Mark Griffith KDØQYN's goal for this project was to design and build a super-simple, ultra-portable system for using Amateur Radio to send and receive email in disaster situations when all else fails... without carrying in a wheelbarrow full of equipment and wires and taking a "two days" to set it all up.
The result: PiGate, a tiny Raspberry Pi-based Winlink gateway.
IPv6 is the brand new addressing scheme for the Internet that will solve all the problems of running out of addresses that IPv4 will run into... um... yesterday. It will provide enough unique addresses to assign one to approximately every molecule of matter on the planet, or at least all the Internet of Things things that Scotty Cowling listed in HRN 289. And by brand new of course we mean 20 years old. And in Internet years, that's old.
We learn all this from Bryan Fields W9CR at the 2016 ARRL & TAPR DCC in St. Petersburg FL. Bryan was a local host for this DCC. He's made presentations the 2015 and 2016 Hamvention® TAPR forums.
And as Bryan explains, this topic affects Amateur Radio in a couple of ways. One is the HamWAN project, a wide-coverage, high-speed data network on 5 GHz. Bryan runs the system in Tampa, and it uses IPv6 addressing. The other is that ham radio has one of the few remaining large blocks of unused IPv4 addresses. And they're worth some money (real money).
Links:
2015 TAPR Forum (HRN 207) https://youtu.be/eAzkSP2nt0M
2016 TAPR Forum (HRN 254) https://youtu.be/IFcESjoWSP8
2013 DCC HamWAN Seattle (HRN 128) https://youtu.be/Vhj9bS8n9jM
The always entertaining Scotty Cowling WA2DFI has been working on a tiny corner of the Internet of Things, so he goes into that corner in detail at the 2016 ARRL & TAPR DCC. His little corner expands to fill the available space.
Last Man Standing is a hit, prime-time TV sitcom on ABC starring Tim Allen as Mike Baxter, a husband and father of three girls, employee of Outdoor Man (an outdoor-everything store like Carbellas or Bass Pro Shop) and ham radio operator KA0XTT. Ham Radio appears in the background of every show, with a fully functional shack in Mike's Outdoor Man office. Two episodes have put ham radio right in the spotlight as a major part of the story.*
Last Man Standing co-Executive Producer John Amodeo NN6JA has often told the story of how ham radio came to be part of this TV show. If you missed it on other ham media, he'll repeat it here, but then go into far greater depth about how ham radio does and doesn't fit into it, ham radio in general media (and why most shows get it 'wrong'), John's personal history (he thought he was going into the ski industry), and a little on ham radio's own new media.
John says that he appreciates HamRadioNow for our long-form programs. He'll really like this one, not (just) because he's on it, but because it's over 2½ hours of in-depth one-on-one with KN4AQ.
*We've reviewed Last Man Standing episodes twice before when they aired those episodes that put ham radio front and center. Here are links to the YouTube videos (sorry, not available as audio just now):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoXFUgQK8qI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfzS-SjS_k8
Because this is an extra-long show, we remind you that it's a good candidate for our audio podcast version - that's just the audio lifted straight off the video and presented as a classic podcast on your favorite app. Or just download or listen to it right here.
TAPR's John Ackermann N8UR details this little Arduino based device - he calls it a stopwatch - that will measure time to the trillionths of a second. Why does anyone need that, when, according to Star Trek, it's possible to give verbal start-stop commands controlling spacecraft going faster than light? Aaaaand... Go! But we digress.
This is a fully assembled device, not a kit (Gary will make that mistake in the intro).
Author Jim George (JK George) N3BB talked to Gary about his (relatively) new book Contact Sport at the 2016 Dayton Hamvention®. The book takes you deep into the world of the participants of the 2014 WRTC (World RadioSport Team Championship), perhaps the most elite contest in Amateur Radio. Jim was embedded with one of the teams, but got lots of additional detail through interviews (and spies?). As a former WRTC competitor and referee, he knew what to look for. And as a writer, he knew how to tell the story.
LINKS:
Emcomm Extra co-host David Goldenberg W0DHG reviews a hospital Emcomm drill that he participated in a few weeks ago.
Then Army MARS Program Manager Paul English WD8DBY/AAA6B introduces us to Air Force MARS Chief Dave Stapchuk KD9DXM/AGA5C, and they review the MARS/Ham Radio Interop Exercise A Very Bad Day.
Mel Whitten K0PFX leads this double-length session to show how practical High Definition Digital Amateur Television is for you, today. Great picture, lower bandwidth, and affordable equipment available now.
Download a PDF of KN4AQ's VHF/UHF Band Chart: PDF
Gary wrote A Ham's Night Before Christmas back in 1996, and performed it live at several radio club meetings that December, and over the next few years. Then it found new life on the web as text, audio, and finally video. In this episode, Gary recreates the live performance, blended with the classic QST December covers and ads from the original video.
And here's a link to some background and the TEXT.
Here's a version with just Gary's voice - no music. You can play this over the air, on repeaters, etc.:
One more thing… Gary has produced four slightly different video versions of A Ham’s Night Before Christmas. The ‘original’ in 4x3 ‘Standard Definition’, an ‘ARRL’ version of that (replacing the ‘Wayne Green’ line), the High-Def ‘Special Edition’, and finally this ‘live’ version. He’s collected them all in this YouTube Playlist… for those who can’t get enough.
Tampa Bay NWS Warning Coordination Meteorologist Dan Noah WX4DAN joins Dan and Gary to talk about SKYWARN Recognition Day. The Special Event will see 24 hours of ham operation from dozens of National Weather Service offices from 7 PM Friday December 2, to 7 PM Saturday (Eastern Time).
