessary.
The response is an XML document that lists the requested flight information and service in the order of the request. The flight information is then either "real-time" or "scheduled". An attribute named “source” on each <Flight> element in the response contains the code of the airline that supplied the data, if the data is real-time flight information. If the data is only schedule information, then this attribute contains the word “schedule”. Scheduled information is returned if the link with the airline is down or busy or if that airline is not supported.
Many airlines do not update their gate information, so that field is often empty or non-existent.
If any flights incurred an error, the error is listed in the position of the flight. Errors are formatted in the standard GWS error format. The basic high-level detail is as follows:
Flights
Flight
Airline
Date
Destination
Flight Number
Number of Legs
Origin
Source
Cities
Departure City
Equipment (Aircraft) Type
Gate
Meal
Scheduled Date and Time
Electronic Ticket
Start Terminal
End Terminal
Flight Time
Departure and arrival time variances and reasons
Destination City Code
Arrival Scheduled Date and Time
Departure and arrival time variances and reasons
Free-form message text as provided by the host
For flight
For cities
Error – embedded as applicable in position where flight information would have existed had an error not been encountered
Additional flights/errors repeated as necessary
Decode section
The Flight Information eBL response contains a decoding section at the end of the XML document. This section lists all codes in the response and their decoded text. Decoding is performed by calling the Travel Codes Translator. All airlines, cities, aircraft types, and services are decoded and included in the decode section at the bottom of the request. The client can then correlate the decoded items in this section to the codes in the Flight Information eBL response. Duplicate codes only appear once in the decode section. For example, if you are requesting flight information for three different Air Canada flights, Air Canada is decoded once in the decode section.
The user sends two profiles in the request, one for Apollo and one for Galileo. Flight Information eBL contains the business logic to determine which profile to use for which airline. Users that have a profile for only one host, or neither, are given a Flight Information-only profile for the hosts, to which they do not already have regular access.
Flight Information-only profiles are specific to Flight Information eBL and cannot be used with XML API or Reservation Builder. However, if customers have a Host Access Profile (HAP), that profile can be used for Flight Information eBL.