[FADCA] RE: APRS WL Only

[Rick Muething]

Bud/ All

Some important clarification on how all the Telpac gateway reporting works

With the latest Telpac 1.1.7 and later there are essentially 3 Reporting
mechanisms that can be used.

1) The RF Beacon from the Telpac gateway on the Telpac gateway frequency.
This can be done using either the AGWPE or the direct serial port provided
you set the beacon text and parameters up. The parameters are in
minutes....Bud's example is incorrect. EVERY 30 is every 30 minutes.
The beacon on the Telpac frequency can be in APRS format as is described in
the docs. That just means it will show up on a map IF the potential user is
listening on the Telpac frequency with an APRS compatible plotting program.
This beaconing is fine but the problem is that unless the potential user
knows the frequency and baud rate he of course won't find the beacon....not
particularly good for a mobile user.

2) If APRS reporting is enabled on the Telpac setup menu a report is sent
DIRECTLY to the APRS servers (actually two servers are used for redundancy
alternating every period). This does NOT go through the CMBO or have
anything to do with the CMBO. It is also possible to direct the beacon to a
user described server and port if necessary. Those servers distribute the
beacons (in real time) to other local APRS IS servers on the internet. The
reason for using the -WL "ssid" was so that these other servers could key
off this unique ssid to gate the Telpac nodes for redistribution by RF. If
only the call and standard ssid (0-15) were used there would be no way for a
server to gate without specifically knowing the call sign to key which
causes maintenance work for the server operator. This was decided by the
APRS guys after discussion and debate ad nausium but I think is a good
compromise. These local APRS servers gate this beacon ONTO the local APRS RF
frequency as received in real time. This is normally 144.39 in most areas.
So If you are in an area and tune to 144.39 with an APRS plotting program
you will see those Telpac gateways local (as defined usually as a radius) to
the APRS IS server. This provides  important information to the potential
Telpac user: The frequency of the Telpac gateway, The call sign and
true -ssid of the gateway, baud rate of the gateway, the estimated range of
the gateway  and location of the gateway and the fact it is a WL2K Telpac
gateway.  To get this the user will have to look at the received packet and
these are very conveniently displayed on the popular Kenwood D7 and D700
screens. The length and syntax of the APRS report were carefully chose to
report well on the Kenwoods. There is no mechanism to display all this
information with just a map symbol so you can see that displaying the symbol
as a consistent Callsign-WL at least indicates it is a Telpac gateway.  The
real value of this mechanism is it provides all necessary Telpac gateway
info to the radio user either mobile (so he may not be familiar with the
area) or the user that has no internet connectivity to use either the
regular Find U servers or the WL2K Telpac status below.  Using a
standard -10 ssid for Telpac gateways is a good idea but as you can see
there is other info (frequency etc) that must also be known and this cannot
be displayed on a simple map symbol so the user must still look at the
actual packet.

3) If the AutoCheckin feature is checked this reports the Telpac gateway's
status (basically ...I'm alive) to the WL2K CMBO (future CMS). This will
then be used to keep a list of active Telpac gateways. This is now working
on the CMS code (not yet in use). Gateways are flagged if current (< 1hr) or
questionable > 1 hr. Gateways are dropped from the dynamic listing if they
haven't reported in 24 hrs. This will allow the internet user easy access
(including sorting of various fields) to the current ACTIVE Telpac gateways.

We'll refine all this a bit as time goes by. For example perhaps having the
internet Find U servers pop up the details (frequency, call/-ssid, range,
baud rate) of the Telpac gateway when clicked on.  The important thing is we
now have the ability to communicate all the required Telpac gateway info on
one standard APRS frequency (144.39) in real time.

I hope this clarifies things a bit.

73,

Rick KN6KB



-----Original Message-----
From: n0ia-11 at winlink.org [mailto:n0ia-11 at winlink.org]
Sent: Sunday, February 27, 2005 07:33 PM
To: n6zue at arrl.net; fadca at mailman.qth.net
Cc: rmuething at cfl.rr.com; oderr at bellsouth.net; k4cjx at comcast.net;
N3PPC at winlink.org; W8EHH at winlink.org; W5TWR at winlink.org;
N4KOX at winlink.org; willy3jax at covad.net; cyber-bill at juno.com;
N4ZEO at winlink.org; n4xeo at bellsouth.net; WB4MOZ at winlink.org
Subject: Re: APRS WL Only



