I'd like to chime in as one who does professional RF engineering for a living. I have worked with Roger for the last 10 years helping to improve radio mobile. There are so many features that the program supports now compared to when I started it just boggles the mind. That being said, it should be put in to perspective that commercial software packages for RF engineering cost from $15,000 to $70,000 dollars and do not perform any better than Radio Mobile. As a professional RF Engineer who has had to learn these commercial tools, I can tell you it takes a huge amount of time to learn any RF propagation software package and that there are no shortcuts or dummies guides. There is no substitute for time and persistence in learning any RF software package. Much of this will be spent in trial an error and reading the archives and tutorials. There are no shortcuts, mouse over or quick start guides. If RF design was as easy as an idiot proof software package, then anyone with a mouse could do it, there would be no need for expertise in the field. Spend the time to read the archives in the yahoo group and the tutorials. Impatience will not speed up anything and whining about a set of documentation or quick tools tips will not make you and RF design expert. Just because a person can point and click does not mean you can generate RF coverage maps. Some knowledge of RF theory helps so that one may understand the methods and settings within a program. If you want hand holding, cough up the 35 grand or so to purchase a commercial software package. I'm sure that is easier than reading a little bit... If I seem sarcastic it is because I really get annoyed at people who complain about a free lunch...This software package is free, quit complaining to the author about your lack of ambition to read the many manuals available on line. For those of us who understand the value of this free product, we dislike those who would say things to possibly discourage the author who donates his time and effort for free giving a product that would otherwise cost in the thousands of dollars..those who think they are entitled just because they sit behind a keyboard and can complain, need a reality check. If you don't like the product that you paid nothing for.simply move on and be quiet. This was never meant to be a for profit program...accept it for what it is and be thankful rather than complain. Any other options are far worse...
Brian From: wireless-boun...@wispa.org [mailto:wireless-boun...@wispa.org] On Behalf Of Fred Goldstein Sent: Wednesday, July 21, 2010 3:25 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Ping --- Radio Mobile Hates Me. At 7/21/2010 12:37 PM, Scott Reed wrote: If you have, join the Yahoo RM group. Lots of help there. Plus links to at least 2 tutorials. I've been there, and it helps. But it is not a substitute for a good collection of documentation. There's useful stuff on Roger's web site too, but it isn't always easy to figure out certain things, like when to use which mode to use for a network (spot, accidental, broadcast...) and what settings make the most sense. I use MapInfo a lot and it has thick manuals, the unabridged one being PDF only. Yes, it's expensive commercial software. I'm spoiled. ;-) I suppose a wiki might be a way for the community to collect its thoughts. I did see some interesting discussions on the Yahoo group about the nodes, and about the land cover. I roughly doubled the forest loss numbers, from Roger's default. This still might not be adequate, though, since it makes it seem *possible* to blast 5.8 GHz through the woods. Is 180 a good setting for most forests? Roger does this for a living and his employer sells a very nice commercial package. They have been nice enough to allow him to to RM for free, so we get a super program at no cost. This also means that Open Source is out, as I am sure the source is too similar to their commercial package. If you want the pay version, I am sure an e-mail to him would get you company contact information. What is the commercial product? He certainly hides any mention of it. If it's reasonable, I might look. I remember seeing an add-on for MapInfo, though. The price was roughly similar to the price of the local calling area database license. My car cost less, new. SPLAT looks to be a somewhat similar open source program, but much more limited in scope and not nearly as well updated. This is complicated stuff, I know. About 3/4 of the confusion might be solved by having a "mouse-over help" function, where you could right-click on a box and pop up a tutorial on what the values mean and how to set them. That could be an interesting volunteer project. Of course Roger's primary market is 2 meter repeaters, so the parameters we use in the WISP bands are a bit different... ...The only time I would see a need for antenna patterns is if you have a fixed-base AP and mobile CPE. If both are fixed-base, I am not sure what the patterns will gain you. I do the same thing; I have a 5.8 network, a 2.4 network and a 900 network. Most of my POPs are setup with 3 120* sectors, so all POPs are setup with an omni of the same gain as the sector antenna. In my experience so far, the results are fairly accurate when there is clear line-of-sight. If there are a significant number of trees in the path, it obviously is not so good. I suppose if you have 2 90* sectors trying to cover 360* you would want patterns to find the nulls and edges, but if you have antennas for full coverage, the pattern probably is not so important. For point to point links, antenna pattern does not matter , assuming you are planning to aim the antennas directly at each other as that is the assumption RM makes. Not all of the sectors need full-circle coverage, so I was thinking about using the model to see how it looked with partial coverage on some poles. This would save radios and antennas... In fact, with three sector radios and two backhaul radios (not to mention needing three backhaul radio "degrees" at mesh junctions), that exceeds the four-slot maximum of any one Routerboard, right? So do you often put back-to-back radios in one box? I think the only way to do sectors in RM is to treat them as separate radios, So if Unit 10 was three sectors, it might end up as say Units 10, 91, and 92, in the access network, right? The Yahoo group has also had discussions about exports and imports. There are several things you can do. Again, check out the tutorials. I would have to disagree about the need for many improvements. Granted, I have been using it for over 5 years, but I find everything to be where expected and do what it should. Roger is open to suggestion, though. Let him know what you would like to see. I don't want to disparage Roger and his great work; it's just little things. I just hate drop-downs, which RM's UI makes me use too often, especially for selecting radios. But also the fact that adding a radio requires going to both the unit properties and then the network properties is counter-intuitive and a bit clumsy. These sorts of things aren't show-stoppers, just places where it helps reduce one's sanity just a bit more. Which can be in short supply... Fred Goldstein wrote: At 7/21/2010 11:41 AM, MarlonS wrote: Radio Mobile hates everyone that doesn't use it every day. It's a great tool, but boy is it frustrating! Roger has done a wonderful thing by putting this out there for free and improving it as he has. But there are so many things that could be done to improve it, especially the clumsy user interface. If it were an open source project, then more people could contribute to the effort. If he had a premium payware version, then he'd have incentive to at least prettify the pay version. Documentation wouldn't hurt either... My current project has set up three "networks" using the same batch of nodes. One is 5.8 GHz backhaul. One is 900 MHz backhaul, for heavy-forest paths. One is 5.8 GHz access. When it does the "show networks", it doesn't seem to find the best path, but it's not terribly predictable as to which common "network" it's using. So I end up having to do path-by-path comparisons anyway. My next chore is to add antenna patterns. I think this means taking each node and turning it into two or three nodes, if it has two or three separate sectors. I can "save network" as a CSV, but that seems to only save the node locations. Copying network parameters between projects seems impossible. :=( grin marlon ----- Original Message ----- From: Robert West <mailto:robert.w...@just-micro.com> To: WISPA General List <mailto:wireless@wispa.org> Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2010 7:38 PM Subject: [WISPA] Ping --- Radio Mobile Hates Me. Ping. (Had to) Bob- Still fighting the animal that is Radio Mobile. -- Fred Goldstein k1io fgoldstein "at" ionary.com ionary Consulting http://www.ionary.com/ +1 617 795 2701
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