Re: [digitalradio] RM-11392
On Thursday 27 December 2007 02:40:01 am Steve Hajducek wrote: I would also like to see the availability of stations involved in the support of Emergency Communications, during such an event allowed to work multi-mode Voice/Digital in the Voice segments and not have to move off frequency. During emergencies, any operator, any station, any power, any mode goes. As long as it is in support of the emergency at hand. Since this is already law, I don't understand how emergency operations keeps being brought into the mix. If there's an emergency, all of these arguments are superfluous.
[digitalradio] Fwd: Your excellent petition
Forwarded with the permission of G3PLX Subject: Your excellent petition Date: Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:37:30 - X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2900.3138 Mark: I hope I have the right email address This is just a note to offer my congratulations and express my admiration for the work you have put in to your petition to FCC, which I have only just seen as a result of various people drawing my attention to it in the last few days. You may know that I was the only non-U.S. citizen to be invited to serve on the ARRL Digital Communications Committee when it was considering what should be the response of the ARRL to the moves in Europe towards separation by emission width, which are now built into the IARU region 1 bandplan. It was me that first proposed the change from segregation by mode to segregation by emission width within IARU region 1. The ARRL committee subsequently reported back to the ARRL board, and you will be well aware of the result. I resigned from that committee before it reported, because it was clear to me that the committee was dominated by a small group whose sole aim was to gain additional spectrum for voice-band unattended digital traffic-handling. They were simply hijacking the separation by emission width debate to further this aim. The result was a disaster, and it's down to people like yourself to sort out the mess! While I was on the committee, however, I tabled arguments almost exactly identical to those you have outlined in your petition, drawing attention to the inappropriate use of ARQ techniques (not just Pactor 3) in the amateur service. The use of ARQ in a congested band is counter-productive, since in the face of co-channel interference (which results from congestion), it INCREASES the amount of time-bandwidth it uses, thus making the congestion worse. I went on to generalise this discussion. To be able to survive congestion in an unregulated band, there must be a mechanism that causes individual transmitting stations to REDUCE their output (in time-bandwidth terms) when faced with undesirable congestion. The AX25 protocol, much maligned for HF use, did achieve this. I will come back to this, but it's also self-evident that all traditional one-to-one amateur operation has this desirable feedback mechanism - an operator faced with QRM due to congestion will shorten his transmissions or close down, thus reducing the congestion, or at least he will do so if he doesn't have any important traffic to pass. This leads to an important conclusion about amateur radio in an unregulated environment where the level of activity is congestion-limited. It will ONLY be stable and self-limiting if there are enough people on the air who are just there for fun, and who will QRT if/when it stops being fun. If we ever got to the situation where a significant fraction of the activity was by people who needed to be on the air for a purpose, then there will be an increasing tendency for congested bands to exhibit 'grid-lock' behaviour. We don't have a big problem over here in Europe. For a start, the use of amateur radio for third-party traffic is illegal everywhere except the USA, so virtually all amateur activity is of the recreastional (fun) type. But I can see it becoming a real problem in USA, and especially if ARQ modes like Pactor become a dominant fraction of the total. When we were discussing emission width segregation in Europe, it became clear that although disparity in emission widths was the most significant source of conflict between operators of different modes, it wasn't the only source of conflict. We identified unattended operation as another major source. With this in mind we created, within the bandplan, segments for this type of operation. This is working well. There is no longer a significant level of complaint by one-to-one operators from unattended systems. I said I would come back to AX25. The fact that AX25 'backed off' in the face of errors (which could be due to congestion) meant that multiple AX25 links could share a channel in a stable way. Pactor has no such characteristic. Co-channel QRM between two Pactor links results in neither link passing any traffic until one link aborts. The logistic consequence of this is that Winlink sysops will always choose to operate on a channel on which they can be sure no other Pactor link will take place. They will always prefer to be subjected to random QRM from another service than to be subjected to QRM from another Pactor link. This unfortunate characteristic has meant that the interference from Pactor to other services is maximised rather than minimised, and it also means that the Winlink organisers complain bitterly that there is insufficient space within the designated automatic sub-bands. The total volume of traffic handled by these unattended stations could easily be passed within the automatic sub-band limits, given a mechanism by which
Re: [digitalradio] STOP THE BITCHING AND MOANING!!!!
I just move to another frequency and move on. There are plenty channels to use out there!!. The problem will be you will run out of places to go. I AGREE ! we do need to solve these problems however as long as 1% of all hams feel they Are entitled to 50% of the bands or more its not going to happen. Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ
[digitalradio] JT65 - work in team
Hello to all, I would be interested to study JT65 and, perhaps, add this mode to Multipsk (let's say before the end of 2008 or the beginning of 2009). The JT65 specifications are too much general and don't permit to build a code from them. I saw that the sources (Fortran and C or C++?) of JT65 exist but there are a lot of files and it is impossible for me to extract the specifications from them (I am not programmer). However even for a programmer, I suppose that this must be complex. I think the only solution (at least for me) would be to work in team. The goal would be: 1) to understand how JT65 is built going into details from the sources (reverse engineering) and to write precise specifications, 2) to share the sources into functional blocks so as to know the role of each one. It would be necessary, afterwards, to organize all these blocks in some diagram so as to permit for anyone to understand the general working (RX, TX, data management), 3) to translate the compressed (many operations in the same line, the general meaning being hidden) source coding in C or C++, into some pseudo-code easy to read, or in Basic as it seems the most readable and it is known by everyone or in non-compressed C source coding. The goal would be that this permit to any Ham having yet written a code for coding/decoding a mode (and so used to a minimum of digital processing) to write his own JT65 code (in Basic, Pascal, C or whatever) and to understand the working. All this might be public and the exchanges done within a Yahoo group. If anybody is interested, tell me. 73 Patrick
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Packet Radio Frequencies
Scott There is some here and APRS too but not a lot --- Scott L. [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Ahhh, the old days300 baud HF packet. I remember when it was all the rage in the early 1990s. Now, VHF packet (1200 baud) was much more interesting and I even had a packet BBS. That was in eastern PA. Now I live in Pittsburgh and can find no VHF packet activity whatsoever. To the O.P. - look for some packet in your area around 145.01, 145.03, 145.05, 145.07, 145.09 - that might have changed over the years too but thats where it used to be! 73-Scott KN3A --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Andrew O'Brien [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: FYI, here is some traffic I just copied on 14095 [FBB-7.00g-ABFHM$] FA B G8MNY WW TECH 40474_GB7CIP 6084 F 55 [FBB-7.00g-ABFHM$] FA B G8MNY WW TECH 40474_GB7CIP 6084 F 55 FBB-7.00g-ABFHM$] FA B G8MNY WW TECH 40474_GB7CIP 6084 F 55 It looks like BBS forwarding using the FBB software. Andy K3UK On Dec 25, 2007 2:32 PM, Andrew O'Brien [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Packet can be easily found on 30M, the APRS stations on 10151 use packet. . Try also 14095 for packet BBS traffic . on HF it is 300 baud packet (below 10M) Andy K3UK On Dec 25, 2007 1:31 PM, kaboona [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hello all and Merry Christmas. I just recently discovered packet radio. The fact that it exists in VHF makes it interesting to me. Now, I understand that it also exists in HF. I use two of the Kenwood radios that have a TNC built in for this purpose and a signalink interface for the HF rig at home. The difficulty I am having now is the finding of frequencies commonly used for packet. Where can I find such a list if one exists? Can anyone point me in the right direction? thanks in advance Jim -- Andy K3UK www.obriensweb.com (QSL via N2RJ) -- Andy K3UK www.obriensweb.com (QSL via N2RJ) Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, W2XJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Demetre SV1UY wrote: First of all not many can afford a satellite phone, which is also not amateur radio. A satellite phone plus connection fees are far more expensive than a PACTOR MODEM. Second many do not even have the luxury of a UHF link, nor are they near a town, so HF is playing a viable role in their communications. This is where PACTOR 3 comes and solves their problem. Also when everything has gone down in an emergency, PACTOR 3 can give you reliable communications using a PACTOR mailbox that resides in a neighbouring country. Sometimes through the night when I cannot access any European PACTOR PMBOS because I do not have a decent 80 meters antenna It looks like your Internet connection to this list is working fine. Are you using PACTOR? I only use PACTOR regularly when I am away from home and only when I want to make test PACTOR connection OM. At home it is not very efficient to use PACTOR except for PACTOR QSOs, which are also condemned and QRMed by some LIDS in this list. 73 de Demetre SV1UY
Re: [digitalradio] JT65 - work in team
No only am I interested, I am ahead of you - I hope to have this working with a C++ engine under Windows by about the end of March 2008. Originally I was targeting end of 2007 but decided to add SSTV support before finishing WSJT. The WSJT code is Fortran, Python and C (I think) which is very easy to understand. The encoding / decoding will be in a Windows DLL with all source available. Simon Brown, HB9DRV - Original Message - From: Patrick Lindecker I think the only solution (at least for me) would be to work in team. The goal would be:
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Dave Bernstein [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: QRM from PMBOs and other deaf robots spoils the enjoyment of amateur radio for many operators Demetre. That's why so many are willing to do practically anything to make WinLink stop generating QRM. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists; Ack *this*. You see now why the PBMOs cannot install any DCD mechanism that detects QRM and they leave the busy detection to be the responsibility of the client? Because people like you would misuse such a mechanism and the PMBOs would be rendered useless. This is a VERY bad practice that you and your followers excercise and hence you should have your license revoked for this action you just admitted yourself. Anyway please comment to your daddy (the FCC) as you like, although you do understand you are wrong, and if you have a PACTOR MODEM and have not understood it's use yet then I am sorry for you because nothing comes even close to PACTOR 3 for emergency comms OM. 73, Dave, AA6YQ 73 de Demetre SV1UY
[digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
Hi Demetre, We are looking forward to your explanation as to how an unattended PMBO, very near to a local station (and which local station, that the far away client cannot even detect), and running a mode other than Pactor, will refuse to transmit over the local station's QSO if queried by the far away client. It is easy to understand how this can happen on 20m where many use directional beam antennas. The local station does not even have to very local to the PMBO, but beaming in its direction for his QSO with a station in the direction of the PMBO, so that the client is off the side of the beam pattern. An operator at the PMBO could easily detect the beaming station, perhaps even over S9, but the client, being off the side of the beam, detects nothing and thinks the frequency is clear. This is critical to the problem of understanding how unattended stations can mix with attended stations on shared bands, and your explanation would be very much appreciated! Thanks in advance, Skip KH6TY
