[Xastir] Winlink stations on APRS-IS

[Curt, WE7U]

On Tue, 24 Jun 2008, Eric Germann wrote:

> Not sure how legal it is, but I use N1ICS-W1 and N1ICS-W2 for the VHF and
> UHF Telpacs I run.

Those calls are fine for the APRS-IS, but there's no way in AX.25
protocol to represent the "W1" or "W2" SSID's, so they cannot be
transmitted over RF.  AX.25 has a spot for 6 letters or numbers,
then it has 4 bits for the SSID, so SSID can only range between 0
and 15.  Anything else in the SSID field '-' cannot be represented
in the AX.25 bits.


> On another note, our local club is building a weathernet on 145.050. 
> What's the process when you exceed 15 stations?  Right now they're W8FY-1
> to W8FY-11 but they will soon go past 15 when we deploy the new hardware.

Well, you _can_ go to 16 stations... W8FY-0 through W8FY-15.  W8FY-0
is the exact same as W8FY.  Most TNC's and packet programs drop off
the '0'.

If you have control over an APRS status field from those weather
stations and can transmit that field at least every 10 minutes (U.S.
rules), you can put "W8FY" in there and put something else in the
callsign field for those stations to keep them all separate.  That's
perfectly legal:  You're identifying the transmitter legally at
least every 10 minutes via status packets.

Of course there will be hams who are less familiar with the rules
that will tell you otherwise.

Technically you can identify the transmitters with morse code only
and have something entirely different in the packet callsign field.

You can also identify the stations with NO path at all, yet send
weather or posits over longer paths.  That's legal too although
probably not with the spirit of amateur cooperation.

It's always good to know where the exact boundaries are, then you
can know where to push.

-- 
Curt, WE7U.				archer at eskimo dot com
http://www.eskimo.com/~archer
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