[FADCA] Anyone familiar with this?

[bud Thompson]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Chuck Hast" <wchast at gmail.com>
To: "FADCA" <fadca at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Thursday, August 17, 2006 20:45
Subject: [FADCA] Anyone familiar with this?


At a EOC meeting this package was brought up and was asked to look
at:


http://67.101.94.88/client/emergency_service_packet_client.htm

The part that appears to generate the most interest is the FEMA part:
  • FEMA Incident Command System ICS-213 General Message format.
  • Automatic matching of responses to ICS-213 messages without
     retransmission of original message.
Is any of this supported in the winlink link? The support of the messaging
format is what has them interested, I have asked the person who brought
it to me to try to set it up and test it as it maybe limited to one protocol
set (SEDAN's TheNet) and we would want it to be able to travel over
any of them that are available, from hf to light. Remember that our
switch sites are multi-protocol and though most of us have not turned
on or brought into play the others they are there for the most part (Flex
execepted as the germans would not release the protocol so you have
to use a bolt on that is a separate stack) IP, NetRom, ROSE, Appletalk,
X.25 and many others along with the HF stuff, so if this will work over
multiple protocols there is interest in using it for inter-agency messaging
due to the ics-213 message format.

If you google • FEMA Incident Command System ICS-213, you will get
a whole listing of sections for this very comprehensive system used by
FEMA.

I am wondering what we would need to do in order for winlink to support
it?


-- 
Chuck Hast  -- KP4DJT --

* * *

I believe this is not a WL2K matter - but could be - WL2K will handle any 
file as an attachment.  The major concern is file size at 1200b between 
paclink agw and Telpac node.  A 50K file is a pretty good file even if 
compressed by B2F to 30k or so.

The problem needs to be addressed first by the EMCOMMs groups who may be 
wanting to be ICS compliant.  Some do, some don't, and even those that do 
have not yet developed a universally "how far do we go?"

The way we have been handling that is to  use the FEMA template in MS word 
and then save as a .doc file and send it that way.  I've only played with 
that once (ICS-213) and never got a definitive response from the recipient 
and never returned to do any investigating.  (Busy Busy) The resulting file 
size is quite large but nothing that can't be handled by 1200b packet 
between Paclink agw and Telpac node.

Another technique is to use a form/template where the sender fills out the 
form and the data are saved as a delimited text file and sent as an 
attachment then the form is reconstructed on the other end.  The resulting 
file is much smaller and more efficient.  The only problem is a systematic 
one - using this technique assumes anyone you send such a delimited file to 
has the 'decoder' on the other end - and that is not yet been established a 
s norm.

The wl2kemcomm at yahoogroups.com has discussed this ad nauseaum w/o coming up 
with a standard.  You might find some more info there in the files section.

bud