Re: [digitalradio] JT65 - work in team
Hello Simon, Glad you are interested (and very widely in advance). I knew Python only as a snake, nice to learn something... For instance, I have written some own specifications in French (see hereafter but I'm not very sure of them). About the source code, I have: * a file which name is WSJT-5[1].9.2-r115.tgz (I don't remember how I get it) with many files and * a file which name is JT65code.gz which seems to be the source code of a soft called SimJT, used to only transmit JT65 frames. Do you have the same or different sources? 73 Patrick JT65 Créateur : Joe Taylor (K1JT) en 2004 Description : Vitesse en bauds: 2,69 (11025/4096) soit 0,372 seconde par symbole de 6 bits Messages : un message d'une durée de 46.8 secondes qui commence à t=1 sec après le début de la minute UTC et se termine à t=47,8 sec (il faut que le PC soit synchronisé sur le WEB...). Il est composé de 126 symboles de 6 bits, chacun ayant une longueur de 4096 échantillons audio (0,372 seconde). 63 portent une tonalité de synchronisation à 1270,5 Hz. 63 symboles portent les 72 bits du message. Les 72 bits comprennent: * call1 (28 bits) + call2 (28 bits) + Locator 4 caractères (15 bits) plus le bit 72 permettant de dire s'il s'agit d'un texte libre ou d'un texte pré-formatté, * call 1 + call 2 (+ pre ou postfixe exemple: G4ABC/P ou ZA/PA2CHR) + plus le bit 72 * call 1 (+ pre ou postfixe exemple: G4ABC/P ou ZA/PA2CHR) + call 2 plus le bit 72 * CQ décalage (113 p.e) call Locator bit 72, R-NN ou -NN (-25 dB p.e) peut remplacer le Locator, * du texte libre 13 caractères (71 / log2(43)) avec 72 bits et 43 caractères possibles IMPORTANT: le décodage se fait à l'issue de l'émission Vitesse : 72 bits (soit 13 caractères max en texte libre) par période de 60 sec (avec un message par période) soit 2,2 mpm Modulation : FSK 65 tonalités (64 tonalités pour les 6 bits plus une tonalité de synchronisation) avec un écart entre tonalités de 2,69 Hz (1x vitesse en bauds) en mode A, 5,4 Hz (x2) en mode B, 10.7 Hz (x4) en mode C, sauf entre la tonalité de synchronisation (1270,5 Hz) et le caractère 0 (écart de 5,4 Hz =2 x vitesse en bauds en mode A, 4 x en mode B et 8 x en mode C). Les fréquences du JT44 sont fixées entre 1270,5 Hz (tonalité de synchronisation) et 1270,5 + 2.6917 (N+2) m Hz avec N valeur entre 0 et 63 du caractère et m pour 1 2 ou 4 pour les sous-modes A, B et C. La tolérance sur la fréquence de synchronisation est de +/- 600 Hz, La tonalité de synchronisation (détectée avec une précision de +/- 1,5 Hz (+/- 3 Hz d'après WSJT 4.7 en français) et 0,03 sec pour la récupération de rythme) est émise suivant une séquence pseudo-aléatoire (fonction d'auto-corrélation en forme de pic autour du retard nul). Le pseudo-bit OOO (pour les 2 calls reçus mais message recu par intermittence) est envoyé en inversant la séquence pseudo-aléatoire (un peu comme en Olivia avec la transformation Hadamard), les 1 passant en 0 et inversement. WSJT cherche la fréquence de synchronisation sur +/- 600 Hz car les QSO's EME peuvent avoir des décalages en fréquence (Doppler) importants. Démodulation : décimation /2 pour aller de Fe=11025 à Fe=5512. FFT glissant sur 2048 points (delta f=2,69 Hz donc une précision de +/- 1,4 Hz en se basant sur la raie la plus puissante. 0,03 sec indique que la distance temporelle entre FFT est de 0.06 s soit 5512*0.06=330 échantillons. Mode de réception: USB par convention (?). Chaque période de 60 sec d'émission et de réception doit commencer sur une minute + 1 sec (t=1) avec une tolérance sur l'horloge de -2 à 4 secondes (? non vu), le décalage en temps pour les QSO EME est d'environ 2,5 secondes (aller-retour Terre/Lune + temps de commutation des XCVR). Jeu de caractères : ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789.,/#?$ ESPACE (pas de caractère de correction d'erreur) (?) Bande passante: 175 Hz en mode A, 350 Hz en mode B, 700 Hz en mode C, Synchronisation: automatique en utilisant la tonalité de synchronisation Code correcteur: Reed Solomon (63, 12) soit 63 symboles de 6 bits pour 12 symboles de 6 bits d'information (soit un rendement de 0,19. IMPORTANT: la démodulation Reed Solomon de type soft-decision est basée sur un algorithme original (cf p10 The JT65 communications protocol ) Code de convolution: non Entrelacement : après le Reed-Solomon, les 63 symboles sont entrelaçés (écriture ligne par ligne dans une matrice 7x9 et lecture colonne par colonne, pas clair). Les bits finaux passent à travers un codage Gray avant d'être émis. Plus bas S/B pour une copie à 96 %: -23 dB (pour un bruit blanc de 2,5 KHz de bande passante). Il est possible de moyenner le même message grâce au signal de synchronisation qui permet d'être sûr que l'on a affaire à un message JT65B. (-1 en JT65A et +1 en JT65C) Note: si l'on envoie des messages connus à l'avance (indicatifs connus à l'avance) on cherche plus loin (Deep search) et on atteint -27 dB (en JT65B, -1 en JT65A et
Re: [digitalradio] Fwd: Your excellent petition
Mark Miller wrote: Forwarded with the permission of G3PLX Thank you for sharing this Mark. If you and Peter Martinez are both for the petition, that along with my independent review is good enough for me. Sorry to see some of the ad hominem bozo remarks on this forum. Hey, I thought I was the only guy who labels his socks by day. :-) This petition, if adopted, will be a huge step towards advancement of the digital modes on the amateur bands, and a clean-up of non-amateur modes and practices that threaten our bands. de Roger W6VZV
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Packet Radio Frequencies
Le Thu, 27 Dec 2007 12:01:22 +0100, bruce mallon [EMAIL PROTECTED] a écrit: Scott There is some here and APRS too but not a lot Hello all, ex sysop of PR node F6KVE, I maintain that APRS mode ar'nt packet- radio, just UI frames and made for breaking PR and divide PR sysops, its all!!! All the best to all and Happy New Year 2008 -- Visitez ma page: http://www.qslnet.de/f6gia Dialoguez avec moi en IRC via: irc.freenode.net.6667#f6gia_irc en phonie via Picophone en rentrant pour me contacter fsixgia. Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/drsked/drsked.php View the DRCC numbers database at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digitalradio/database Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digitalradio/ * Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional * To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digitalradio/join (Yahoo! ID required) * To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
[digitalradio] Re: Fwd: Your excellent petition
-Thanks for sharing this Mark Andy -- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Mark Miller [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Forwarded with the permission of G3PLX Subject: Your excellent petition Date: Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:37:30 - X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2900.3138 Mark: I hope I have the right email address This is just a note to offer my congratulations and express my admiration for the work you have put in to your petition to FCC, which I have only just seen as a result of various people drawing my attention to it in the last few days. You may know that I was the only non-U.S. citizen to be invited to serve on the ARRL Digital Communications Committee when it was considering what should be the response of the ARRL to the moves in Europe towards separation by emission width, which are now built into the IARU region 1 bandplan. It was me that first proposed the change from segregation by mode to segregation by emission width within IARU region 1. The ARRL committee subsequently reported back to the ARRL board, and you will be well aware of the result. I resigned from that committee before it reported, because it was clear to me that the committee was dominated by a small group whose sole aim was to gain additional spectrum for voice-band unattended digital traffic-handling. They were simply hijacking the separation by emission width debate to further this aim. The result was a disaster, and it's down to people like yourself to sort out the mess! While I was on the committee, however, I tabled arguments almost exactly identical to those you have outlined in your petition, drawing attention to the inappropriate use of ARQ techniques (not just Pactor 3) in the amateur service. The use of ARQ in a congested band is counter-productive, since in the face of co-channel interference (which results from congestion), it INCREASES the amount of time-bandwidth it uses, thus making the congestion worse. I went on to generalise this discussion. To be able to survive congestion in an unregulated band, there must be a mechanism that causes individual transmitting stations to REDUCE their output (in time-bandwidth terms) when faced with undesirable congestion. The AX25 protocol, much maligned for HF use, did achieve this. I will come back to this, but it's also self-evident that all traditional one-to-one amateur operation has this desirable feedback mechanism - an operator faced with QRM due to congestion will shorten his transmissions or close down, thus reducing the congestion, or at least he will do so if he doesn't have any important traffic to pass. This leads to an important conclusion about amateur radio in an unregulated environment where the level of activity is congestion-limited. It will ONLY be stable and self-limiting if there are enough people on the air who are just there for fun, and who will QRT if/when it stops being fun. If we ever got to the situation where a significant fraction of the activity was by people who needed to be on the air for a purpose, then there will be an increasing tendency for congested bands to exhibit 'grid-lock' behaviour. We don't have a big problem over here in Europe. For a start, the use of amateur radio for third-party traffic is illegal everywhere except the USA, so virtually all amateur activity is of the recreastional (fun) type. But I can see it becoming a real problem in USA, and especially if ARQ modes like Pactor become a dominant fraction of the total. When we were discussing emission width segregation in Europe, it became clear that although disparity in emission widths was the most significant source of conflict between operators of different modes, it wasn't the only source of conflict. We identified unattended operation as another major source. With this in mind we created, within the bandplan, segments for this type of operation. This is working well. There is no longer a significant level of complaint by one-to-one operators from unattended systems. I said I would come back to AX25. The fact that AX25 'backed off' in the face of errors (which could be due to congestion) meant that multiple AX25 links could share a channel in a stable way. Pactor has no such characteristic. Co-channel QRM between two Pactor links results in neither link passing any traffic until one link aborts. The logistic consequence of this is that Winlink sysops will always choose to operate on a channel on which they can be sure no other Pactor link will take place. They will always prefer to be subjected to random QRM from another service than to be subjected to QRM from another Pactor link. This unfortunate characteristic has meant that the interference from Pactor to other services is maximised rather than minimised, and it also means that the Winlink organisers complain bitterly that there is insufficient space
Re: [digitalradio] Fwd: Your excellent petition
Hey, I thought I was the only guy who labels his socks by day. :-) This petition, if adopted, will be a huge step towards advancement of the digital modes on the amateur bands, and a clean-up of non-amateur modes and practices that threaten our bands. Roger, I had my wife take a look at that comment about the socks and she about died laughing. I should post a picture of my shack and that would explain her reaction. Thank-you for your comments. Peter is a great guy and a wonderful philosopher. 73, Mark N5RFX
[digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
Why don't we just simply give the bands back to the FCC and then let the government run emergency comm. That would solve the whole mess. (LOL) More Government, More Regulations, More Law Suits --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Rodney [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I too, agree with the petition! There NEEDS to be some reining back of some, if not A LOT of the HF, as well as VHF UHF band operators! I'm NOT a fan of Internet Radio (IRLP or Echolink). Internet is NOT Radio! A LOT of these IRLP and Echo link nodes are oblivious to the fact that there ARE other people using that particular frequency and jump in over the top of them. This can be life threatening in an emergency! I'm FOR some regulation or regrouping! Rod KC7CJO
