2023-12-22 - Reimagining Amateur Radio Repeaters in the MMDVM Era, Interesting Thread on digitalvoice Mailing List, Bob “Coop” Cooper K6EDX / ZL4AAA is a Muted Microphone
I agree with your article. Perhaps made a bad example. But I also think there are additional problems. 1. Lack of interest. Few are willing to roll up their sleeves and do this hard work, often for free. 2) poor documentation. I messed around with flexes apps, for example. They are doing a poor job cultivating a dev community.
Hi Steve - Maybe I’m just being dense but help me understand how high volume data networks would be used in ham radio. Still images when the need is maybe really for streaming video in emergency situations? Files of what kind of data? If the networks were there now, exactly how would they be used? Some examples that aren’t edge cases? Thanks! -Ed WA6AXX
Steve- Just started reading Zero Retries and it is very interesting with focus on things not talked much about in any Ham Radio magazines with a look to the future- very refreshing- Thank You
Steve said: I’m continually amazed that these systems are being developed, manufactured, sold, and supported… solo by WB6CXC.
-- And I am amazed at how easy it has become to do this stuff. The modern tools such as KiCad, and the (relatively) inexpensive scopes, signal generators, and spectrum analyzers, along with the extremely affordable PCB fab (and sometimes assembly) make rapid development and turnaround possible for us mere mortals. And of course the available software tools. And the CAD / NC milling tools for hardware prototypes. Yes, you need to understand how to design the circuits and systems, but that's what you get from years of working in the trenches. It's never been easier. Or more fun!
It also helps to hook up with people who have challenging problems that need solving. If I were doing this purely for my own amusement I would be much more likely to quit half-way through a project (I've got boxes full of half-baked ideas).
Boy, a lot to unpack here this week. I've been putting off building (rebuilding) the K0RV-DR repeater, mostly because when it went offline due to a wear-leveled microSD card a few years back I didn't get get it right back online right away, so some of the knowledge escaped to the aether. As things progressed the MMDVM-Pi hat was released along with a prebuilt Pi image of the Brandmeister firmware. Since I was basically the only ham club member with a D-Star radio I thought going to the Zum radio MMDVM Pi hat would be better for a club callsign repeater. However, there's registration across multiple networks needed, all the stuff that's specific to DMR, and generally not much in the way of a manual. Sure, there's plenty of "just click on this and enter that" how-to videos but not much that explains what's going on under the hood. So I get a little bent out of shape over not knowing what it is I'm actually doing, and go for a walk. Repeat every few months when the urge strikes. Don't get me wrong, I'm really happy that binary blobs exist, and the application is excellent. But without access to a good Elmer who can explain it at a level that goes beyond "click on the box" would be nice. And maybe get rid of the extra registrations and such. I have coordinated repeater with a license. Shouldn't that be good enough?
But, on a positive note, one of the big discoveries this year was ChatGPT 4's ability to write Python scripts, including GNU radio flow graphs. I've been using it for several simple tasks that I probably could write out on my own, but why? I still need to debug but it is much easier than staring at the blank screen wondering where to begin.
Thanks for the continued coverage of Project Yamhill! It's all been 'pencil whipping' at this point, but it should get a lot more interesting soon, and I'm pushing to get PCBs to fab in the very near future. Definitely want to beat Chinese New Year. I also just made a very large order of prototype components from Mouser, so things are in motion on that front.
The P3ST is interesting to me, as another modular type of project. Funny how multiple people will often come out with similar things at similar times.
Regarding the whole digital regulatory debate, I'm all for modernizing our regulations and easing up on the constraining regulatory environment for digital emissions, but I do feel strongly that legacy modes on HF such as CW and SSB need to be protected as well. Last I looked into it, the voice codecs used on HF that use the same bandwidth as SSB were still of inferior audio quality to SSB. Also, CW still plays a very important role as our premier low-bandwidth mode that can get through in marginal conditions and with simple gear. For the perhaps selfish reason that I believe there always needs to be a path to learning and deploying analog modulation in amateur radio (especially using home built gear). Also, I know that CW is very important for SOTA and POTA ops, for multiple reasons.
