TAK Fleet Server
The RotorLab TAK Fleet Server is one server on your own network that speaks MAVLink to your aircraft and ground stations, publishes the whole fleet to ATAK, and records what happened. Switch on Fleet Server Cloud and it files every flight to RotorLab too.
It runs on a laptop at the scene or in Docker in a rack, and it keeps working with no internet at all. It is licensed annually per server: add crews without adding licenses.
What it does#
- The whole fleet on TAK. Every airframe is published as a MIL-STD-2525 track: position, heading, and the sensor footprint on the ground. Your crews get their own markers too, so the map shows who is where.
- Command by ATAK. An approved operator tasks an aircraft by dropping a marker on the map. The ground station decides whether to carry it out; nothing on the server ever touches an autopilot directly.
- Ground stations enroll. A station joins with a code somebody types once, then dials out over TLS. No inbound ports, works across NAT, and any station can be revoked instantly by name.
- It is the buffer. A ground station hands over a finished flight and is done. Whether RotorLab is reachable is the server's problem, never the pilot's and never the aircraft's; a durable outbox replays everything when the link returns.
- Every run is recorded. Each session is written to an append-only, hash-chained record. Replay the fleet picture at any moment of a call, and re-verify that the recording has not been altered since.
- It is the cache. Roster, registry, and checklists are pulled from RotorLab and served from the local copy, so a crew picking a pilot and an aircraft never waits on an internet round trip.
- It holds the only key. The one RotorLab credential lives on the server, in your building. Nothing downstream (a ground station, a vehicle, the aircraft) carries anything that opens your RotorLab account.
Aircraft are recognized by their autopilot's hardware UID, not by a callsign somebody typed, so the same airframe stays the same airframe across stations and days. Rows appear on their own as flights are filed, and the accumulated hours are real flown time.
How it connects to RotorLab.app#
Fleet Server Cloud is not a separate product and there is nothing to buy. It is a menu item inside the Fleet Server: paste a RotorLab Device Key and the connection to RotorLab switches on.
The flow is always ground station to Fleet Server to RotorLab.app. The ground station never talks to RotorLab; the Fleet Server is the only thing that holds a RotorLab credential and the only thing that makes an outbound call. With a key in place it does four things:
- Roster and registry sync. It reads your pilots and your aircraft registry from RotorLab and caches them locally, so crews pick from the real roster at the launch point, currency warnings included.
- Flight filing. When a flight ends, the server files a flight record through the RotorLab API. Each record carries the server's own reference, so a retry after a dropout updates the same flight instead of creating a duplicate. Filed flights appear in Pilot logbook.
- The log file, kept with the flight. The flight's log is handed over after the record is filed, and appears against that flight in Fleet health.
- Checklist completions. Pre-flight and post-flight checklist runs are filed against those flights.
The Device Key is minted by your own org admin in RotorLab under My account, then API & credits, then Devices. It is scoped so it can file flights but cannot spend your analysis credits, it is shown in the Fleet Server by prefix only, and it can be revoked in seconds by retiring the device in RotorLab. Filing flights and checklists is not metered, so day-to-day operation never draws on your API quota.
What it will never do#
- It cannot stop a flight. Not a lapsed certificate, not a revoked key, not an unreachable RotorLab. Everything it reports is information.
- It never touches an autopilot. A Command-by-ATAK order is handed to the ground station, which decides what to do with it. There is no path from the map to your flight controller.
- It does not send RotorLab your telemetry. Only the record of a flight that has ended, once, after the fact, plus its log if you want it kept.
Without a Device Key the Fleet Server is a complete TAK fleet server; the RotorLab half is simply not switched on. Retire the key and the server keeps flying, recording, and publishing to ATAK regardless.
Licensing and purchase#
One annual license per server. Activate binds a key to a machine and Deactivate frees the slot for another one. The license is re-checked with a 72 hour offline grace window, and a license problem never stops the server working, at start-up or mid-incident.
License keys are issued through the shop at https://shop.rotorlab.app. Tell us what you fly and we will size it with you: request a quote at https://rotorlab.app/quote.