[FADCA] Re: Networking, Hi speed Hf, et al

Thu Aug 18 23:06:57 EDT 2005

At 10:35 PM 8/18/2005, you wrote:
>  I can see a advantage to having the whole network on the same software
>problems are solved faster and  up time can be at 99%+   numbers are the way
>of the future  years ago we tried that but the software of those days  didnt
>work  but sure the techonology woud today and how hard would it be to get a
>routing system based n ip address's .

That is what we have now for the most part now John we are based on 
numbers for the destination site.

>  the only sad thing i see is a migration away from bbs systems over the
>years  the users went away so did the bbs systems , Maybe one day it will
>return

It depends where you are. My bbs never went away just the users. I 
still forward with 5 bbs's here on the east coast. We never stopped.

>god  I miss the late night keyboard sesions to all aparts of the
>world  but those days are gone forever .
>     Get a system working and lets all get on the same wagon  and make it
>work .

The network DOES work and we never stopped working on it. But it has 
been a small handful that have been doing all the work around the 
state and I thank them for staying with it!!!

  It is up to the people in the areas that the network needs updating 
to get involved and help out with it. The few of us and I'll say bud 
and Charlie in your area can't do it all. I think they are taking 
care of 4 or 5 switches up your way because no one else will take 
them over and work on keeping them running. They are still trying to 
get the Orlando switch moved back to Orlando. All they need is a site 
and the switch is ready to go...

>    I no longer get active because of health problems  but
>  one day I may return to the air in this remote west central florida area
>still got all my junk ,
>   personally I dont care how they do it up north! This isn;t the north! but
>thats my 2 cents worh and I am sticking to it

The message I put out didn't have anything to do with "how we do it 
here or there" It was just a request as to why and how we do what we 
are doing.  Just the fact that Rick is in Wisconsin and knows about 
FADCA must mean we are doing something right with FADCA and our network.

Here is his full message. All he is looking for is information.

Perhaps I missed a message? Did Bob comment on linlink about mode development.

On a related note, is anyone here in the states using the PSKmail 
program yet. This has to be one of the most exciting developments in 
terms of someone actually being able to engineer an ARQ mode forged 
from an existing digital sound card mode. Even if it is not the 
optimum mode, it is a major breakthrough.

I have some questions that some of you experts may be able to help me with:

1). Is either the server or client version of this Linux software 
(PSKmail) possible to develop on Windows XP or are there limitation 
in the later Windows OS that make this impossible? I have heard that 
it is theoretically possible to do this. Then you would have a much 
larger pool of potential interest since Linux is still almost unused 
by U.S. hams.

2). Is it true that Windows XP and other versions of Windows after MS 
DOS are not able to auto boot? If you lose power to a computer driven 
node and you need it to restore to full operation when unattended can 
this be done in current MS OS's? This seems to be one of the main 
factors driving the use of Linux FPAC with FADCA in Florida.

3). Is there anyone on here from FADCA or who might know how and why 
different network node software is used. Namely, comparing the FPAC 
and Flexnet. Or steer me toward someone who has experience with both 
and who has that knowledge. I have talked with others, such as the 
FlexNet folks in New England, but everyone seems to only know their 
own network and pretty much ignores anything else. I suppose that is 
human nature:) But still, when you consider the tremendous 
development effort of world wide amateur radio software solutions, it 
is painful to see how much work has gone into what may be dead end 
solutions, when what we really need may not be well addressed. Or at 
least the energies are not being focused in that direction. 
Rightfully, though, the developer is usually going to do things that 
interest that individual and you can not blame them for that. But 
what if there was some kind of critical mass or formation of a group 
who can come up with desirable designs of what is needed?

4). Could we hear more about efforts being done toward some kind of 
high speed HF modem? I know Walt has spoken of this often and to me 
privately, but I have not heard of anyone else who supports his view 
of an unconnected, non ARQ mode of transmission. Is there some 
interest group working on this approach?

5). Is the ARRL planning any proposals of any kind? I have not heard 
of this. Right now, ARRL seems to be more inclined to move emergency 
communications toward the internet and Winlink 2000, and away from 
RF, as the main solution. I happened to contact a league staffer in 
the past week or so about another issue and although he personally 
has no interest in digital issues or even emergency stuff (its mostly 
a hobby thing for him) he is totally sold on Winlink 2000 as the 
solution. And nothing could dissuade him from that support.

Thanks for any help on this.

