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When you buy a book of government approach plates, or a Terminal Procedures Publication (TPP) it comes with a legend and other supplemental documents along with it. Now that a lot of pilots are using digital flight bags like ForeFlight it's easy to overlook this stuff.
What I need is a PDF of these materials, but after a lot of searching I'm just not finding it. Does anyone know if the FAA publishes this digitally? This page mentions that it's available, but I don't see the download for it.
Apparently the file you are looking for is FRNTMATTER.PDF, located in the "D" download file.
(but it still looks like you have to download the 900MB ZIP file just to get that one important file)
The file that @JonathanWalters referenced has very similar information in a much smaller download and a different format. But there are differences between the two.
I recommend downloading both the Chart Users guide at the FRNTMATTER.PDF file, and judging for yourself which one (or both) best has the info you are after.
Much of the information is available on FAA.gov, in a handy web-based format in a document called the "Aero Guide", or as a PDF download called the "Aeronautical Chart User's Guide".
The Aero Guide provides a digital document of the reference information provided with both the VFR and IFR paper aeronautical charts and publications, as well as other information not included with the charts. For example, much (if not all) of the same information on Approach Lighting Systems is included in the Guide. However, some other information found in the TERPS publications is not available, such as the Inoperative Components Table.
Here is a screen cap of one of the legends available in the Aero Guide on the TPP Symbols tab (or in the PDF):
For a web-based version follow the link to the Aero Guide and click on the TPP or TPP Symbols tabs for the TPP information you want.
For the PDF: as quoted from the 'product description' on the Aero Guide page:
Provided here is the Aeronautical Chart User's Guide in a web-based format. This web-based version is designed to easily reference chart symbology while providing access for all devices. For now, the downloadable PDF version is still available at the bottom of this page.
That link to the downloadable PDF is found at the bottom of the Intro tab. This is the current direct link. Go to the bottom of that page (although not all the way down into the generic FAA.gov info) and look for the "Aeronautical Chart User's Guide" link. This document is about 22 MB in size.
