[aprssig] TNCX setups?

[Cap Pennell]

And this is key, Bill.  Duration of need.  We all need to turn it off or
drop it down when we're done using it.  (But this doesn't happen often
enough.)  Our sole VHF frequency simply can't afford full-time full-service
WIDEn-N digis on every hogback, side ridge, or anthill.

In one sense, it's quite fortunate for our VHF network that most users don't
care to receive _any_ packets from other stations; they only want their own
packets to reach the internet (from everywhere all the time).

Already in Northern and Central California, most of the entire "Sierra front
country" counties are covered by full service digis _on the far side_ of the
Central Valley.  Unfortunately, any full service digis on the high elevation
Sierras themselves are sharing the limited airtime throughout the greater SF
Bay Area and entire Central Valley too.  Our high elevation VHF
transmissions do not stop at the County line.  Yet if the VHF network has
too many packet collisions (mostly occurring at high elevations between the
high digis which all hear each other up there), then our transmissions may
not be decoded by anyone.

It routinely becomes too much airtime consumed for too few actual
_listeners_.  It must be hoped that we can all keep "the big picture" in
mind more often, and strive to operate in a manner most courteous to our
fellow hams.

Of course we believe we know this already.  <grin>
73, Cap KE6AFE


> -----Original Message-----
> From: aprssig-bounces at tapr.org [mailto:aprssig-bounces at tapr.org] On
> Behalf Of Bill V WA7NWP
> Sent: Friday, July 17, 2009 8:24 AM
> To: TAPR APRS Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [aprssig] TNCX setups?
> 
> > And this is the problem. The reason for using a fill-in is to get you
> out of an
> > area not serviced by other high-level digis....like alot of downtown
> Jackson,
> > CA and other areas around Amador County. You can use a fill-in to get
> you out,
> > but when you're in the holes and the only thing you can hear is the
> fill-in,
> > you really don't have a return path.
> >
> > I'm not saying don't use fill-ins. I'm saying they can present their
> own share
> > of problems.
> 
> 
> If you don't hear the other WIDEn digi's, then what you need is
> another WIDEn digi-- not a fill-in.   A fill-in is to help with
> outgoing packets for lower powered stations in marginal areas.
> 
> For a temporary situation, like filling-in from the network to a cafe
> with a Kenwood mobile, it's a simple matter to temporarily add WIDE2-2
> and WIDE2-1 to the list of digipeater aliases.  That gives incoming as
> well as outgoing packets.
> 
> Bill - WA7NWP