73,

Rick, KV9U

>  John
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Chuck Hast" <wchast at gmail.com>
>To: "Florida Amateur Digital Communication Association"
><fadca at mailman.qth.net>
>Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2005 10:10 PM
>Subject: Re: [FADCA] Re: Networking, Hi speed Hf, et al
>
>
>Bill,
>I will let you decide on how you want to handle this, but this is the
>same crap that Bud got from the people who changed the node at
>Cocoa and Melbourne to Flexnet, we have a state full of FPAC or
>even X1J and they moved two sites in the middle of nothing to Flex.
>
>Bud wanted to know if there was a way to go through the Flex stuff
>in order to link two FPAC switches, I do not think that Flex will trans-
>port the 01 PID of ROSE/FPAC. more below...
>
>
>On 8/18/05, Bill Sinbine <n4xeo at bellsouth.net> wrote:
> >
> > Below is a copy of what I sent to Rick kv9u and the linlink group.
> > Can anyone that is much better than I send a reply to this message
> > with more information than what I did please? You can either sent
> > your reply to me and I'll get it to Rick and the list or you can send
> > it direct to Rick. His email address is in this message..
> >
> > 73, Bill N4XEO
> >
> > CU all at the tech conference Saturday!!!!
> >
> > At 03:45 PM 8/18/2005, Rick Williams wrote:
> > >
> > >2). Is it true that Windows XP and other versions of Windows after
> > >MS DOS are not able to auto boot? If you lose power to a computer
> > >driven node and you need it to restore to full operation when
> > >unattended can this be done in current MS OS's? This seems to be one
> > >of the main factors driving the use of Linux FPAC with FADCA in Florida.
> >
> > Windows will auto boot. I have mine set up that way here at the house.
> >
> > The main reason that we are starting to move to Linux FPAC is that
> > the dos version hasn't had any updates in YEARS.....
> > The Linux version already has many more options to use. I don't think
> > we will ever move the entire network over to linux but having key
> > sites running it will add so much more that we can do with it.
> > Winblows just has too much overhead and isn't stable enough to use at
> > all the remote sites that we have. It takes MUCH more horse power in
> > windows to do the same job with fpac using a old 486 with 8 meg of
> > ram running in dos. This is why we have never looked at running fpac
> > in windows. I don't even know if it would run in windoze!!!
> >
> > >
> > >3). Is there anyone on here from FADCA or who might know how and why
> > >different network node software is used. Namely, comparing the FPAC
> > >and Flexnet. Or steer me toward someone who has experience with both
> > >and who has that knowledge. I have talked with others, such as the
> > >FlexNet folks in New England, but everyone seems to only know their
> > >own network and pretty much ignores anything else. I suppose that is
> > >human nature:) But still, when you consider the tremendous
> > >development effort of world wide amateur radio software solutions,
>
>Of all of the solutions at least ours is based on ITU protocols (X.25 and
>X.121) and will transport all of the rest. I can not say so for the rest of
>them and those that do are a real pain in the but to do.
>
>Now he is getting in to the old "They don't do it that way up naawth"
>syndrom, to which my retort is go back up nawth if you do not like the
>way we do it. ROSE now FPAC was born here in Florida based on the
>old GatorNet product which turned into COSI and then ROSE.
>
>
> > >it is painful to see how much work has gone into what may be dead
> > >end solutions, when what we really need may not be well addressed.
> > >Or at least the energies are not being focussed in that direction.
> > >Rightfully, though, the developer is usually going to do things that
> > >interest that individual and you can not blame them for that. But
> > >what if there was some kind of critical mass or formation of a group
> > >who can come up with desirable designs of what is needed?
> >
>FPAC is no more deadend than Flex, indeed show me where FLEX is
>used as a commercial protocol (FPAC uses X.25 as the netowrk and
>X.121 as the addressing, both are used in the GSM/GPRS/EDGE world,
>if you are running a GSM phone is HAS a X.121 address buried in it
>somewhere in order to do data).
>
>Not only that but if you learn how to do X.121 addressing the IP addressing
>will not be that big of a step to take, but if you are used to some
>rinkydink
>networking system like NetRot or Flex which routes on of all things
>callsigns
>then you are in for a rude awakening...
>
>In the end I think our desire is to move the whole thing to IP and FPAC will
>just be a transport layer for IP like eithernet or ATM or any of the
>numerous
>protocols that form the backbones that IP rides over. The advantage that we
>have over the others is that the guys who did FPAC and ROSE understood
>that they were working with a real world network that might some day have
>to talk to othe real world networks and so they tried to make it work as
>near
>as possible to real world with such as IP.
