[aprssig] Txt messaging

[chiefsfan2 at cox.net]

I seen a post the other day asking "has ham radio missed out on the texting craze" which got me wondering how we could take more advantage of txt in ham radio especially in the aprs world. Txt has been pretty much limited to a station with a computer or one of the aprs equipped radio. Texting with one of the aprs ready radios is clunky at best with the built in keyboard. So I was thinking that if it was possible to interface a smart phone via Bluetooth to a radio and a ham txt app was written for such messaging on aprs would be as easy as texting over the cellular network which a lot of do everyday already. Just a quick search of the internet came up with small tnc's such as the tinytrak 4and it looked like it had a Bluetooth adapter available? Any radio could be made into a aprs txt radio and with the digipeater function in the tinytrak a mesh network could be established with other mobile stations at a special event or with igate's on the aprs network. Or you could set at home and 
txt others via your radio and smartphone. There maybe other technicalities I'm missing but it sounds like a inexpensive way to start. You could also attach this to any band radio, 6m, 220 ect for more flexibility. I know there is a aprs app for android I think that does this but it maybe more aimed at position reporting where my thought are more towards messaging. We have a pretty decent igate network where this would work well and maybe it would increase the use of texting on our ham network.
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