Wednesday's 2m net brought up some of us wanting to learn packet radio. I'm no expert, but here are some links that I found really useful over the last year to learn some of the basics on packet radio.
obligatory wiki link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_radio
really great introductory site:
http://www.choisser.com/packet/
You really want a core understanding of traditional packet, the fact that AirMail/WinLink2000 still supports a standard 'keyboard' connection really helps both winlink and standard packet. Once you understand traditional packet it makes a lot of stuff easier to understand. The best of all things is the club has a standard packet BBS running on 145.050, on a machine at the AARC clubhouse. It's always on and is a great tool for learning how to connect, leave messages, read messages and generally get your feet wet with packet. Best of all you don't have to worry much about stepping on peoples toes, there's a LOT of bandwidth available on the 145.050 frequency, and it will be good to see more activity. I'm trying to collect up more standard packet frequencies, maybe we'll add a few stations on other frequencies as people get some experience in the club.
I've set up my home station (and a go-kit one) around an existing backbone called WinLink. Most of the EOC's in the area have a 'node' working on 145.750, and there's more things to check into, after you've got some of the initial mistakes and learning out of the way on 145.050. I've got mine set up on 145.750 in a 'hybrid' mode. If you connect to N3USP you will be directed to my AirMail send/receive software, even using standard packet, you will receive a standard prompt, alloing read/write of messages, request a list of 'stations heard' from my system, all that kinda stuff. If you drop a message here, it will appear in a piece of windows software called AirMail, that looks like a normal email client, in fact I can reply-to and it will leave a message for you to read the next time you connect. This is entirely dependent on the computer being up and the software working right. For a first time user, I wouldn't tackle a dedicated 2-m TNC based always on dedicated computer airmail/winlink setup, it's a lot to jump into, and standard packet is just really cool.
The hybrid part is that my system also supports JUST standard packet by connecting to me through N3USP-1. It's all the same hardware, you're connecting to the same radio, and TNC, but instead of using the windows computer, you are actually logging directly into the hardware TNC, and interacting with it's own internal Packet Bulliten Board System (PBBS), I've upgraded it to a whopping 500k of text collecting madness. Once you are connected you'll be greeted with a text welcome message and a prompt. All the commands typed on the screen, and typing HELP will give you more information, and typing HELP will give you full online documentation.
Key things to know, you connect with:
C N3USP-1
or using a digipeater
C N3USP-1 v W3AAC-5
or
C N3USP-1 v KH6ILR-10
once you have a login prompt, you can leave me a message with
SP N3USP (means send-private, if you just do S anyone can read it)
or
S N3USP
You will be asked for a subject line, type it in and hit return
It will then tell you to type in the body of the email, when you are done, hit return to add a blank line, and type /EX
that will close the message entry, save it and put you back to the login prompt.
you can list messages by typing
L
you can just see messages to you with:
LM
and you can read messages, by their number:
R 20 (to read message number 20)
It's really pretty simple, the toughest part is getting the cable made, interfacing it with the radio, and getting connected the first time.
This should be a basic introduction, we'll add more after tonight's meeting
FYI:
Winlink uses a LOT more overhead of hardware/software that can sometimes be problematic to navigate. I've only ever used this system with a KPC3+ after getting one to work the first time. There are AGW and other parts of winlink/airmail/paclink that can help with other TNCs, but I'm most familiar with configuring KPC3+s
The winlink site is suffering server problems: http://www.winlink.org/
Though not 'normal' packet, winlink allows a more familiar 'email' type interface, and is extremely efficient about message sending, actually compressing the correspondence before transmitting, as well as un-compressing it automatically, completely transparent to the users. It does allow standard emails to be sent, but a significant use is peer-to-peer messages between stations. I'm using it more for an EMCOMM application, and generally like making use of the system in curious ways. It's designed around 'node' stations that have internet connections, and allow traffic to pass via emails to/from the node and convey them out over packet frequencies.
