Integrated Asterisk VoIP & Amateur Radio

[SquireJohn-p40]

Though still not "full up" a D-STAR homebrew radio has been built. See: http://www.moetronix.com/dstar/

There are other projects underway, including Open Source software and hardware designs.

Hams are not Public Safety ... there are several aspects of APCO25 that I find incompatible with the main purposes of Amateur Radio (e.g. central authority to issue radio ids) --- D-Star is growing much more rapidly in Amateur Radio circles than APCO25, though there are APCO25 repeaters and radios on the amateur bands.

-- John K7VE

[SquireJohn-p40]

Lets take this idea into a real disaster area, the gulf coast after Katrina. We had two jump teams from our stake (The Huntsville Alabama Stake of Zion) that arrived within hours after the storm had passed through. There was no power, no phone, no internet, no cell phones, no running water, no street signs, big tree limbs covering the roads, you get the picture. The skies were very overcast so sat phones were marginal especially since the people who had them had not used them in so long the could not remember how.

To truely be useful, this kit would need to operate when all connecting infrastructure is unavailable.

Post Katrina, Alabama has become the most D-STAR active region in North America (mostly in the last year), if not the world. They have provisioned a significant number of D-STAR systems, including portable repeaters with Satellite earth stations. See http://www.arrl-al.org/Alabama_link.htm

Southern Baptist Disaster Relief is part of this system. Just think if the stakes were tied into this system and SLC had systems online for the field relief teams to use for ordering supplies and personnel ... plus as supplies and personnel were moved around, the DGPS system could keep everyone updated.

If you are anywhere near Huntsville, there is a great opportunity to learn more next month. "The International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) has announced that Global Amateur Radio Emergency Communications Conference 2007 (GAREC-07) will take place in August in conjunction with the 2007 ARRL National Convention at the Huntsville Hamfest." See: http://www.hamfest.org/

-- John

[SquireJohn-p40]

The only part of a stake conference link that would be questionable is the music and that should be alright because it is a digital transmission.

Ithink this one has been addressed and the fact that the music is digitally encoded does not permit it to be sent over amateur radio. Using Amateur Radio to broadcast Stake conference would not be in line with the basis and purpose and would certainly cause the Church[font=&quot]embarrassment and potentially cause loss of licenses if a complaint was filed.

Let's keep the use of Amateur Radio to emergency preparedness, public service, and personal hobby/recreational activities.

Also the use of "digital techniques" e.g. digital voice does not permit them to be used in the digital (e.g morse code, rtty, packet, psk31) portions of the bands. Some new Techs have messed up on this one.

-- John
[/font]

[SquireJohn-p40]

I am not sold on the idea of a proprietary digital format. I am not sold on the idea of a single manufacturer spec for digital.

You might enjoy:
Thoughts on Open Source vs. Proprietary Techonology and D-STAR


http://k7ve.ampr.org/index.php?option=c ... &Itemid=26

[The_Earl]

incompatible with the main purposes of Amateur Radio (e.g. central authority to issue radio ids)
-- John K7VE

Interesting dilemma.

On the one hand, all amateurs have an FCC ID that is required when they are on the air. On the other hand, D-Star users are finding that if they have multiple radios, or more importantly, a radio and a repeater, the one call will not work for them and they need a unique id for each.

Bottom line, you can't route traffic without an address, and addresses must be unique if you don't include the routing information with the traffic.

You and I need to get together sometime to chat about some of this stuff. I will be at the Sept UARC meeting, or you can PM me to set up a time.

AD7PE

[SquireJohn-p40]

Interesting dilemma.

On the one hand, all amateurs have an FCC ID that is required when they are on the air. On the other hand, D-Star users are finding that if they have multiple radios, or more importantly, a radio and a repeater, the one call will not work for them and they need a unique id for each.

Bottom line, you can't route traffic without an address, and addresses must be unique if you don't include the routing information with the traffic.

You and I need to get together sometime to chat about some of this stuff. I will be at the Sept UARC meeting, or you can PM me to set up a time.

AD7PE

All correct. The main difference being APCO25 needs a central authority to generate a radio ID that is not the legal callsign ID and generally requires special programming software from a vendor. On the other hand, on D-Star, users can create their own IDs based on their callsign that are unique for addressing and can be more or less ad hoc. The repeater callsign issue is an artifact of the Icom implementation that may or may not be an issue in future versions of the controller/gateway software, but getting a "club" callsign is not a big deal.

-- John, K7VE
http://k7ve.ampr.org
http://groups.google.com/group/utah-d-star-users

[DarrellBray-p40]

Post Katrina, Alabama has become the most D-STAR active region in North America (mostly in the last year), if not the world. They have provisioned a significant number of D-STAR systems, including portable repeaters with Satellite earth stations. See http://www.arrl-al.org/Alabama_link.htm

Southern Baptist Disaster Relief is part of this system. Just think if the stakes were tied into this system and SLC had systems online for the field relief teams to use for ordering supplies and personnel ... plus as supplies and personnel were moved around, the DGPS system could keep everyone updated.

If you are anywhere near Huntsville, there is a great opportunity to learn more next month. "The International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) has announced that Global Amateur Radio Emergency Communications Conference 2007 (GAREC-07) will take place in August in conjunction with the 2007 ARRL National Convention at the Huntsville Hamfest." See: http://www.hamfest.org/

-- John

Any info on how this has developed?

[Mikerowaved]

Any info on how this has developed?

Hi Darrell. You quoted a few different developments. Which one did you have in mind?

[DarrellBray-p40]

The potential for the stakes to get tied into the system. Did it ever move beyond the 'idea' stage?

[The_Earl]

The potential for the stakes to get tied into the system. Did it ever move beyond the 'idea' stage?

In order for stakes to use d-star systems, all they would need is a d-star capable radio.

If you are talking about more integration than that, I doubt the church would invest the money. I am not aware of the church funding or sponsoring repeaters of any kind.

I do not know if there are plans to get d-star capable radios at bishop storehouses, or roll d-star equipment out to ERC groups.

I speculate that the church is having enough trouble getting good-old-fashion 2m FM and HF in all the places it wants it, and is not concerned about staying at the cutting edge of the technology curve.

The Earl