• Weather or APRS station?

    From xqtr@21:1/111 to All on Sun Feb 17 11:29:34 2019
    I have an idea for sharing weather and/or APRS packets through echoareas. Is there any one who uses such systems? I don't want to grab the packets from the internet. The packets should come from software connected to a HAM radio or a device for weather data collection. Can someone help with the format of these packets/files?

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  • From toofargone@21:4/132 to xqtr on Sun Feb 17 21:57:30 2019
    I have an idea for sharing weather and/or APRS packets through
    echoareas. Is there any one who uses such systems? I don't want to
    grab the packets from the internet. The packets should come from
    software connected to a HAM radio or a device for weather data
    collection. Can someone help with the format of these packets/files?

    Vk3jed 21:1/109 is probably your man, I don't know of any other HAMs here
    but he's the only one I know of.

    In fact he probably has APRS already set up.. possibly :)

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  • From Vk3jed@21:1/109 to toofargone on Mon Feb 18 17:22:00 2019
    On 02-17-19 21:57, toofargone wrote to xqtr <=-

    I have an idea for sharing weather and/or APRS packets through
    echoareas. Is there any one who uses such systems? I don't want to
    grab the packets from the internet. The packets should come from
    software connected to a HAM radio or a device for weather data
    collection. Can someone help with the format of these packets/files?

    Vk3jed 21:1/109 is probably your man, I don't know of any other HAMs
    here but he's the only one I know of.

    In fact he probably has APRS already set up.. possibly :)

    Actually, I don't. APRS for me has been a bit of a solution looking for a problem. It's a great system, but I haven't had many uses for it myself. I'm not sure how useful echomail would be, because APRS is a real time system, and even with today's technology, there's still some delays (seconds to minutes, depending on software configuration) for each FTN hop, and QWK hops on some systems may be even longer (SBBS setups ted to poll every X minutes).


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  • From echicken@21:1/164 to Vk3jed on Mon Feb 18 01:35:36 2019
    Re: Re: Weather or APRS station?
    By: Vk3jed to toofargone on Mon Feb 18 2019 17:22:00

    Actually, I don't. APRS for me has been a bit of a solution looking for a problem. It's a great system, but I haven't had many uses for it myself.

    Exactly my feelings about it as well. I like the idea and design, but I can't think of anything I actually want to do with it.

    I will note for OP that the weather message format (among others) appears to be detailed here:

    http://www.aprs.net/vm/DOS/PROTOCOL.HTM

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  • From Vk3jed@21:1/109 to echicken on Mon Feb 18 19:46:00 2019
    On 02-18-19 01:35, echicken wrote to Vk3jed <=-

    Exactly my feelings about it as well. I like the idea and design, but
    I can't think of anything I actually want to do with it.

    Yep, APRS is an awesome concept and seems well implemented. It also suits the 1200 bps simplex channels. Now to find a use for it. :)

    I will note for OP that the weather message format (among others)
    appears to be detailed here:

    http://www.aprs.net/vm/DOS/PROTOCOL.HTM

    That should help any developers. :)


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  • From xqtr@21:1/111 to Vk3jed on Mon Feb 18 19:06:10 2019
    Yep, APRS is an awesome concept and seems well implemented. It also
    suits the 1200 bps simplex channels. Now to find a use for it. :)

    I will note for OP that the weather message format (among others) appears to be detailed here:

    http://www.aprs.net/vm/DOS/PROTOCOL.HTM

    Weather reports from APRS msgs, should be valid for 24h. I would like to build something like a weather map for locations that send APRS packets. This way,
    we could have valid weather reports for towns, at least for a day.

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  • From Vk3jed@21:1/109 to xqtr on Tue Feb 19 07:06:00 2019
    On 02-18-19 19:06, xqtr wrote to Vk3jed <=-

    Weather reports from APRS msgs, should be valid for 24h. I would like
    to build something like a weather map for locations that send APRS packets. This way, we could have valid weather reports for towns, at
    least for a day.

    Hmm, for some purposes, more like 1 hour at best. But today's FTNs are more than adequate for that frequency. :)

    Position reports, OTOH require more immediacy.