----- Original Message -----
From: <n6zue at arrl.net>
To: <N0IA-11 at winlink.org>
Cc: <rmuething at cfl.rr.com>; <oderr at bellsouth.net>
Sent: Sunday, February 27, 2005 15:54
Subject: APRS WL Only

> Hi Bud,
>
> I played around with this a bit today.  Here's what I came up with:
>
>
http://mm.aprs.net/map.cgi?call=*-WL&lon=-82.2&lat=27.8&range=7&map=APRSworl
d
>
> On your request for the SSID to be shown, my -10 is not even listed on
> APRS
> (findu).  My -WL is listed just fine. It appears the data is sent from -10
> but that data doesn't seem pertinent to the APRS system.  Only everything
> after the semicolon seems to be collected for display purposes.  Here's my
> raw packet:
>
> Raw packet: N6ZUE-10>APWL2K,TCPIP*,qAC,N6ZUE-10:;N6ZUE-WL
> *272032z2754.87NW08218.59WaRNG0050 144.910 1200b winlink.org Telpac
>
> Like you said, maybe there needs to be a standard (10).  This research has
> brought up another point in my mind -- should the AGWBeacon sent out by
> Telpac reflect the -10 or the -WL -- since it is being beaconed as APRS
> formatted data....    Just a thought.....
>
> 73
> Gregg
> N6ZUE

* * *
All-

Thanks, Gregg.. yes,the RAW PACKET shows the ssid - that much is good, but
maybe the -10 as a standard is still needed for those who can't get that far
in the APRS MAPMAZE.

'This APRS WL url Gregg supplied is the one I like...

>
http://mm.aprs.net/map.cgi?call=*-WL&lon=-82.2&lat=27.8&range=7&map=APRSworl
d

but our individual County Emergency Managers will want (easier) access to
about a 75 mile radius from their specific locations (i.e. including each
bordering County.)

. . .   but most won't know how to navigate from a state-wide map to their
area (I'm having a problem with that too) - eventually each Emergency
Manager (or who ever) will want to have an IE FAVORITE/BOOKMARK reference
that will take him/her to the static area he/she is interested in.

We are getting there -this is exciting

> Like you said, maybe there needs to be a standard (10).  This research has
> brought up another point in my mind -- should the AGWBeacon sent out by
> Telpac reflect the -10 or the -WL -- since it is being beaconed as APRS
> formatted data....

I need to learn much more... There are two 'beacons' -

(1) Goes out on the Florida Layered Packet LAN the TelPac is on.. that one
is the only one that goes out over the radio.

This is the beacon my TelPac makes from c:\program
files\Telpac\AGWbeacons_1.txt

; Beacons file for AGW Packet Engine
;  This file defines the beacons, beacon text, path and interval ; for all
ports
; Any line with a leading ";" is ignored
;  Any text following a ";" is ignored
; Format is port number space [BTEXT, EVERY, TO, VIA Dig1, Dig2, ;       ...
Dig7]
; A maximum of 7 digis can be used each separated by a ","
; Setting EVERY 0 will disable a beacon.
;  TO and DIGIS must have 10 or fewer characters
; The following example is for Port 1 beacon using two digis with
;  a destination of USERS
; with the following line of beacon text for port 1
1 BTEXT N0IA-10 Winlink 2000 TELPAC node (EL98pf) Deltona ARRL ARES Message
capable (http://www.winlink.org/Emergency.htm)
1 EVERY 30; Beacon port number 1 every (30 x 60 seconds =)5 minutes
1 TO USERS; Destination of USERS
1 VIA N0IA-8; Using this 2 Digi string for the unproto beacon on port 1
; Other ports here. Ports can be in any order

If you get serious and have more than one Telpac incidences on more than one
VHF/UHF frequency, you'll have to ferret all this out!

We have virtually zero 'users' on the LAN, so beaconing every five minutes
is not too much. For every five user than start monitoring 24/7 I'll reduce
the beacon by five minutes until it is every 30 minutes.

(2) The other is a 'check in' with the WL2K CMBO via Telnet.  That one
contains both the WL2K-required information and the information that is
passed along to the APRS server by the CMBO. There is no problem with check
in every 30 minutes and there apparently is no reason for making it any less
frequent so far as APRS is concerned.  My understanding is the APRS maps
will show a posting for ten days after the last check in - It would be best
if for WL Telpacs if that were 24 hours!

Anyone with more updated knowledge - please step in.

bud N0IA