>
>
>
> >
> > I'll cross post this to the FADCA reflector and send you any replies
> > that I get Rick.
> >
> > I'll leave the answers to others that are much better at explaining
> > it but I will have so comments here also.
> >
> > FPAC in the Linux version has almost all of the networks built in,
> > Rose, netrom etc. All you have to do is set it up and run it.
> > One of the main reasons we here in Florida went to ROSE years ago was
> > that netrom didn't work for us for what we needed. With Florida being
> > flat we have no big hills or mountains to get hundreds of miles in
> > one hop. Our sires are on average 25 to 30 miles apart. We are now
> > trying to push sites upwards of 50 miles. With running netrom with
> > all the overhead that it takes for all the nodes to know where
> > everyone is there wasn't much space left for the traffic.
>
>As we have discussed many times in the past, the move to LInux will allow
>for the using of other protocols as we get the foundation laid. The
>foundation
>being functional Linux machines, initially doing FPAC and of course IP along
>with Netrom, though probably the latter will not be turned on until we have
>the
>other stuff debugged. We can add flex to it as we get a chance as it too can
>run in there, the idea being to provide as many possible network solutions
>as possible.
>
> >
> > With the ROSE protocol it is easier to set up our network in a
> > hardened fashion. We know where and how our routing will work and we
> > have alternate routes set up if a backbone would go down. We took
> > this approach with keeping smaller lans to reduce the "hidden
> > transmitter syndrome" . When we were running netrom and the band
> > would open we say a reduction in data flow. This is why we opted for
> > small lans with dedicated backbones. Works much better .
>
>The networking tables for ROSE/FPAC are quite simple and only need to
>know enough about the network to route a packet down the path that needs
>to get it there. We do not have to store the entire network universe in each
>node in order to route a packet, just enough data about the route to start
>it going that way. I know that Flex has the automatic network building piece
>I would like to see that put in FPAC, perhaps we can get someone to look
>at the code and get it in there, I think that the WP is a step that way, in
>the end once that is done, all you would have to do is tell the new switch
>about it's neighbors, and tell each neighbor about the new switch then they
>should exchange the proper data and the new switch would build it's routing
>based on the neighbors data, and the neighbors would add the new switch
>to the routing and also propagate that data on down the line, there is a
>point
>at which it will no longer need to be propagated because the addressing to
>get a packet to that switch is too granular to need to have that fine of
>data.
>
> >
> > Some of us have looked into flexnet years ago and it didn't fit in
> > with the network that we needed to have. I couldn't even get a copy
> > of the node software so we just gave up and continued improving our
> > FPAC network. Now there is no turning back. We did loose a lot of our
> > network after 4 major hurricanes came through here last year. The
> > only up side to it is that with needing to rebuild sites we can
> > improve them also.
>
>The Flex guy that was here at the Networking Conference was a real asshole,
>when we asked him about using X.121 addressing on Flex rather than callsigns
>he was real condecending and treated us like we were from some real remote
>place, but I always compare his protocol to ours and see that the real world
>is based on numerical addresses, and all of the routing is done that way. I
>have yet to see a network that routes on callsigns, strictly speaking you
>COULD
>do it at least at the country leve, but then if you try to use the
>rest of the call
>you are screwed, hey!! look at me, I am kp4djt, now a router based on
>callsigns
>would say hmmm K = USA, KP4= Puerto Rico, all I will route this packet to
>USA/PUERTORICO, but I am in Florida so that one gets shot out the door...
>
>Yes the internet uses domain names, but they always map to a address, there
>is no escaping it numbers rule when it comes to routing.
>
>
> >
> > And YES Florida is still a long way from getting back to where we
> > were before last year. I still don't have my house finished and I'm a
> > lot better off than a lot of people here. Enough about that....
> >
>
>Well, I waxed long on that one, but these yankees piss me off when they
>pull that 'up nawth' stuff. If they don't like it they can shut up and go
>back
>to where they came from.
>
>See ya tomorrow or Sat a.m.
>
>--
>Chuck Hast
>To paraphrase my flight instructor;
>"the only dumb question is the one you DID NOT ask resulting in my going
>out and having to identify your bits and pieces in the midst of torn
>and twisted metal."
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Think about it .....
A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing on usenet and in e-mail?

73, Bill Sinbine
n4xeo at bellsouth.net 