[FARC] On APRS

[Kirk Talbott]

Excerpts from Bob Bruninga's foreword in Stan Horzepa's book, "APRS-Moving Hams on the Radio and the Internet."

On Bandwidth:

"The availability of almost infinite bandwidth for "free" on the Internet, fiber, or backbones has made a paradigm shift that most ham operators have not awakened to yet; I.e. that the mountaintop microwave or repeater sites are dinosaurs and not only worthless, but a liability."  

"To most hams familiar with repeaters and digipeaters the concept of making their ranges less, using lower towers, and giving up mountaintop locations is repugnant to the past ways of thinking.  Nevertheless, it is the only way to go forward."  

"A mountaintop or very tall microwave tower these days sees too much spectrum making it almost useless."

"..... as APRS grows in an area, its early, high digipeater sites become liabilities which hold back bandwidth instead of being an asset.   It is time for the local APRS operators to wake up to the fact that the local APRS RF channel should only be optimized for end-user access and should not be used for any long-haul transportation of data.  We must begin to evolve our high digipeater sites to long-haul backbones and move that data off of the user access channel to allow for growth." 

On Applications:

"The second key point that is missed by most newcomers to APRS is the wide possibilities of applications that are usually overlooked by everyone's fascination with the mobile vehicle location aspect of APRS.  APRS was never designed to be an automatic vehicle location (AVLS) system.  APRS is a local data network for exchange of any data that is of need to hams in range.  Of course the advent of GPS made vehicle tracking a perfect application for APRS, but AVLS is not the driver of the APRS protocol, network, or its potential applications."

 

Sorry Joe, I still contend APRS is a solution looking for a problem.  It should not be considered as the only altermative digital system for emcomm in any locality.  

The prime directive of APRS, "the local exchange of data that is in need to hams in range," can be accomplished easily by 2-meter simplex, given the fact that the APRS powers-that-be want to tear down all the repeaters.  "Local" implies that we don't need the Internet.   If we need to do long-haul exchange of data there is E-mail on the Internet or cell phones on the Internet.  Hey, aren't cell phone towers dinosaurs too?

APRS has its own problems which of course weren't discussed in this book and which everyday use of APRS will illuminate.  As an automatic vehicle location system, APRS does this really well, too bad it wasn't its intended purpose.  

As to what APRS' intended purpose is as outlined in Bruninga's foreword, this is amorphous.  Bruninga went on at length about direction finding being a good primary application.  For APRS to "direction find," the lost individual or vehicle must transmit its position, the assumption being he has a working radio and a GPS.  I contend, if you have a GPS you can't be lost and don't need to be found.   I will concede the fact that the "lost" individual could be injured in an accident with the radio/GPS unit on and undamaged and working as an emergency locator transmitter.   But wouldn't this come under the heading of vehicle location system?   

APRS and all it has to offer may be fine as long as access to the Internet is up.  Oh, and the last time I checked use of the Internet wasn't free. The more communications systems begin to rely entirely on the Internet, and after the high mountain repeater tower sites are torn down and hauled off, the Internet will become even less "free."    The Internet has been around for a long time now, I wonder why those old dinosaurs weren't torn down years ago?

Bruninga's agenda appears to promote APRS to the exclusion of all other systems.  I would concede that APRS has an application in emcomm as an adjunct to the use of all other systems.  To many "eggs" in one basket can't be a good thing.    

Touted as a "for-fun" exercise, which it very well may be, I believe Operation Golden Packet could be masking the hidden agenda of gathering data that helps to artificially elevate the merits of APRS and accentuate Bruninga's negative points above about mountaintop repeaters.  In all probability this is not the case but you never can tell.   Bruninga's disdain for mountaintop repeaters is apparent and forceful and carries over to the hams whom have apparently been asleep for all these years.  The red flag of "no so fast" pops up, or should, with the advent of zealots.  Beware.  

Yeah, I use APRS on the computer and on the Kenwood TM-D710 which is a good rig.  I think it's neat to tell W3ICF-2  mobile that he has a heavy foot and that his altitude is a little low, especially when he doesn't know how to message back to me on his TM-D710 yet.  But my ears were burning.  To label APRS as a novelty may be too harsh, but what APRS is is another cool digital mode like Packet, Pactor, Amtor, RTTY, PSK31, Olivia et. al., and that's all it is.   No need to storm Gambrill mountain with torches to take down a repeater.  


73
KB3ONM
Kirk