[aprssig] "Best" packet decoder solution

[Wes Johnston, AI4PX]

Sadly, I am the very person who kept thinking it was ui-view on this SIG.
:-/    My assumption was based on observations of my track on the way to
work and watching it leap frog foward and back.  In every case the offending
aprs station was running UI-View.  But I have just learned that the closest
guy to me with the delays is also running a kpc3plus.  Perhaps each of the
offending stations is running a kpc3plus as well.  I gotta say though, I
never saw the behavior in an xastir station.  Maybe xastir people are too
cheap to buy new TNCs??? hihi.

I'm very pleased to have a better scape goat.  :-)

Wes
---
God help those who do not help themselves.


On Wed, Dec 29, 2010 at 13:30, Keith VE7GDH <ve7gdh at rac.ca> wrote:

> Wes AI4PX
>
>
> Please tell me more about the delays.  Do they just affect KISS mode?
>>
>
> After running KISS mode for about a week or two, the KPC3+ starts
> introducing delays. I've observed it in UI-View and a friend has seen it
> in Xastir. I don't know who started the rumour that it was a "UI-View
> problem" but that person was incorrect... and likely not a UI-View user.
>
>
> Do they affect in-tnc digipeating?
>>
>
> I have a KPC3+ based digi running for several years, and I've never
> observed
> any delays in anything that it digipeats. If the frequency is quiet, it
> digipeats
> what it is supposed to right away.
>
>
> Do they affect CONVerse mode?
>>
>
> Sorry, except for playing around with it the odd time, I haven't used
> CONVerse mode for years.
>
>
> This could be the delay issue we've been chasing for years.... the
>> issue that I've thought was UI-View all this time! Could it be???
>>
>
> I haven't heard any evidence to point the finger at UI-View. I know
> there are a few digis and IGates in the Puget Sound (Seattle) area
> that are sometimes involved with delayed packets, and sometimes
> some IGates in the Vancouver (BC) area. Unless you are watching on
> RF, it's difficult to prove that a digi was involved. Only occasionally
> can it be proved that a digi was responsible, but if one was using
> squelched audio and the squelch was set too loose, it could delay
> digipeating a packet. In many (if not almost all) instances where the
> cause has been pinned down to an IGate, it has been a KPC3+ running
> in KISS mode at an IGate. I try to be open minded, but if I don't see
> any shred of evidence of it being a UI-View problem, I'll believe
> my eyes and see it as a TNC problem. I have a stack of KPC3+, all
> ver 9.1. I'm actually running one in KISS mode on my IGate now, but
> only because a KPC3 quit responding. With over half a dozen KPC3+
> sitting there, I just grabbed one of them... and promptly told UI-View
> to restart every day. This will take the TNC out of KISS mode and
> put it back in KISS mode when the program starts. It's a work-around
> to fix a TNC problem, but it's been running at least a month or so like
> that and I haven't observed any delays.
>
> If you hear anyone talking about UI-View introducing delays, please
> ask them to do their homework. They can take my word for it, or they
> can run their own tests and see it for themselves. If they have another
> TNC, use it. If the KPC3+ is their only option, it should be restarted
> periodically. While one could manually tell it "com port none" and
> OK their way out from there, and then tell it the correct com port
> again, a more foolproof method is to use the Schedule Editor to
> make it automatic and just restart the program every day at 3 am
> or whatever time of the day there is the least amount of APRS activity.
>
> You can't be blamed for thinking it was a UI-View problem because
> it was being parroted on all of the APRS related support lists. I'm
> not the original person that debunked the issue. Someone on one of the
> support lists that I participated in said that it was the KPC3+ causing
> the delays. I don't really recall if it was the APRS SIG, UI-View support
> list or the NWAPRS list, but it was probably the latter. I was most likely
> using a KPCII or a KPC3 at the time. At some point, I changed over to
> a KPC3+ for some reason. One day, I got  involved in trying to track
> down some delayed position reports and observed my own IGate doing
> it. I ran my own tests and observed the problem myself. Not much later,
> an Xastir user within earshot of me ran the same tests. We also did some
> tests with one of us sending beacons to the other and counting the seconds
> (or minutes) before the other's KPC3+ spat the packet out to the APRS
> client. We have also both asked the operators of several KPC3+ based
> IGates to restart the TNC or the program (effectively restarting the TNC)
> and it has solved the problem... for a while.
>
>
> 73 es cul - Keith VE7GDH
> --
> "I may be lost, but I know exactly where I am!"
>
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