[digitalradio] auto-detect was used once upon a time
It did not work out well and has not been used since. Oh don't get me wrong the auto-detect worked, worked to well if you ask me. John
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
I am quoting here my reply to DAVE about his Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PACTOR PMBO frequencies for your information! That shows you exactly the attitude of some people against anything they dislike and how they act. If the Pactor PMBOs activated any DCD mechanism, people like Dave would sit there all day to deliberately cause QRM with their Anti-Radiation missiles tuned to the PACTOR PMBO frequencies, as he said, and cause havoc. Is this kind of QRM accepted by you? What about this Skip? Is this justified? Tell me what works perfectly on HF and if we manage to correct them all then PACTOR will follow and I believe the PMBOs will have no problem finding a way to implement a DCD mechanism. Demetre, Of course it is not justified! The point is that on shared bands, like our amateur bands, no machine can take the place of human intelligence to negotiate a fair sharing or use of a frequency, just like no software can figure out the meaning of sloppy CW sending by including the context of the QSO, as a human can. I am not in favor of busy signal detectors as a solution, both for the reason you cite, and because the clients can just disable them. The solution lies in separation of unattended operations from attended operations, with the space allocated to unattended operations in proportion to their representation in the ham community, if unattended operations are to be permitted at all. That proportion is currently about 1% of the US amateur population or about 0.3% of the worldwide amateur population, but already the FCC allocates 3.5% of the HF band spectrum to unattended activity, which is obviously more than fair. I am in favor of hams being able to use unattended operations as long as they are kept apart from other ham operations and in a space proportional to their representation. It is pointless to argue which use of a ham band is more important, as that depends upon each individual's interests. However, unattended operation is contrary to the recreational use of shared bands, because one half of a communication with an unattended station cannot share. If it is to be allowed, then it must be in a place where it cannot interfere with persons that are capable of negotiating for a frequency on a fair basis. Unattended stations cannot negotiate. To you, Winlink 2000 is a valuable resource, as it is to others. With proper management, such as eliminating wasteful scanning, for example, and using only narrow modes for small size messaging, there is more than enough space in the 3.5% of ham spectrum for unattended operations for those who need them. Peter Martinez is correct in that the system design of Winlink 2000 is not consistent with shared bands, but that should be an incentive to develop a system that can, instead of constantly try to dominate more and more space to avoid interference by spreading out. Replace unattended stations with live operators and the sharing problem is resolved, and messaging can take place anywhere the mode itself is permitted. If that is not done, the unattended stations need to stay in a space in proportion to their representation in the ham community in order to help relieve congestion to those who are capable of sharing spectrum. Have a Happy New Year! 73, Skip KH6TY
Re: [digitalradio] Bozo's guide to RM-11392
Andy - What did you say? Hi! Hi! I LOVE Digital. Have a GREAT day, and HAPPY NEW YEAR! Lou WA5LOU Andrew O'Brien [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: OK, I am coming to this issue rather late but did give the proposal a quick read. For those who do not have time to read all the email or the lengthy pdf document, here is is my Bozo's guide. I am sure I will have some things wrong, after all...I am a bozo. If I have some things wrong, correct me. Bottom line : The proposal has no chance of being adopted, The Kyoto protocol will be easier to implement than this. The FCC will see all the chaotic comments and ignore the issue. What N5RFX wants: Nothing wider than 1500 Hz below 10M and automatic stations will be sent to Soweto and live under an apartheid system . What are automatic controlled stations? While PACTOR is the primary culprit, ALE, Packet, CW, RTTY and PSK operations occasionally operate in an unattended way . This means a station leaps in to action with a transmission while the licensee is in the kitchen making a bologna sandwich, is busy taking a slash in the bog (look it up) or perhaps driving 200 miles from his house. This is good if you want to get things done without always having to be close to that damn radio. Some folks get upset at this because , while you are making that sandwich , you missed the fact that AA6YQ was working North Korea on 80M QRP. Your automatic station just drowned the North Korean giving Dave an RST of 339. Aside from Pactor, I suspect that many ALE operations are not always under full manual control. Neither are some Propnet stations that use 300 baud packet or PSK31. Many DXpeditions act like they can transmit any place they want, and then there are also the folks at W1AW who send old news automatically at predetermined times via RTTY and CW. Is this N5RFX geezer mean/nasty and does he want to get rid of all digital modes ? I doubt it. He seems more like a bloke that has all his socks neatly arranged in a drawer, tagged with the day of the week he plans to wear them. He wants unattended operations confined to certain parts of the dial, in their own section of the drawer. In fact, rather than mean, he may be actually a nice guy since he gives many frequencies to the unattended folks. Far more than is really needed . If there was a national or International emergency, a well coordinated event would need just two or three bands. This N5RFX dude has auto folks all over the bands. But will I be able to work K3UK with 3000/128 Olivia? What about all those other fun digital modes? N5RFX seems to want to kill some wide modes . Does this really matter to the average ham ? Remember the average ham can't spell shortwave. Many average hams think a shortwave is one of those $29.95 small microwave ovens that Wal-Mart has on sale. They could care less about those funny noises on the airwaves. However, there are some hams that are as geeky as those JT65A guys warbling their way through narrow spectrum for five minutes just to exchange a grid square and call sign . The wide mode freaks are just as geeky but they like wide modes to send the Magna Carta in full , with pictures and social commentary, all in on 3 second data burst that is 25 mHz wide ! Actually, they are usually not that wide, most are within 2.4 kHz. The modes appear like the QEII sailing down your waterfall, and steal that spot you were about to use to endlessly call CQ. These wide modes can be very useful and can contain a lot of information that some people thing is valuable(data, pictures, station ID, even your voice). Many experimenters try wide modes and feel like they are advancing the state of the art. While some think girth has pleasurable advantages, N5RFX thinks we should be happy with 1500 Hz. He argues that 1500 Hz can still achieve satisfaction and those who are obsessed with size can go try 10 meters. 10 meters is the Nevada of the amateur radio world, the Amsterdam of the spectrum. You can hang out on 10 meters and be as dirty as you want with your wider than 1500 Hz signals . No one will really care, because 60% of the time 10M is only open to North Carolina! When it is open to the world, you can get lost because your dial twirling fingers will get tired long before you reach the end of the band (just try manually tuning from 28.001 to 29Mhz !) So, while the tech folks debate Gaussian White Noise (did they open for AC-DC once ?) , rest assured that most amateur radio will continue unaffected by N5RFX's OCD. If he gets his way, you may not get stomped on as much and you may get frustrated that you can't send 3000/128 Olivia on 80M to work that rare South Dakota station when the propagation gods have made PSK31 unusable. Oh, and if you run a PACTOR or ALE station, you may feel yourself to be a bit like Martha Stewart did when she was under house arrest. Frustrated that you can't party all over the place. That's all, Andy K3UK
[digitalradio] Re: Fwd: Your excellent petition
Unfortunately Peter, G3PLX, is missing some important point in his comments whereas I can follow and agree to most of his statements: 1. There is a bandplan which allows a max. of 2700 Hz. I assume that there was a lengthly discussion about those limits before they were established. 2. Even though the majority of the existing and normally used digital modes don't occupy the 2700 Hz we don't know yet what the future might bring on robust digital modes for HF which need more than 1500 Hz. 3. The discussion about unattented operation and the problems caused by them has the side effect of hindering progress in developing and experimenting with digital modes. Another observation from me: Did anybody complain about the ignorance (or arrogance?) of FJ/OH2AM using the spectrum from 14100 to 14130 for receiving? I haven't heard complaints so far, even though many called between 14100 and 14110 jamming beacons as well as digital modes just to get a new DXCC entity (to avoid any misinterpretation: I have worked them on 17, 20, 40 and 80, so there is no frustration causing this comment). It shows, however, for whatever reason the attitude of a significant number of ham's towards digital modes. On the other hand it reinforces the need for a factual based and non emotional discussion of all aspects of digital modes in amateur radio services, one to protect the possibility for new development, and second the need for a good lobby work at regulatory authorities like the FCC and others because we are still a small minority. 73 Juergen, DL8LE --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Mark Miller [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Forwarded with the permission of G3PLX Subject: Your excellent petition Date: Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:37:30 - X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2900.3138 Mark: I hope I have the right email address This is just a note to offer my congratulations and express my admiration for the work you have put in to your petition to FCC, which I have only just seen as a result of various people drawing my attention to it in the last few days. You may know that I was the only non-U.S. citizen to be invited to serve on the ARRL Digital Communications Committee when it was considering what should be the response of the ARRL to the moves in Europe towards separation by emission width, which are now built into the IARU region 1 bandplan. It was me that first proposed the change from segregation by mode to segregation by emission width within IARU region 1. The ARRL committee subsequently reported back to the ARRL board, and you will be well aware of the result. I resigned from that committee before it reported, because it was clear to me that the committee was dominated by a small group whose sole aim was to gain additional spectrum for voice-band unattended digital traffic-handling. They were simply hijacking the separation by emission width debate to further this aim. The result was a disaster, and it's down to people like yourself to sort out the mess! While I was on the committee, however, I tabled arguments almost exactly identical to those you have outlined in your petition, drawing attention to the inappropriate use of ARQ techniques (not just Pactor 3) in the amateur service. The use of ARQ in a congested band is counter-productive, since in the face of co-channel interference (which results from congestion), it INCREASES the amount of time-bandwidth it uses, thus making the congestion worse. I went on to generalise this discussion. To be able to survive congestion in an unregulated band, there must be a mechanism that causes individual transmitting stations to REDUCE their output (in time-bandwidth terms) when faced with undesirable congestion. The AX25 protocol, much maligned for HF use, did achieve this. I will come back to this, but it's also self-evident that all traditional one-to-one amateur operation has this desirable feedback mechanism - an operator faced with QRM due to congestion will shorten his transmissions or close down, thus reducing the congestion, or at least he will do so if he doesn't have any important traffic to pass. This leads to an important conclusion about amateur radio in an unregulated environment where the level of activity is congestion-limited. It will ONLY be stable and self-limiting if there are enough people on the air who are just there for fun, and who will QRT if/when it stops being fun. If we ever got to the situation where a significant fraction of the activity was by people who needed to be on the air for a purpose, then there will be an increasing tendency for congested bands to exhibit 'grid-lock' behaviour. We don't have a big problem over here in Europe. For a start, the use of amateur radio for third-party traffic is illegal everywhere except the USA, so virtually all amateur activity is of the recreastional
[digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, kh6ty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi Demetre, We are looking forward to your explanation as to how an unattended PMBO, very near to a local station (and which local station, that the far away client cannot even detect), and running a mode other than Pactor, will refuse to transmit over the local station's QSO if queried by the far away client. It is easy to understand how this can happen on 20m where many use directional beam antennas. The local station does not even have to very local to the PMBO, but beaming in its direction for his QSO with a station in the direction of the PMBO, so that the client is off the side of the beam pattern. An operator at the PMBO could easily detect the beaming station, perhaps even over S9, but the client, being off the side of the beam, detects nothing and thinks the frequency is clear. This is critical to the problem of understanding how unattended stations can mix with attended stations on shared bands, and your explanation would be very much appreciated! Thanks in advance, Skip KH6TY Hi Skip, I am quoting here my reply to DAVE about his Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PACTOR PMBO frequencies for your information! That shows you exactly the attitude of some people against anything they dislike and how they act. If the Pactor PMBOs activated any DCD mechanism, people like Dave would sit there all day to deliberately cause QRM with their Anti-Radiation missiles tuned to the PACTOR PMBO frequencies, as he said, and cause havoc. Is this kind of QRM accepted by you? What about this Skip? Is this justified? Tell me what works perfectly on HF and if we manage to correct them all then PACTOR will follow and I believe the PMBOs will have no problem finding a way to implement a DCD mechanism. And just like Andy, our moderator, said previously: - Aside from Pactor, I suspect that many ALE operations are not always under full manual control. Neither are some Propnet stations that use 300 baud packet or PSK31. Many DXpeditions act like they can transmit any place they want, and then there are also the folks at W1AW who send old news automatically at predetermined times via RTTY and CW. -- And I must add, what about the numerous nets on HF that deliberately cause QRM when anyone dares to use their frequency before they start their NET? What about AX25 BBS FORWARDING that still takes place on HF? (These are really the automatic ROBOTS, not the semi-automatic PACTOR PMBOs), what about HF APRS Digis? What are you going to do about all them? Fix the HF bands first and then blame PACTOR PMBOs and automatic operations. Forget about PACTOR 3 being the problem because it isn't. 73 de Demetre SV1UY --QUOTED MESSAGE From Dave- Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Dave Bernstein [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: QRM from PMBOs and other deaf robots spoils the enjoyment of amateur radio for many operators Demetre. That's why so many are willing to do practically anything to make WinLink stop generating QRM. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists; Ack *this*. You see now why the PBMOs cannot install any DCD mechanism that detects QRM and they leave the busy detection to be the responsibility of the client? Because people like you would misuse such a mechanism and the PMBOs would be rendered useless. This is a VERY bad practice that you and your followers excercise and hence you should have your license revoked for this action you just admitted yourself. Anyway please comment to your daddy (the FCC) as you like, although you do understand you are wrong, and if you have a PACTOR MODEM and have not understood it's use yet then I am sorry for you because nothing comes even close to PACTOR 3 for emergency comms OM. 73, Dave, AA6YQ 73 de Demetre SV1UY --END OF QUOTED MESSAGE-
[digitalradio] Re: First FCC Came for the PACTOR
Michael, Eloquently said! Brian AB5KT Near Austin Texas --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Michael Hatzakis Jr MD [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I agree; a little unnecessary drama. I think we can stay rational and have an educational discussion. I've learned from this debate and this is the most useful purpose for sharing opinions, even if I disagree with some. Even still, let's use the FCC web site and exercise what democracy remains on the use of the airwaves and register our opinions. I am hearing the major objection to PMBO's is their inability to listen to other stations, not just other PMBO's, before they occupy a frequency. So why isn't the proposed rulemaking oriented towards solving THESE SPECIFIC problems rather than abolishing them? Seems this would be consistent with FCC intended rules and would be a no-brainer to get passed. I agree, this community may not have played fair, so regulate the activity that is a problem. HF digital modes that can operate under very low signal situations are very useful to many and would be sad to see them be abolished. I agree, their use needs to be fine tuned, but abolishing them seems draconian. With all our innovation, why not spend our energy on their fair and more efficient use rather than chasing them away. My fear is that if we chase away modes we don't like, when HF bands become really quiet because people no longer use CW and the number of hams declines because the hobby becomes uninteresting, the allocation gets sold to the highest commercial bidder. We need to promote diversity to survive. The world is going digital and wireless and this is what many new hams enjoy, like myself. Michael
RE: [digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
Anyone notice that the vast majority of the negative comments about the petition are (nearly) identical. Sort of reminds me of the Send the following letter to your Congressman! like the NUMBERS count and not the content. I sure wish that petitioners -- both pro and con -- would think for themselves and file thoughtful, personal, comments to help the FCC... instead of merely submitting what amounts to a form letter that expresses somebody ELSE's views. de Peter K1PGV
Re: [digitalradio] JT65 - work in team
Hi, That's it. Your first step is to follow Joe's instructions and compile this, then understand how to use it. I have written a lot of user interface but not yet attacked the decoding. Simon Brown, HB9DRV - Original Message - From: Patrick Lindecker * a file which name is WSJT-5[1].9.2-r115.tgz (I don't remember how I get it) with many files and * a file which name is JT65code.gz which seems to be the source code of a soft called SimJT, used to only transmit JT65 frames.
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
If you go to the SCS website, it clearly states that PACTORIII is designed for commercial operation, especially maritime. They then have a tanned rich German guy on the website giving a testimonial how the system works from his yacht. If people want to tie up marine frequencies with such a low speed system, fine. Personally I think if one can afford a sea going vessel with an installed ham station, they can carry Immarsat and move data at 64 kbps. This has no place on amateur frequencies. Demetre SV1UY wrote: Hi Skip, I am quoting here my reply to DAVE about his Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PACTOR PMBO frequencies for your information! That shows you exactly the attitude of some people against anything they dislike and how they act. If the Pactor PMBOs activated any DCD mechanism, people like Dave would sit there all day to deliberately cause QRM with their Anti-Radiation missiles tuned to the PACTOR PMBO frequencies, as he said, and cause havoc. Is this kind of QRM accepted by you? What about this Skip? Is this justified? Tell me what works perfectly on HF and if we manage to correct them all then PACTOR will follow and I believe the PMBOs will have no problem finding a way to implement a DCD mechanism. And just like Andy, our moderator, said previously: - Aside from Pactor, I suspect that many ALE operations are not always under full manual control. Neither are some Propnet stations that use 300 baud packet or PSK31. Many DXpeditions act like they can transmit any place they want, and then there are also the folks at W1AW who send old news automatically at predetermined times via RTTY and CW. -- And I must add, what about the numerous nets on HF that deliberately cause QRM when anyone dares to use their frequency before they start their NET? What about AX25 BBS FORWARDING that still takes place on HF? (These are really the automatic ROBOTS, not the semi-automatic PACTOR PMBOs), what about HF APRS Digis? What are you going to do about all them? Fix the HF bands first and then blame PACTOR PMBOs and automatic operations. Forget about PACTOR 3 being the problem because it isn't. 73 de Demetre SV1UY
[digitalradio] Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
- Original Message - From: David Struebel To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 4:33 PM Subject: Re: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Hi Everyone, I've been following this debate for the past several days and finally have to add my two cents. I'm part of NTSD, that's the National Traffic System Digital...We mostly use the old version of Winlink (before Winlink 2000) also reffered to as Winlink Classic running Pactor I II and sometimes III... We used to use AMTOR and Clover but have all changed over to Pactor... Many of us are still using PK-232MBX's for Pactor I, others are using SCS TNC's All our connects occur in the automatic band segments... Winlink Classic has a very good busy detector in it... I've seen it work on not only Pactor, AMTOR, and Clover signals but other including RTTY, dead carriers etc... Winlink classic when it hears another signal, postpones the connect and then tries 15 minutes later for a total of three attempts at a clear frequency. I can tell you that with an active busy detector, our systems are almost helpless against RTTY signals that come into the automatic band segments especially during contests... Traffic thru put declines severely during these contests. We're happy with staying within the automatic band segments with our 500 Hz Pactor I and Pactor II signals... It would be nice if others realized that the automatic segments do contain stations with busy detector armed and ready and please refrain from casual operation there, especially during a contest. I know I'm going to get a lot of flack from those of you that don't like automatic stations, but like I said Winlink 2000 is not the only Pactor operation around running automatically... We prefer to stay in the automatic band segments... Please have the common courtesy to respect our operations. Dave WB2FTX Eastern Area Digital Coordinator- NTS Digital Section Traffic Manager- Northern NJ - Original Message - From: Rick To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 4:10 PM Subject: Re: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Packet? This does not have much to do with the subject though. John Becker, WØJAB wrote: Rick you of all people should know that one of the older systems had a auto-detect or busy detection that worked very good. -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.11/1200 - Release Date: 12/27/2007 1:34 PM
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
+++ more AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Demetre SV1UY [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: QRM from PMBOs and other deaf robots spoils the enjoyment of amateur radio for many operators Demetre. That's why so many are willing to do practically anything to make WinLink stop generating QRM. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists; Ack *this*. You see now why the PBMOs cannot install any DCD mechanism that detects QRM and they leave the busy detection to be the responsibility of the client? Because people like you would misuse such a mechanism and the PMBOs would be rendered useless. This is a VERY bad practice that you and your followers excercise and hence you should have your license revoked for this action you just admitted yourself. +++Demetre, an anti-radiation missile is a weapon typically used to destroy air-defense radars by locking onto their transmitter frequency. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists was a humorous way of pointing out that PMBO QRM has generated widespread and massive frustration. Nowhere in this message -- or any other message I have posted -- do I advocate QRMing PMBOs. This sort of action would be as irreponsible as using or operating a PMBO, and I have made that point here on several occasions. +++I have heard the argument that WinLink can't now apply busy- frequency detectors because the amateur radio community is so angry at them for years of QRM that operators would camp on PMBO frequencies just to prevent them functioning. This argument is completely bogus - just another rationalization for continuing to generate QRM. While a few operators might QRM a few PMBOs for a few days, the effect would be minimal. Even the most perverse human operator won't sit at a station continuously just to QRM an automated station. He or she will get bored and go bother someone more likely to provide a reaction. 73, Dave, AA6YQ