A long winded way of saying let's move forward without discarding the past that still is useful.
Are you aware of
https://www.flexradio.com/documentation/smartsdr_freedv_waveform_installer-exe-2/
I agree with your article. Perhaps made a bad example. But I also think there are additional problems. 1. Lack of interest. Few are willing to roll up their sleeves and do this hard work, often for free. 2) poor documentation. I messed around with flexes apps, for example. They are doing a poor job cultivating a dev community.
Appreciate what you do. Keep speaking truth
Hi Steve - Maybe I’m just being dense but help me understand how high volume data networks would be used in ham radio. Still images when the need is maybe really for streaming video in emergency situations? Files of what kind of data? If the networks were there now, exactly how would they be used? Some examples that aren’t edge cases? Thanks! -Ed WA6AXX
Steve- Just started reading Zero Retries and it is very interesting with focus on things not talked much about in any Ham Radio magazines with a look to the future- very refreshing- Thank You
Steve said: I’m continually amazed that these systems are being developed, manufactured, sold, and supported… solo by WB6CXC.
-- And I am amazed at how easy it has become to do this stuff. The modern tools such as KiCad, and the (relatively) inexpensive scopes, signal generators, and spectrum analyzers, along with the extremely affordable PCB fab (and sometimes assembly) make rapid development and turnaround possible for us mere mortals. And of course the available software tools. And the CAD / NC milling tools for hardware prototypes. Yes, you need to understand how to design the circuits and systems, but that's what you get from years of working in the trenches. It's never been easier. Or more fun!
It also helps to hook up with people who have challenging problems that need solving. If I were doing this purely for my own amusement I would be much more likely to quit half-way through a project (I've got boxes full of half-baked ideas).
Boy, a lot to unpack here this week. I've been putting off building (rebuilding) the K0RV-DR repeater, mostly because when it went offline due to a wear-leveled microSD card a few years back I didn't get get it right back online right away, so some of the knowledge escaped to the aether. As things progressed the MMDVM-Pi hat was released along with a prebuilt Pi image of the Brandmeister firmware. Since I was basically the only ham club member with a D-Star radio I thought going to the Zum radio MMDVM Pi hat would be better for a club callsign repeater. However, there's registration across multiple networks needed, all the stuff that's specific to DMR, and generally not much in the way of a manual. Sure, there's plenty of "just click on this and enter that" how-to videos but not much that explains what's going on under the hood. So I get a little bent out of shape over not knowing what it is I'm actually doing, and go for a walk. Repeat every few months when the urge strikes. Don't get me wrong, I'm really happy that binary blobs exist, and the application is excellent. But without access to a good Elmer who can explain it at a level that goes beyond "click on the box" would be nice. And maybe get rid of the extra registrations and such. I have coordinated repeater with a license. Shouldn't that be good enough?
But, on a positive note, one of the big discoveries this year was ChatGPT 4's ability to write Python scripts, including GNU radio flow graphs. I've been using it for several simple tasks that I probably could write out on my own, but why? I still need to debug but it is much easier than staring at the blank screen wondering where to begin.
Thanks for the continued coverage of Project Yamhill! It's all been 'pencil whipping' at this point, but it should get a lot more interesting soon, and I'm pushing to get PCBs to fab in the very near future. Definitely want to beat Chinese New Year. I also just made a very large order of prototype components from Mouser, so things are in motion on that front.
The P3ST is interesting to me, as another modular type of project. Funny how multiple people will often come out with similar things at similar times.
Regarding the whole digital regulatory debate, I'm all for modernizing our regulations and easing up on the constraining regulatory environment for digital emissions, but I do feel strongly that legacy modes on HF such as CW and SSB need to be protected as well. Last I looked into it, the voice codecs used on HF that use the same bandwidth as SSB were still of inferior audio quality to SSB. Also, CW still plays a very important role as our premier low-bandwidth mode that can get through in marginal conditions and with simple gear. For the perhaps selfish reason that I believe there always needs to be a path to learning and deploying analog modulation in amateur radio (especially using home built gear). Also, I know that CW is very important for SOTA and POTA ops, for multiple reasons.
A long winded way of saying let's move forward without discarding the past that still is useful.