[GreenKeys] The Old and The New

[Roy Norris]

I personally think it is a great concept.  It provides an easy way to
interconnect Teletype Machines so that they can be used as they were
intended.  A real step forward.  I just hope people connect real
Teletype Machines to the interface !  That seems to be what is occurring
and that is a verry good thing.  Bravo for George !!

I think you should call it "Wide Cast" since that really is what it
does.

I just oppose calling "glass teletype  -- computers using the Baudot
code" anything other than just that.  Teletype it is not.  

It's probably not practical to generate large quantities of broadcast
material on paper tape anymore due to the shortages and costs and
logistics of paper tape.  So doing it electronically is probably a
minimally invasive modification to the traditional Teletype station.
But when you hang MMTTY or one of the other Glass TTY programs on the
end of it instead of a Teletype Machine, it cease to be Teletype, in my
opinion.  It becomes just an inefficient use of computer equipment by
the use of inappropriate codes, speeds, and the elimination of error
checking protocols.  It just becomes a computer using Baudot code to
communicate with another computer.  That's not Teletype.  That's an
abortion.  

If you really want to go "retro" with your computer communications to
the extreme, go all the way back to Morse and have a program decode it
for you and put the characters on the screen and convert your keyboard
entries to the appropriate dits and dahs. (There are programs that do
that but I would never call their users CW operators  or what they are
doing as CW/Morse operation).

Use of the internet to transmit Baudot signals to real Teletype Machines
is a brilliant idea, in my opinion.  It solves so many problems while
retaining the true essence of Teletype operation.  It allows our non-Ham
Teletype enthusiasts to participate.  It does not require the erecting
of an antenna, which is a task that some of our older enthusiasts are
finding a little difficult to accomplish.  It does not require the
ownership of a good, stable shortwave radio.  

All it requires is a terminal unit which can be inexpensively obtained
over ebay (you don't need anything fancy since there is no interference,
noise, or selective fading to deal with  -- an ST-5,6, 5000, 6000 or any
of the cheap ones will do fine)  and signal strengths are excellent and
the same all over the world.  It is perhaps the perfect solution for
true Teletype (with machines) communications and makes it possible for
everyone with a machine to participate.

Now if you hang MMTY off the end of it you have a real kludge, in my
judgment.  If you want to receive text on you computer, slowly, why not
just use a 300 baud modem ??  At least you retain the CRC error
checking.

I hope the technology will be developed to allow Teletype over the
Internet to go two way so that it can be used just like do with RTTY.
That is certainly possible to anyone who wants to take the time to work
out the protocols and such (Bill Bytheway could do it !)

Old Teletypers did'nt worry about  whether it was a DC circuit or an
audio circuit that connected their machines.  They didn't care whether
the signals traveld through copper wire, steel wire, aluminum wire or
air.  I don't think we should care either.  Why not take advantage of
this tremendous, free resource for interconnect that we have called the
Internet.  But in the Spirit of this group, lets hang real Teletype
Machines on the ends.

If you want to use MMTY and play like you are doing Teletype, go ahead.
Anyone is free to pursue their own delusions.



Regards -- Roy Norris, K4EEG
______________________________________________________________________ 
"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant:
It's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

-----Original Message-----
From: greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net
[mailto:greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Eugene Hertz
Sent: Friday, February 25, 2005 8:08 AM
To: gil at baudot.net; GreenKeys
Subject: Re: [GreenKeys] The Old and The New

Maybe we ought to coin a new acronym, "ITTY" instead of RTTY to describe
George's teletype over internet as opposed to teletype over radio.
(Internet Teletype vs Radio Teletype)

Eugene



>3) George's internet audio project: you need a TU to use this with 
>your tty, but this whole concept is very exciting. Yeah, it's not 
>radio, but it allows everyone to listen in to a broadcast, and drive 
>real hardware. If George and Bytheway manage to make this interactive, 
>we will have a world-wide tty network! Even if that proves too 
>daunting, the internet broadcast is great. Another non-audio 
>possibilty is a chat room. 



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