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
IMNSHO malicious interference, interference that prevents or interrupts a QSO on a frequency from any source is ILLEGAL by the existing rules. The fact that this rule is not being enforced should generate information to the FCC on these interferences and requests to the same agency to clean it up. If I were operating on a frequency and one of these stations climbed on MY frequency (yes, I own it while operating on it legally) a report would go to the FCC the same day with time, frequency, and any identifying information on the interfering station. The squeaky wheel concept. Again in MO, any station operating unattended and generating RF interfering signals should NEVER be allowed on Amateur frequencies. If any persons/organizations wishes to operate in this fashion they should apply for licenses and frequency assignments that allow this type of operation. It certainly is more commercial than hobby. 73 Les At 01:36 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: +++ more AA6YQ comments below --- In mailto:digitalradio%40yahoogroups.comdigitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Demetre SV1UY [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: QRM from PMBOs and other deaf robots spoils the enjoyment of amateur radio for many operators Demetre. That's why so many are willing to do practically anything to make WinLink stop generating QRM. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists; Ack *this*. You see now why the PBMOs cannot install any DCD mechanism that detects QRM and they leave the busy detection to be the responsibility of the client? Because people like you would misuse such a mechanism and the PMBOs would be rendered useless. This is a VERY bad practice that you and your followers excercise and hence you should have your license revoked for this action you just admitted yourself. +++Demetre, an anti-radiation missile is a weapon typically used to destroy air-defense radars by locking onto their transmitter frequency. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists was a humorous way of pointing out that PMBO QRM has generated widespread and massive frustration. Nowhere in this message -- or any other message I have posted -- do I advocate QRMing PMBOs. This sort of action would be as irreponsible as using or operating a PMBO, and I have made that point here on several occasions. +++I have heard the argument that WinLink can't now apply busy- frequency detectors because the amateur radio community is so angry at them for years of QRM that operators would camp on PMBO frequencies just to prevent them functioning. This argument is completely bogus - just another rationalization for continuing to generate QRM. While a few operators might QRM a few PMBOs for a few days, the effect would be minimal. Even the most perverse human operator won't sit at a station continuously just to QRM an automated station. He or she will get bored and go bother someone more likely to provide a reaction. 73, Dave, AA6YQ No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.11/1200 - Release Date: 12/27/2007 1:34 PM
[digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
I'm glad to hear that you are using a busy frequency detector, Dave. The detectors in PK232 and SCS modems are certainly better than nothing, but are quite limited. Neither detects PSK31 transmissions, for example. As part of the SCAMP project, Rick KN6KB (a member of the Winlink team) developed a soundcard-based busy detector that was reported here to be very effective at detecting most modes found on the ham bands today. I have repeatedly suggested that Rick's detector be incorporated in WinLink PMBOs -- a straightforward and inexpensive process -- but there has inexpicably been no progress on this front for several years. Our HF amateur bands are a shared resource; no one can stake a claim of ownership of any frequency or set of frequencies unless an emergency has been declared. If contests draw more amateurs to the HF bands -- as intended! -- then yes, there will be more congestion and it will be harder to find a clear frequency on which to exchange messages. Using HF amateur bands to offer a message passing service with guaranteed quick delivery times is simply incompatible with the defined usage model for these bands. There are techniques you could use to optimize performance -- like QSYing to the WARC bands during contests -- but nothing short of exclusively-assigned frequencies would enable you to achieve a guaranteed Quality-Of-Service. I personally don't think the assignment of exclusive frequencies to specific sub-groups is consistent with amateur radio -- except during a declared emergency. 73, Dave, AA6YQ --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, David Struebel [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: - Original Message - From: David Struebel To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 4:33 PM Subject: Re: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Hi Everyone, I've been following this debate for the past several days and finally have to add my two cents. I'm part of NTSD, that's the National Traffic System Digital...We mostly use the old version of Winlink (before Winlink 2000) also reffered to as Winlink Classic running Pactor I II and sometimes III... We used to use AMTOR and Clover but have all changed over to Pactor... Many of us are still using PK- 232MBX's for Pactor I, others are using SCS TNC's All our connects occur in the automatic band segments... Winlink Classic has a very good busy detector in it... I've seen it work on not only Pactor, AMTOR, and Clover signals but other including RTTY, dead carriers etc... Winlink classic when it hears another signal, postpones the connect and then tries 15 minutes later for a total of three attempts at a clear frequency. I can tell you that with an active busy detector, our systems are almost helpless against RTTY signals that come into the automatic band segments especially during contests... Traffic thru put declines severely during these contests. We're happy with staying within the automatic band segments with our 500 Hz Pactor I and Pactor II signals... It would be nice if others realized that the automatic segments do contain stations with busy detector armed and ready and please refrain from casual operation there, especially during a contest. I know I'm going to get a lot of flack from those of you that don't like automatic stations, but like I said Winlink 2000 is not the only Pactor operation around running automatically... We prefer to stay in the automatic band segments... Please have the common courtesy to respect our operations. Dave WB2FTX Eastern Area Digital Coordinator- NTS Digital Section Traffic Manager- Northern NJ - Original Message - From: Rick To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 4:10 PM Subject: Re: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Packet? This does not have much to do with the subject though. John Becker, WØJAB wrote: Rick you of all people should know that one of the older systems had a auto-detect or busy detection that worked very good. -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.11/1200 - Release Date: 12/27/2007 1:34 PM
Re: [digitalradio] RM-11392
Hi Again, Steve, I think that you are also supporting protectionism as I am, only you don't think of it that way. It protects the users of incompatible modes from reducing the use of the spectrum. There may be no technical way for them to coexist unless you literally drive them off. Some may feel that way, but I do not. And it was not until I really tried using CW when the SSB operators encroached that I realized how bad it can get. The SSB operators may have multiple notch filters that can remove tones, but even that is not often satisfactory. CW can not cope well with SSB and similar waveforms, even with the narrowest filters. Now with digital modes, we see the use of either analog or digital SSTV image transmissions interspersed with SSB voice. It may someday be possible to merge DV with image since both need about the same signal strength (steady +8 dB or so) in order to operate.well so they are closely matched. They also sound the same and there is no practical way to filter out multiple OFDM type carriers since they pretty much fill the spectrum in their bandwidth. The segregation of narrow and medium and wide modes (as per the new Region 2 Bandplan) will help clarify things a bit if many hams adopt it. The ARRL attempted to get the FCC to create a new rule that would make bandplans a legal requirement, but the FCC chose not to accept this. Theoretically, you could be cited for not following a bandplan and I understand that this has come up from time to time. Where I find the rules ridiculous is where you can operate analog or digital voice and can operate image, but even though the signals may sound identical, you can not send text. As you know, I have asked the FCC to let us know what they interpret image and fax to be. I have no problem with whatever the FCC interprets, which may surprise you. None of this stuff is that important. What matters to me is that we understand what we can and can not do, even if that causes extreme reactions from proponents of ALE and other modes. It is true that when a government official makes a determination on such matters, it does have the force of law (contrary to what I have seen from other commenters). But once you have this clearly established, you can then ask for adjustments in the interpretation. I have done this professionally in my career in Environmental Safety and Health. Sometimes you win and sometimes you don't. But at least everyone then has the information. If there is a specific rule holding us back, I would like to hear what it might be. Almost no hams would support wide text data modes,on HF certainly not those wider than what would be considered a communications quality voice bandwidth. If you can not meet that standard, it is not much of a technological achievement to just go wider and wider to make something work better. The technological achievement is to use spectrum conserving modes that enhance the radio art. As you know, when conditions deteriorate there are fewer operators on the bands. That is the time that wider modes might be more appropriate to use. When conditions are good, there are a drastically increased number of operators. Remember that we have a shared band, not a specific channel with a specifically authorized bandwidth. Few of the wide modes are all that effective when conditions become poor. Even Pactor three drops to below 1000 Hz in width. As far as an agenda, of course you have an agenda. It is focused on ALE, and rightly so, if that is your special interest area. We all have one or more of them. Mine is to promote technology and cooperation that works for emergency communications. It can be digital or analog depending upon which is a better fit for a given solution. I have several other agendas such as promoting amateur radio as a leader in my county AR club, provide many classes to bring new hams into amateur radio, provide many test sessions over the years to make this happen, etc., etc. You stated that the MILSTD serial tone modem waveforms exceed both symbol rate and bandwidth in the current digital sub bands. This may be true of the symbol rate, but where do you see any restriction on bandwidth? Currently, is there any real bandwidth restriction in Part 97? ARRL's argument was that by their petition for bandwidth, they would eliminate wide bandwidth modes from developing. Hopefully, in answer to the question of attached files and other types of files being sent in the voice/image areas of the bands we will have an answer from my query to the FCC. The reason that I support a mixed voice/data concept in the voice area is because it is very unlikely that we will ever be given voice modes in the text digital area. The voice areas here in the U.S. are the largest part of the bands now. We already can use analog and digital voice and image any place we want in the voice portions of the bands athough a number of hams seem to not be aware of this.
[digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Dave Bernstein [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, kh6ty kh6ty@ wrote: I am quoting here my reply to DAVE about his Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PACTOR PMBO frequencies for your information! snip What about this Skip? Is this justified? Of course it is not justified! Demetre completely misrepresented the content of my post, Skip. Check the original and see for yourself: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digitalradio/message/25230 73, Dave, AA6YQ He he, It takes one to know one Dave. 73 de SV1UY
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Dave Bernstein [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: +++ more AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Demetre SV1UY sv1uy@ wrote: QRM from PMBOs and other deaf robots spoils the enjoyment of amateur radio for many operators Demetre. That's why so many are willing to do practically anything to make WinLink stop generating QRM. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists; Ack *this*. You see now why the PBMOs cannot install any DCD mechanism that detects QRM and they leave the busy detection to be the responsibility of the client? Because people like you would misuse such a mechanism and the PMBOs would be rendered useless. This is a VERY bad practice that you and your followers excercise and hence you should have your license revoked for this action you just admitted yourself. +++Demetre, an anti-radiation missile is a weapon typically used to destroy air-defense radars by locking onto their transmitter frequency. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists was a humorous way of pointing out that PMBO QRM has generated widespread and massive frustration. Nowhere in this message -- or any other message I have posted -- do I advocate QRMing PMBOs. This sort of action would be as irreponsible as using or operating a PMBO, and I have made that point here on several occasions. +++I have heard the argument that WinLink can't now apply busy- frequency detectors because the amateur radio community is so angry at them for years of QRM that operators would camp on PMBO frequencies just to prevent them functioning. This argument is completely bogus - just another rationalization for continuing to generate QRM. While a few operators might QRM a few PMBOs for a few days, the effect would be minimal. Even the most perverse human operator won't sit at a station continuously just to QRM an automated station. He or she will get bored and go bother someone more likely to provide a reaction. 73, Dave, AA6YQ Exactly Dave, This is because of people like you. You just admitted it, so don't cry now. You know all the techniques of war it seems. 73 de Demetre SV1UY
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Les Warriner [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: IMNSHO malicious interference, interference that prevents or interrupts a QSO on a frequency from any source is ILLEGAL by the existing rules. The fact that this rule is not being enforced should generate information to the FCC on these interferences and requests to the same agency to clean it up. If I were operating on a frequency and one of these stations climbed on MY frequency (yes, I own it while operating on it legally) a report would go to the FCC the same day with time, frequency, and any identifying information on the interfering station. The squeaky wheel concept. Unless you're willing to purchase an SCS TNC, you will not be able to know who or what QRM'd you. A requirement that all unattended stations identify in CW at least once within each 5-minute period of activity would eliminate this problem. 73, Dave, AA6YQ
RE: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
You caught me, Demetre. I did rent an F-16 last weekend and got all the way to Winlink Planetary Headquarters before realizing that the HARMs Hertz gave me were tuned to 7.105 GHz instead of 7.105 MHz as requested. So I buzzed the tower and flew home to beat the commuter congestion at Hanscom. What's your grid square? 73, Dave, AA6YQ -Original Message- From: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Demetre SV1UY Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 5:42 PM To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Subject: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Dave Bernstein [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: +++ more AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Demetre SV1UY sv1uy@ wrote: QRM from PMBOs and other deaf robots spoils the enjoyment of amateur radio for many operators Demetre. That's why so many are willing to do practically anything to make WinLink stop generating QRM. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists; Ack *this*. You see now why the PBMOs cannot install any DCD mechanism that detects QRM and they leave the busy detection to be the responsibility of the client? Because people like you would misuse such a mechanism and the PMBOs would be rendered useless. This is a VERY bad practice that you and your followers excercise and hence you should have your license revoked for this action you just admitted yourself. +++Demetre, an anti-radiation missile is a weapon typically used to destroy air-defense radars by locking onto their transmitter frequency. Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PMBO frequencies were on a lot of Christmas lists was a humorous way of pointing out that PMBO QRM has generated widespread and massive frustration. Nowhere in this message -- or any other message I have posted -- do I advocate QRMing PMBOs. This sort of action would be as irreponsible as using or operating a PMBO, and I have made that point here on several occasions. +++I have heard the argument that WinLink can't now apply busy- frequency detectors because the amateur radio community is so angry at them for years of QRM that operators would camp on PMBO frequencies just to prevent them functioning. This argument is completely bogus - just another rationalization for continuing to generate QRM. While a few operators might QRM a few PMBOs for a few days, the effect would be minimal. Even the most perverse human operator won't sit at a station continuously just to QRM an automated station. He or she will get bored and go bother someone more likely to provide a reaction. 73, Dave, AA6YQ Exactly Dave, This is because of people like you. You just admitted it, so don't cry now. You know all the techniques of war it seems. 73 de Demetre SV1UY
RE: [digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
But, it won't happen; the FCC Will take spectrum back, long before we ever evolve to the point of becoming better operators and having constructive discussion for the common good. Ham radio an't broke if the digicrats would wake up and smell the interferance coffie and work to be just another mode we would look at them in a whole new way ... Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your home page. http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs
[digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, kh6ty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I am quoting here my reply to DAVE about his Anti-radiation missiles tuned to PACTOR PMBO frequencies for your information! snip What about this Skip? Is this justified? Of course it is not justified! Demetre completely misrepresented the content of my post, Skip. Check the original and see for yourself: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digitalradio/message/25230 73, Dave, AA6YQ
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
Oh, I nearly forgot to ask you Dave, what's the matter with you and PACTOR-3? Has uncle Steve been bad to you recently? I can help you know!!! 73 de Demetre de SV1UY P.S. Please smile, this is only a hobby OM. MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY NEW YEAR to all.
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
At 04:23 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Again in MO, any station operating unattended and generating RF interfering signals should NEVER be allowed on Amateur frequencies. It's not ! under FCC rules
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Dave AA6YQ [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: You caught me, Demetre. I did rent an F-16 last weekend and got all the way to Winlink Planetary Headquarters before realizing that the HARMs Hertz gave me were tuned to 7.105 GHz instead of 7.105 MHz as requested. So I buzzed the tower and flew home to beat the commuter congestion at Hanscom. What's your grid square? 73, Dave, AA6YQ Well our old God APOLLO will not be kind to you Dave. Propagation is not good between us right now so I guess I am saved for the time being! 73 de Demetre SV1UY P.S. Please have a good drink OM, you might forget about PACTOR 3. It's Christmas after all.
[digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, W2XJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If you go to the SCS website, it clearly states that PACTORIII is designed for commercial operation, especially maritime. They then have a tanned rich German guy on the website giving a testimonial how the system works from his yacht. If people want to tie up marine frequencies with such a low speed system, fine. Personally I think if one can afford a sea going vessel with an installed ham station, they can carry Immarsat and move data at 64 kbps. This has no place on amateur frequencies. So are all the radios we use, ICOM, YAESU, KENWOOD, ALINCO to name a few. Are they commercial too? Noone is going to make something for nothing OM. These are all commercial radios and we like to call them Amateur because we like to use them. Same with the SCS modems. As for the rich tanned German guy, is it illegal to be rich and tanned now? Should we ban from the hobby the tanned rich Germans now? 73 de Demetre SV1UY
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
At 04:37 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Unless you're willing to purchase an SCS TNC, you will not be able to know who or what QRM'd you. A requirement that all unattended stations identify in CW at least once within each 5-minute period of activity would eliminate this problem. Dave I'm not to sure about this. My pactor station *WILL* ID in either CW or P1 my call no matter what pactor mode I'm running at the time. John, W0JAB
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
Band segments for narrow modes at the low end up to segments suitable for AM at the high end of each band seems a reasonable way to minimize intererence. However, the restriction on content needs to be eliminated so that stations in a QSO can send text, image or voice in analog or digital form as necessary within the maximum bandwidth allowed in that segment. 73, John KD6OZH - Original Message - From: Michael Hatzakis Jr MD To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:55 UTC Subject: RE: [digitalradio] Re: Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Maybe there is a better way too abolish higher bandwidth digital in the HF spectrum. How about futher band segent segregation? .
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
Demetre SV1UY wrote: --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, W2XJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If you go to the SCS website, it clearly states that PACTORIII is designed for commercial operation, especially maritime. They then have a tanned rich German guy on the website giving a testimonial how the system works from his yacht. If people want to tie up marine frequencies with such a low speed system, fine. Personally I think if one can afford a sea going vessel with an installed ham station, they can carry Immarsat and move data at 64 kbps. This has no place on amateur frequencies. So are all the radios we use, ICOM, YAESU, KENWOOD, ALINCO to name a few. Are they commercial too? Noone is going to make something for nothing OM. These are all commercial radios and we like to call them Amateur because we like to use them. Same with the SCS modems. As for the rich tanned German guy, is it illegal to be rich and tanned now? Should we ban from the hobby the tanned rich Germans now? 73 de Demetre SV1UY You miss all my points. I suspect you prefer it that way. Point 1 the website states that PACTOR III is designed for SSB HF channels. They also link to a number of commercial maritime service providers. This is the intended use. At least in the US and probably elsewhere, this on it's face makes the system illegal for amateur use since text and data can not be transmitted in the SSB band segment and SSB width signals are not permitted in the text data segments. It is a very simply a system designed for primarily marine channels and serviced by commercial gateways. My comment about the German guy speaks to selfish abuse of the amateur bands. If he has the money to be cruising the Mediterranean in his yacht, he can afford to pay a commercial PACTOR gateway and/or use immarsat. Immarsat is a superior solution to begin with. It would be interesting to see just how much PACTOR traffic violates various amateur rules pertaining to content and third party relay. In this country it could be argued that it also violates rules that pertain to automated stations. I am contemplating the purchase of an SCS TNC just to turn in the violators.
[digitalradio] Interface recommendations?