SKYWARN is well known, but needs lots more participation from hams, especially in rural areas.
We haven't heard a lot from FCC Special Counsel Laura Smith lately, but she spoke at Pacificon, a large ham conference in the San Francisco area, last October. Her talk was recorded by Bob Miller WB6KWT and his son Robert KA7JKP, and Bob gave us permission to use the talk for HamRadioNow.
Gary adds a long intro, with a summary of the talk's highlights and a few comments, along with a status report on the Amateur Radio Parity Act, before we play Laura's talk in full.
The title is a bit of click bait. Laura does actually talk about repeaters and uses that phrase, but she talks about a lot of other things, too. The headline should probably be about the plan to have ARRL Official Observers work closer with the FCC on initial investigations of complaints. We've put time-links to each of Laura's topics in the YouTube description so you can zero in on those if you want to.
There is life left in P25, perhaps the first somewhat popular digital voice mode on Amateur Radio VHF/UHF. The life comes from a linking system that David Krauss NX4Y introduces at the 2016 DCC. He calls it P25NX - Network Exchange.
The P25 mode started in Public Safety radio in the mid '80's. After about 10 years, those guys say their radios are due for replacement. Hams bought the trade-ins and put them on the ham bands. But the repeaters were isolated islands. D-STAR became more popular because repeaters were linked, bringing in traffic from around the country or world. P-25 is about to have even more cheap equipment on the market as they migrate to Phase 2, and David's link system could make P25 a competitive mode in ham radio again.
AREDN Project Manager Andre Hansen K6AH details this mesh based data network that's up and running in the San Diego CA area. It uses the 2.4, 3.4 and 5.9 GHz ham bands to haul data across the region, and then distribute it to local users, with a primary EmComm goal.
Andre gave this talk at the ARRL & TAPR Digital Communications Conference in St. Petersburg FL in September 2016.
From the ARRL & TAPR Digital Communications Conference in St. Petersburg FL, September, 2016. Lou Romero W4LT has been doing the remote for a long time - before it became the popular thing it is today. He'll tell his story, review the options for private and public remotes, club-based remotes, Off the Shelf and DIY.
This is not super-technical talk. It's more 'what the pieces are and how they go together.' Lou will demo his club's system at the end of the talk, and there's some good Q&A.
Scotty Cowling WA2DFI details a new TAPR kit that turns a Raspberry Pi into a 20 meter WSPR beacon - cheap and easy. From the 2016 ARRL/TAPR DCC.
the original title....
The Sunday Seminar is the annual deep dive in to a single subject at the ARRL and TAPR Digital Communications Conference. It runs from 8 AM to noon on Sunday as the wrap-up to the three-day event.
In 2016, Michelle Thompson W5NYV and Dr. Bob McGwier N4HY teamed up to paint a picture of what the Future of Amateur Radio (and pretty much all radio) will look like. It starts with smart radios that figure out how to share spectrum with one another, and goes from there. The Ham Radio 8.0 idea comes from HamRadioNow host Gary Pearce KN4AQ, not Michelle or Bob, but he thinks they might agree. Gary makes his case in his introduction to Part One.
We're presenting Michelle and Bob's talk in three parts (three videos/audios), mostly to keep the video file size and compression reasonable. We take our break when they did at the conference. It's a lot to watch, so it's also available in audio that you can listen to on your phone when you're on the go. Here's how to subscribe to the HamRadioNow podcast.
HamRadioNow's video of the DCC is made possible by our KICKSTARTER backers. Thanks to 75 hams who ponied up over $6000 to cover the cost of shooting, editing and producing the 20 videos that make up the conference.
Michelle Thompson W5NYV talks spectrum and cognitive radio. She expects technology to really disrupt the radio art in the near future. Just how that happens is for Parts TWO and THREE
In the intro, Gary mentions a pair of TV shows that have a significant ham radio component:
Bob McGwier N4HY begins his portion of the Sunday Seminar.
Bob reviews a lot of history as he lays the groundwork for his prediction of a major shakeup in communications (and Ham Radio) that he'll detail in Part Three.
Bob McGwier N4HY makes his case for The Future of Amateur Radio... and why we need it.
Agree? Disagree? The discussion starts now, but like it or not, the technology is right around the corner.
Links:
Yeah, the MARS Attacks title is just click bait. But really, MARS, the Military Auxiliary Radio Service, will be sort of invading the ham bands in a new kind of interoperability test. If you're quick, you'll catch it - it starts at 11 PM Eastern on Sunday, October 30, 2016 on 60 meters. Even if you miss it live, this show will give you some good background. Co-Host David W0DHG and Gary talk with Army MARS Program Manager Paul English WD8DBY, and go in depth (this is HamRadioNow) on the test and the MARS system today.
Gary KN4AQ and new Co-Host David Goldenberg W0DHG launch the HamRadioNow EmComm Extra with Episode 2, because Episode 1 was a rush job during the onset of Hurricane Matthew.
This time they talk to two hams who participated directly in ARES activity as Matthew roared by. Scott Roberts KK4ECR is an Assistant EC and PIO for Clay County ARES, just outside Jacksonville FL. Linda Selleck KJ4EVV is the EC for Berkeley County ARES, next to Charleston SC.
Before the interviews, David and Gary talk about what they'd like the EmComm Extra to be. We're not going to hold them to it, but it'll give you a clue.
FEMA Chief Technology Officer Ted Okada K4HNL addresses the 2016 ARRL & TAPR Digital Communications Conference. Unlike most DCC talks, this is not highly technical, but Ted does conclude with a challenge to develop digital tools to advance the art of preparing for and responding to disasters.
