[aprssig] Portable APRS

[John Davis]

Question.

I am a new to the HAM community, so please excuse my ignorance in advance. I
have been involved in technology for a long time until a friend of mine,
Mike (KN8J) peaked my interest in APRS. I purchased an RC-D710 with the
intentions of creating an HT setup similar to what Bob did. With that said,
I am realizing there is a problem with input, it is a slow and tedious
process and a limitation to APRS.

What I mean is that using the keypad is fine, but long and kind
of unnecessary. I am starting to feel the need for a keyboard on an HT or
something more than a keypad. Pardon my reference, but similar to the need
for them on smartphones and cellphones. If we are to get a mass adaptation
there needs to be an easy way to utilize all of its features.

I am contemplating hacking away at my RC-D710 to use the keyboard over
serial(if possible), but I think that if we can incorporate Bluetooth with a
VX-8DR/R we should be able to make or allow a keyboard to be connected to an
HT/mobile unit to allow better data input.

Another idea I have is to create a device with a dedicated
transceiver(Micro-Trak
TinyTrak4) in the same case as a picoITX motherboard(EPIA-P820) using either
an SSD or CF card as a hdd in a fanless case, and mount some form of 7in
monitor(touchscreen or not) and keyboard on this device. This device should
be light and self contained, with a battery life of 5 hours on
transmit/receive. I think I could make it work.

My question is this: Why are we still so limited to computers for data input
and monitoring with APRS when we have so many great technologies at our
fingertips for pretty cheap.

If anyone is interested in my ideas please let me know and I can discuss
them with you, on or off the thread. Thank you everyone!

-- 

[image: John R Davis Jr]
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