I thought that I had eliminated most, if not all of my RFI problems with my ICOM 756 Pro 2 when connected to my homebrew computer interfaces. But I still am having some problems. This is particularly true for the audio cable which picks up quite a bit of RF even though it has isolation transformers. I reduced the problem significantly with large 125 mu permeability rods on both the CI-V cable and the audio cable, but there is still some RF present. I have tried some bypassing capacitors although I found that if too large will cause the CI-V to not work properly. I have been looking at schematics of different units and might try some chokes, but am not sure what to use and where to put them. The problem is not so much when operating digital modes, but when I want to run power with SSB. I am forced to disconnect the cables from the computer to reduce the RFI affecting my transmitted audio quality. It also seems that my older emachines computer that I use with XP is more of a problem than the newer HP running Vista. This may be due to better shielding or improved design in the newer computer. Has anyone had actual experience with the problem and tried a number of interfaces? Which ones worked the best for you? The two that I am seriously considering are the MicroHam USB Interface II and also the Tigertronics Signalink (not the USB version). I know the Signalink has problems with some modes such as ALE signaling, but am hopeful that it will work good enough for most modes and will likely have the most isolation of anything available. There are a few other interfaces, but they either have worse isolation (West Mountain Rig Blasters) or cost more than I am willing to pay, (Navigator, etc.). 73, Rick, KV9U
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
At 05:46 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: I am contemplating the purchase of an SCS TNC just to turn in the violators. 1. what are you going to do when you find a KB2KB QSO going on? 2. how are you going to know for *sure* that anyone is being QRM'ed ? 3. under FCC rules there is no such thing as a unattended station. however there are automatically controlled data stations. Talk nice to me and I just may let you use one of the two SCS modems that I have. John, W0JAB
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
The best solution is then regulation by bandwdth so that text and data can be sent in the current phone/image segment. The rtty/data segments could become the 500 Hz bandwidth segments, the phone/image segments the 3 kHz bandwidth segments, and there could be 6 kHz and 50 Hz bandwidth segments at the top and bottom for AM and CW. 73, John KD6ZOH - Original Message - From: W2XJ To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 23:46 UTC Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition Demetre SV1UY wrote: --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, W2XJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If you go to the SCS website, it clearly states that PACTORIII is designed for commercial operation, especially maritime. They then have a tanned rich German guy on the website giving a testimonial how the system works from his yacht. If people want to tie up marine frequencies with such a low speed system, fine. Personally I think if one can afford a sea going vessel with an installed ham station, they can carry Immarsat and move data at 64 kbps. This has no place on amateur frequencies. So are all the radios we use, ICOM, YAESU, KENWOOD, ALINCO to name a few. Are they commercial too? Noone is going to make something for nothing OM. These are all commercial radios and we like to call them Amateur because we like to use them. Same with the SCS modems. As for the rich tanned German guy, is it illegal to be rich and tanned now? Should we ban from the hobby the tanned rich Germans now? 73 de Demetre SV1UY You miss all my points. I suspect you prefer it that way. Point 1 the website states that PACTOR III is designed for SSB HF channels. They also link to a number of commercial maritime service providers. This is the intended use. At least in the US and probably elsewhere, this on it's face makes the system illegal for amateur use since text and data can not be transmitted in the SSB band segment and SSB width signals are not permitted in the text data segments. It is a very simply a system designed for primarily marine channels and serviced by commercial gateways. My comment about the German guy speaks to selfish abuse of the amateur bands. If he has the money to be cruising the Mediterranean in his yacht, he can afford to pay a commercial PACTOR gateway and/or use immarsat. Immarsat is a superior solution to begin with. It would be interesting to see just how much PACTOR traffic violates various amateur rules pertaining to content and third party relay. In this country it could be argued that it also violates rules that pertain to automated stations. I am contemplating the purchase of an SCS TNC just to turn in the violators.
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
Dave, Thanks for your comments... We do make substantial use of 30 meters on a regular basis... However, within Eastern area we also rely heavily on 80 and 40 hence my comments By the way NTS has been around for over 50 years. Are your suggesting that we discontinue operations, especially during a contest? Dave - Original Message - From: Dave Bernstein To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 5:03 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? I'm glad to hear that you are using a busy frequency detector, Dave. The detectors in PK232 and SCS modems are certainly better than nothing, but are quite limited. Neither detects PSK31 transmissions, for example. As part of the SCAMP project, Rick KN6KB (a member of the Winlink team) developed a soundcard-based busy detector that was reported here to be very effective at detecting most modes found on the ham bands today. I have repeatedly suggested that Rick's detector be incorporated in WinLink PMBOs -- a straightforward and inexpensive process -- but there has inexpicably been no progress on this front for several years. Our HF amateur bands are a shared resource; no one can stake a claim of ownership of any frequency or set of frequencies unless an emergency has been declared. If contests draw more amateurs to the HF bands -- as intended! -- then yes, there will be more congestion and it will be harder to find a clear frequency on which to exchange messages. Using HF amateur bands to offer a message passing service with guaranteed quick delivery times is simply incompatible with the defined usage model for these bands. There are techniques you could use to optimize performance -- like QSYing to the WARC bands during contests -- but nothing short of exclusively-assigned frequencies would enable you to achieve a guaranteed Quality-Of-Service. I personally don't think the assignment of exclusive frequencies to specific sub-groups is consistent with amateur radio -- except during a declared emergency. 73, Dave, AA6YQ --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, David Struebel [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: - Original Message - From: David Struebel To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 4:33 PM Subject: Re: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Hi Everyone, I've been following this debate for the past several days and finally have to add my two cents. I'm part of NTSD, that's the National Traffic System Digital...We mostly use the old version of Winlink (before Winlink 2000) also reffered to as Winlink Classic running Pactor I II and sometimes III... We used to use AMTOR and Clover but have all changed over to Pactor... Many of us are still using PK- 232MBX's for Pactor I, others are using SCS TNC's All our connects occur in the automatic band segments... Winlink Classic has a very good busy detector in it... I've seen it work on not only Pactor, AMTOR, and Clover signals but other including RTTY, dead carriers etc... Winlink classic when it hears another signal, postpones the connect and then tries 15 minutes later for a total of three attempts at a clear frequency. I can tell you that with an active busy detector, our systems are almost helpless against RTTY signals that come into the automatic band segments especially during contests... Traffic thru put declines severely during these contests. We're happy with staying within the automatic band segments with our 500 Hz Pactor I and Pactor II signals... It would be nice if others realized that the automatic segments do contain stations with busy detector armed and ready and please refrain from casual operation there, especially during a contest. I know I'm going to get a lot of flack from those of you that don't like automatic stations, but like I said Winlink 2000 is not the only Pactor operation around running automatically... We prefer to stay in the automatic band segments... Please have the common courtesy to respect our operations. Dave WB2FTX Eastern Area Digital Coordinator- NTS Digital Section Traffic Manager- Northern NJ - Original Message - From: Rick To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 4:10 PM Subject: Re: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Packet? This does not have much to do with the subject though. John Becker, WØJAB wrote: Rick you of all people should know that one of the older systems had a auto-detect or busy detection that worked very good. -- -- No virus found in
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
If you'd actually read any of my posts, Demetre, you'd know that my focus is on automatic stations without busy detectors -- no matter what protocol they are using. In fact I recently posted here that banning Pactor III because a bunch of inconsiderate operators use it in PMBOs would be like banning automobiles because some people drive drunk. See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digitalradio/message/25201 73, Dave, AA6YQ --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Demetre SV1UY [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Oh, I nearly forgot to ask you Dave, what's the matter with you and PACTOR-3? Has uncle Steve been bad to you recently? I can help you know!!! 73 de Demetre de SV1UY P.S. Please smile, this is only a hobby OM. MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY NEW YEAR to all.
[digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
I have never heard a WinLink PMBO identify in CW. 73, Dave, AA6YQ --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, John Becker, WØJAB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 04:37 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Unless you're willing to purchase an SCS TNC, you will not be able to know who or what QRM'd you. A requirement that all unattended stations identify in CW at least once within each 5-minute period of activity would eliminate this problem. Dave I'm not to sure about this. My pactor station *WILL* ID in either CW or P1 my call no matter what pactor mode I'm running at the time. John, W0JAB
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
John Becker, WØJAB wrote: At 05:46 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: I am contemplating the purchase of an SCS TNC just to turn in the violators. 1. what are you going to do when you find a KB2KB QSO going on? Be darned surprised. There are almost zero, goosegg, nada keyboard-to-keyboard QSOs in Pactor. The mode is dead except for robots. de Roger, W6VZV
[digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, David Struebel [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thanks for your comments... We do make substantial use of 30 meters on a regular basis... However, within Eastern area we also rely heavily on 80 and 40 hence my comments By the way NTS has been around for over 50 years. Are your suggesting that we discontinue operations, especially during a contest? Not at all. I'm only suggesting that during congested conditions, it will take longer to deliver messages over the amateur bands. This is a desirable property of these bands, as Peter G3PLX so nicely pointed out. 73, Dave, AA6YQ
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
Listen to mineIt IDs in CW at the end of an unsucessful connect attempt and at the end of a completed connect... The rules allow for ID via Pactor exchanges in the interim showing the callsigns of both stations. Dave WB2FTX - Original Message - From: Dave Bernstein To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:26 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats I have never heard a WinLink PMBO identify in CW. 73, Dave, AA6YQ --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, John Becker, WØJAB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 04:37 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Unless you're willing to purchase an SCS TNC, you will not be able to know who or what QRM'd you. A requirement that all unattended stations identify in CW at least once within each 5-minute period of activity would eliminate this problem. Dave I'm not to sure about this. My pactor station *WILL* ID in either CW or P1 my call no matter what pactor mode I'm running at the time. John, W0JAB -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.11/1200 - Release Date: 12/27/2007 1:34 PM
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
Dave, Do you sit there at your computer waiting for any reply in this thread to immediately respond to? Dave WB2FTX - Original Message - From: Dave Bernstein To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:30 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, David Struebel [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thanks for your comments... We do make substantial use of 30 meters on a regular basis... However, within Eastern area we also rely heavily on 80 and 40 hence my comments By the way NTS has been around for over 50 years. Are your suggesting that we discontinue operations, especially during a contest? Not at all. I'm only suggesting that during congested conditions, it will take longer to deliver messages over the amateur bands. This is a desirable property of these bands, as Peter G3PLX so nicely pointed out. 73, Dave, AA6YQ -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.11/1200 - Release Date: 12/27/2007 1:34 PM
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
Dave Bernstein wrote: I have never heard a WinLink PMBO identify in CW. 73, Dave, AA6YQ That is because they never do. The SCS TNCs can be set to ID in CW, but in practice no one ever does. de Roger W6VZV
RE: [digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
No, I spend most of my amateur radio time DXing or working on DXLab. At this instant, I am finishing the release note for DXKeeper 6.0, a release on which I've been working for more than a year. Having been in the computer hardware and software business for 35 years, I can multi-task. 73, Dave, AA6YQ -Original Message- From: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of David Struebel Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:38 PM To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? Dave, Do you sit there at your computer waiting for any reply in this thread to immediately respond to? Dave WB2FTX - Original Message - From: Dave Bernstein To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:30 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Re: Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology? AA6YQ comments below --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, David Struebel [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thanks for your comments... We do make substantial use of 30 meters on a regular basis... However, within Eastern area we also rely heavily on 80 and 40 hence my comments By the way NTS has been around for over 50 years. Are your suggesting that we discontinue operations, especially during a contest? Not at all. I'm only suggesting that during congested conditions, it will take longer to deliver messages over the amateur bands. This is a desirable property of these bands, as Peter G3PLX so nicely pointed out. 73, Dave, AA6YQ -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.11/1200 - Release Date: 12/27/2007 1:34 PM
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
Dave, you said earlier that you were running Winlink Classic, not Winlink 2000.
