[K4RY] Old business items for the meeting today

Fri Sep 23 07:17:30 CDT 2011

Thanks for the expansion of the historical situation, Keith.

Yes, running it as a digipeater as well is certainly something the Club could consider if it is useful in the area. 
With the digi high up on Gold Hill tower, I'd not heard concerns about needing a fill in digi in the campus area. 

An automatic antenna switching device is really needed due to the limited number of antennas and 
transmission lines.  I've done some thinking about this that we can discuss if you would like and have time.

73

John...
WB4LNM

-----Original Message-----
From: Keith Warren <kowarren at bellsouth.net>
To: k4ry <k4ry at mailman.eng.auburn.edu>
Sent: Thu, Sep 22, 2011 10:10 pm
Subject: Re: [K4RY] Old business items for the meeting today

              To All,

    I think what Carey was referring to was "why can't it be set up like    it was before ?"

    This is not a regulatory problem. The way we used to have it set up    was as a Digipeater that repeats what it hears locally on RF.  Any    received station is repeated after inserting the K4RY call in the    path and decrementing the WIDE suffix.  There was an option to have    a list of calls that could be gated back onto RF locally.  This    insures that you know who these people are and they are indeed    validly licenced Amateurs and there is local interest (family &    friends & club members) that would want to see where they are on    APRS. This is also important if you do any ARPS messaging and a digi    where you are forwards the message traffic to the nearest IGate to    the destination station and if the option to Gate that call back to    RF is enabled then the message is digipeated out to local RF.

    For messaging, the system is set up to be bandwidth efficient.  Say    I am visiting a distant city and I send a message to a local station    in Auburn.  The message is routed via the APRS internet gateway only    to IGates that have heard the destination station within the last    half hour (to insure probable proximity) and it is only gated to RF    if the sending station is on the list of calls that are allowed (so    you know its a licensed ham)

    Our list was probably less than 12 calls and they were all    definitely hams.

    This is of use for those of us that travel with APRS....... nice to    be able to communicate position and messages with the home station    in Auburn or with friends.

    Its also very useful for balloon missions.  Many times K4RY was the    destination call in the balloon path which insured that our beacons    would get passed to Auburn locally (monitored via RF on my home    station & others)
    and since K4RY was at that time an IGate it made an internet record    of all our packets. Of course the internet raw data complete with    time stamp and path is only saved for 48 hours. If it also exists on    a local RF station's history file that is an extra backup that    doesn't expire. 

    Its also very useful for weather nets and spotters.  For example    Mike WX4AL , could be in his car observing a funnel cloud.  What is    easier .....having him read out some coordinates or looking on the    APRS map and seeing his position plotted ?

    The other issue is Auburn campus especially, is in a fairly low area    and would benefit from a "fill-in" Digi.  Normally these stations    have an alias of WIDE1-1  , and only repeat one hop which is enough    to get you out to a real WIDE digi with a better tower and broad    coverage.  Why? Because APRS is meant to be a mobile service. If    Carey or I were driving around we would want to see local RF    traffic......  not everyone is sitting at home looking at the    internet. 

    The only decent Digi in the county is W4LEE-1 and it is not close    enough to hear the Auburn campus or west Lee County very well . 

    Also,  as far as I can tell the receive-only IGate is not even    reporting received stations right now.  I am 0.75 mi from campus and    it hasn't heard my home station yet.  I just got digipeated by    KE4KWE in Phenix City and it digi'ed to KJ4RHB on the east side of    Columbus.  So the IGate that put my beacon on the internet was over    35 miles away. 

    Keith Warren
    AK4KO

    On 9/22/2011 9:53 PM, John Klingelhoeffer wrote:    
Hi Carey;        

Having the iGate transmit is a regulatory concern.  There          is a somewhat weak protection on the iGate server farm, so it          is possible for non-hams to put traffic into the system that          would end up out on the air without any control mechanisms.           This would be a problem for the station trustee.  

I guess I can't see the rationale about 'broadcasting' a          remote users location, since one can go on any of the internet          sites that monitor the APRS servers and see the location.  Can          you give me an example of how that would be useful?

Good to have traffic on the email reflector.  Thanks.

73

John...

WB4LNM

-----Original Message-----
            From: Carey Huff <huff360 at gmail.com>
            To: K4RY <K4RY at eng.auburn.edu>
            Sent: Thu, Sep 22, 2011 12:29 pm
            Subject: Re: [K4RY] Old business items for the meeting today

              The list is always quiet - So I figure a discussion would              do the mail server some good!               

What's the reasoning behind planning to make it                receive only?  You lose some features of an I-Gate that                make them such a good asset.  

In the past, the I-Gate that was on the old ETV tower                was setup to always output the calls of 'old hams' from                the area.  Anyone that used to be a part of the club                would get their packet pulled off the net and broadcast                in RF there in town.  You could always see where I was                as long as I was within range of another I-Gate.  (I                don't run APRS much anymore, so it's not a big deal for                me) 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not fussing, just more of a                question out of curiosity.  

                Carey

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