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  • From Pepper@21:1/187 to xqtr on Sat Mar 30 07:35:56 2019
    On 02/17/19, xqtr said the following...
    I have an idea for sharing weather and/or APRS packets through
    echoareas. Is there any one who uses such systems? I don't want to grab

    Up until my weather station wires got eaten in a unfortunate lawn mower
    attack perpetrated by my son. I used to submit weather readings to CWOP and also APRS. I need to get the weather station back up again. I've been looking for a good excuse to buy a new weather station.
    What did you have in mind ?

    -=Pepper=-

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  • From xqtr@21:1/111 to Pepper on Sat Mar 30 18:39:10 2019
    Up until my weather station wires got eaten in a unfortunate lawn mower attack perpetrated by my son. I used to submit weather readings to CWOP and also APRS. I need to get the weather station back up again. I've
    been looking for a good excuse to buy a new weather station.
    What did you have in mind ?

    hmmm... nothing specific yet... just general ideas of using APRS. For example, one idea was just a simple script to connect to a APRS internet service and display raw packages, based on location of the user who uses the script.

    Another idea was to use echomail to send packages across BBSes. Then a script will catch these packages and display weather data. A "weather package" is valid for about 12-24 hours... So, it would be a neat way to have "offline" weather data via netmail/BBSes and not Internet. I wanted to use a radio to catch the packages via TNC (am i correct? i am not an operator :) ) and not
    via internet.

    For now, its on the bottom of my list... if there is interest, i would love to implement it. :)

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  • From Pepper@21:1/187 to xqtr on Sat Mar 30 16:15:48 2019
    On 03/30/19, xqtr said the following...
    hmmm... nothing specific yet... just general ideas of using APRS. For example, one idea was just a simple script to connect to a APRS internet service and display raw packages, based on location of the user who uses the script.

    aprs.fi has a nice API (https://aprs.fi/page/api) that could be used for that. You can query weather and also APRS messages. So I suppose you could "sign
    up" to receive APRS messages on your local BBS if you were a ham.
    Getting local weather updates would be nice. I'm not sure how much of
    interest raw packets would be as you really need your propeller hat on to transpose them to human readable.

    have "offline" weather data via netmail/BBSes and not Internet. I wanted to use a radio to catch the packages via TNC (am i correct? i am not an operator :) ) and not via internet.

    Yes, all you need is a radio and a TNC. But I suppose there is the
    possibility of using a USB RTL-SDR dongle for the receive radio and software for decode. I found a RF to APRS I-Gate that parts of this might be able to
    be used. https://github.com/asdil12/pymultimonaprs

    All very interesting!

    -=Pepper=-

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  • From xqtr@21:1/111 to Pepper on Sun Mar 31 16:28:32 2019
    aprs.fi has a nice API (https://aprs.fi/page/api) that could be used for that. You can query weather and also APRS messages. So I suppose you
    could "sign up" to receive APRS messages on your local BBS if you were a ham. Getting local weather updates would be nice. I'm not sure how much
    of interest raw packets would be as you really need your propeller hat
    on to transpose them to human readable.

    There are many servers someone could login... and if i make a script, the
    sysop will have the option to choose the server to login, as there are many local ones, instead of using only aprs.fi. Also the script will need some location info, to restrict the package streaming and be local info only. The idea is to collect only weather data packets and display the info in a human readable way or even better to an ansi local map, with different towns / locations to choose from.

    Yes, all you need is a radio and a TNC. But I suppose there is the possibility of using a USB RTL-SDR dongle for the receive radio and software for decode. I found a RF to APRS I-Gate that parts of this
    might be able to be used. https://github.com/asdil12/pymultimonaprs

    Yes a rtlsdr solution would be an easy and cheap one. Even a RPi with a rtlsdr usb dongle could be used.

    To avoid the use of internet, a process/app will be collecting the data
    packets and store them in a directory. Then another process will 'translate' them into the way we want (ex. ansi map, text list etc.) and the final script for the bbs, will read and show those readable files.

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