Method and system for aircraft data and portfolio management

1. A computer-based system providing a method of managing aircraft-related records, the method which comprises:

(a) entering information to identify a unique aircraft into the system;

(b) automatically generating a unique aircraft identifier for said unique aircraft, by said system;

(c) collecting physical and electronic data records pertaining to said unique aircraft;

(d) scanning the physical data records into a computer system and converting the data into files having a computer-searchable format;

(e) sorting said converted data files by said unique aircraft identifier;

(f) creation of a secure access relationship between said records of said unique aircraft and initiating said secure access relationship by creation of a Base 64 encrypted password by creating a password KEY followed by creation of corresponding initialization vector; and

(g) providing user access to said secure access relationship through said to the virtual aircraft records with access permission tagged to said records of said unique aircraft.

2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the virtual aircraft records are stored on a web server, and a user having permission to access the virtual aircraft records is enabled to gain access through the Internet with a computer running a web browser.

3. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the step of providing user access comprises copying the virtual aircraft records onto a portable data carrier with computer-readable files and transferring the portable data carrier to the user.

4. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the converting step comprises subjecting scanned records to optical character recognition and outputting files in text-searchable format.

5. The method according to claim 1 , which further comprises entering pictures and graphical files into the database system and making available the pictures and graphical files pertaining to the given aircraft upon user request through the network.

6. The method according to claim 1 , wherein said user access to the virtual aircraft records is for a specific aircraft group.

7. A computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-readable data pertaining to an aircraft records portfolio, comprising: files containing graphical data of scanned paper records of the records portfolio of a given aircraft for display on a computer screen showing the records in graphical format and having text information of the paper records in text-searchable format; and data files with photographic information related to the given aircraft, scanning the said graphical and data records into a computer system, converting said scanned records into files having a computer-searchable format; sorting said scanned records such that the are accessible and searchable by a unique aircraft identifier.

8. A set of application program interfaces embodied on a computer-readable medium for execution on a computer having an application program for identifying and displaying specific aircraft portfolio information to an interested person, comprising: a login interface enabling or denying access to a data set with a specific aircraft records portfolio based on a unique aircraft identifier; a search query interface receiving a set of search attributes; a search engine matching the set of search attributes with each occurrence of the search attributes in the data set with said aircraft records portfolio, and an interface returning and displaying a list of resulting matches corresponding to a unique aircraft identifier; and a display interface, responsive to a selection by the user from the list of resulting matches, for displaying matching data from the aircraft portfolio in graphical display format.

9. The set of application program interfaces according to claim 8 , wherein the data set is comprised of text-searchable records generated by scanning paper records and optical character recognition.