That would make your station a BBS instead of a PMBO, wouldn't it?
Dave (the other one) was commenting about PMBOs. Maybe the WL2K code is
different?
73, Howard K5HB
- Original Message
From: David Struebel [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 7:36:45 PM
Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR
PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
Listen to mineIt IDs in CW
at the end of an unsucessful connect attempt and at the end of a completed
connect... The rules allow for ID via Pactor exchanges in the interim showing
the callsigns of both stations.
Dave WB2FTX
- Original Message -
From:
Dave
Bernstein
To: digitalradio@ yahoogroups. com
Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:26
PM
Subject: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on
digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
I have never heard a WinLink PMBO identify in CW.
73,
Dave,
AA6YQ
--- In digitalradio@ yahoogroups. com,
John Becker, WØJAB [EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:
At 04:37 PM
12/27/2007, you wrote:
Unless you're willing to
purchase an SCS TNC, you will not be
able
to know who or what
QRM'd you. A requirement that all unattended
stations identify in
CW at least once within each 5-minute period of
activity would
eliminate this problem.
Dave I'm not to sure about
this.
My pactor station *WILL* ID in either CW or P1 my call
no matter what pactor mode I'm running at the time.
John,
W0JAB
No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG Free
Edition.
Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.11/1200 - Release Date:
12/27/2007 1:34 PM
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Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
At 07:28 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Be darned surprised. There are almost zero, goosegg, nada keyboard-to-keyboard QSOs in Pactor. The mode is dead except for robots. Yeah Roger you keep saying that yet I seem to find them all the time. Have you given it a try?
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Questions on digital opposition, QRM on PACTOR PMBOS now from DAVE, Congrats
At 07:26 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: I have never heard a WinLink PMBO identify in CW. Like I said Dave my winlink station does it all the time. Either in P1 or CW. Now if I'm in a KB2KB QSO it will not I will force the SCS modem to do it. But under computer control it will. It's in use right now. and I will let you know what it does. Nice really nice - some lid with a PSK signal is tuning up and down the band to make sure he get's us. P1 ID when the link was dropped. John, W0JAB
[digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
Have you taken time to actually read the pro RM-11392 comments? Most all of them are individual thoughts. It is the winlink camp that is posting the boiler plate comments hoping that numbers not content will kill the petition. Greg KC7GNM --- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Peter G. Viscarola [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Anyone notice that the vast majority of the negative comments about the petition are (nearly) identical. Sort of reminds me of the Send the following letter to your Congressman! like the NUMBERS count and not the content. I sure wish that petitioners -- both pro and con -- would think for themselves and file thoughtful, personal, comments to help the FCC... instead of merely submitting what amounts to a form letter that expresses somebody ELSE's views. de Peter K1PGV
Re: [digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
John Becker, WØJAB wrote: At 07:28 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Be darned surprised. There are almost zero, goosegg, nada keyboard-to-keyboard QSOs in Pactor. The mode is dead except for robots. Yeah Roger you keep saying that yet I seem to find them all the time. Have you given it a try? Yes, for years. This year I finally realized that Pactor is dead dead dead as a QSO mode and I sold my SCS PTC-II. To a boater, by the way, not a ham. For over a year I never heard one K-to-K Pactor QSO; really none for several years. They aren't out there no matter what you keep saying. You keep telling us about all the digital QSOs you have on Pactor, but I never work you on any of the modes, and I have been active on all of them. de Roger W6VZV
Re: [digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
Yes I did. No matter what happens if you read starting at line 4 of page 11 of the PDF file you can see that this is no more then more damn noise from the anti-wide people. And I'll say it again here that under FCC rules there is no such thing as a unattended station what there is (for the clueless) automatically controlled data station. Got it? At 08:54 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Have you taken time to actually read the pro RM-11392 comments? Most all of them are individual thoughts. It is the winlink camp that is posting the boiler plate comments hoping that numbers not content will kill the petition. Greg KC7GNM
[digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, Michael Hatzakis Jr MD [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: For what it is worth, this is what I typed in my response to this proceeding. We should be focusing on finding ways to encourage more use of this spectrum, lest we lose it. With the elimination in the licensing requirement for CW, how crowded do we really think the bottom ends of the band will really be in 50 years with CW operators? I oppose this proceeding and a step backward in innovation for ham radio. I strongly oppose limiting digital automatic transmission on the HF bands. I strongly suggest leaving the bands as they are unchanged for the following reason: 1.) With the number of hams declining, and a decline in the use of CW modes, there really is no substantial risk of overcrowding in this spectrum. Well Pactor III is already crowding out the other modes and they want more space. They tried that already. Remember RM-11306? 2.) The automatic PACTOR II III modes are an invaluable service to nautical hams in urgent situations when no other communication may be available, i.e., cell phone or available HF phone operators. This is an innovative method of safety of operation for nautical operators. So you are saying that sailors are more important than other hams? There is a service called Sailmail that they can pay for that does the same exact thing? Why do you have to put this garbage on the ham bands? It is because they are cheap and want their free email. I guess Yahoo and Google have really made us cheapskates lately. 3.) If limitations in the use of automatic PACTOR use were really necessary, why not just band segregate their usage rather than completely ban them. Ok we give Pactor III it's own spectrum then we have to give packet, psk31, psk125, RTTY, CW, SSB, SSTVetc all their own spectrum. Now would this not kill innovation faster than limiting bandwidth of pactor III? Besides this RM does not ban pactor III as you seem to think it does. It only limits the Speed Level to SL1 and SL2. 4.) The hobby of ham radio would be better suited to increase the number of available operating modes to encourage further hams use of HF spectrum. See #3 above about giving each mode it's own slice of the amateur radio spectrum. Greg KC7GNM
[digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
--- In digitalradio@yahoogroups.com, John Becker, WØJAB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Ok so you are telling me there is always a live operator sitting at a PMBO 24/7? Unattended for the clueless means the station operator is not at the controls. Yes I did. No matter what happens if you read starting at line 4 of page 11 of the PDF file you can see that this is no more then more damn noise from the anti-wide people. And I'll say it again here that under FCC rules there is no such thing as a unattended station what there is (for the clueless) automatically controlled data station. Got it? At 08:54 PM 12/27/2007, you wrote: Have you taken time to actually read the pro RM-11392 comments? Most all of them are individual thoughts. It is the winlink camp that is posting the boiler plate comments hoping that numbers not content will kill the petition. Greg KC7GNM
[digitalradio] Re: Your excellent petition
Here we go again. All it takes to bring out the flaming and shouting matches is a controversial subject like this. I have nothing against thoughtful, constructive discussion and differences of opinion, but do we have to resort to this kind of stuff? Let's all act like grown-ups, eh? It's not just this forum, either. It gets old pretty quick when you see the same posts and arguments on a bunch of other forums. KCÃPTO Les
Re: [digitalradio] Re: FCC: Petition to Kill Digital Advancement
On Thursday 27 December 2007 01:34:56 pm [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If folks would utilize the time they spend complaining learning to be better operators, Interpretation: Learn to get out of the way of automated stations when they come on frequency without checking to see if the frequency is in use. learning to work through interference, Interpretation: Learn to recognize when an automated station just knocked you out of an ongoing qso. learning to master the features of the equipment they operate, Interpretation: Grab that tuning knob and get off my frequency, you clod. learning to operate alternative modes, Interpretation: On some other frequency. and most of all, learning to communicate... Oh, I understand what you've got to say. However, I'm convinced that you don't recognize rude behavior even when it is happening right under your nose. It isn't the mode that I'm complaining about. It isn't the frequency I'm complaining about. It isn't the bandwidth that I'm complaining about. It's the rude behavior that exists in the form of unattended stations smashing into ongoing qso's without looking to see where they are going. Y'all stop doing that, I'll stop complaining. If I went into your home and started smashing into things without looking where I was going, you'd soon want me to stop in just the same way.
Re: [digitalradio] Fw: [illinoisdigitalham] Will You Let FCC Kill Digital Radio Technology?
On Thursday 27 December 2007 04:35:11 pm David Struebel wrote: especially during contests... Traffic thru put declines severely during these contests. And this is as it should be. During heavy use, bandwidth is a limited resource. And if you have decent busy detectors and you detect that the frequency is in use, then you were not there first. This is not a new concept. If you are looking for guarantees, there are commercial solutions. Thank you for using the automatic segment and busy detectors.
Re: [digitalradio] JT65 - work in team
Patrick, Also look at the WSJT group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/wsjtgroup/ - Joe also has an inactive developer group. It would appear that much less than 1% of digital mode users actively develop software, I know many excellent software guys who are also Hams but they just don't have the spare time for digital mode software. As you know writing a program is easy - the support takes up so much time it's just not true! Simon Brown, HB9DRV - Original Message - From: Patrick Lindecker TKS for info.
