Introducing a new paradigm in digital radio….
Remember the good old days of packet radio? Remember the problems on HF because
the stations were not hearing each other?
The solution is of course to make sure everybody hears everybody else.
We have the same problem on the PSKmail common APRS frequency. The moment I write this, there are 9 servers active on 10147.00. And none of them hears every other server because of the skip on 30 meters. The solution will be to provide a channel without skip.
Fortunately all servers are connected to the Internet. So it is easy to provide a channel without QRM and propagation problems.
The new server, pskmail_server-1.0.45, connects to a socket in the pskmail.org domain, and sends its PTT status to all other connected servers. So theoretically all servers know if the channel is busy, and can act accordingly.
Of course this function has to discriminate between frequencies and geographical locations.
pskmail_server-1.0.45 offers a test environment for experimenting with this new feature, which I call “Cloud Marshalling” (The servers use the Cloud to communicate their status).
I hope many server ops have the opportunity to test this if software is enhancing channel throughput… It would of course be ideal if all servers on 10147.00 would try this 🙂
The geographical footprint is limited to the servers between 70 and 35 degrees North, and -20 to +20 degrees East. So servers outside this range should not be blocked. Which has to be tested as well 🙂
Rein Couperus, PA0R
pa0r 