[aprssig] APRS Newbie - Overwhelmed

[Steve Noskowicz]

Michael,
 The attached should help.  I put it together some years back being in the same position you are in mow.  Things have changed and advanced some, but the basics are the same.
Bob Bruninga has put much information together, but I tried to make this start from the bottom and work up. Several people told me that it helped them.
 It's aimed at the Kenwood radios because that's what I had/have.
APRS Beginner Guide - K9DCI Ver 5-1.pdf
I hope it helps you.

-- 
 Regards, Steve Noskowicz, K9DCI
 Science & Technical Advisor
 challenger.org
--------------------------------------------
On Sun, 1/21/18, Michael Barnes <barnmichael at gmail.com> wrote:

 Subject: [aprssig] APRS Newbie - Overwhelmed
 To: "TAPR APRS Mailing List" <aprssig at tapr.org>
 Date: Sunday, January 21, 2018, 6:05 AM
 
 I am wanting to get
 into APRS and am rapidly getting overwhelmed. My intent is
 to have APRS in my vehicle to see stations around me and to
 allow my home station to track me. I have a Raspberry Pi
 with touchscreen and TNC-Pi connected to a Kenwood HT with
 external antenna for the truck. That station will run
 Xastir. Most of the home monitoring I am assuming can be
 done with a computer displaying aprs.fi.
 
 I guess the first thing I am looking for is an APRS
 for Dummies guide to help me get started. I'll need to
 figure out how to configure the mobile for reporting or
 beaconing or whatever it does.
 
 I'm also trying to make sense of aprs.fi. I see a
 ton of icons on the map, but I have no idea what they all
 are. I am especially confused by a large number of what seem
 to be non-ham entities on there. I am seeing fire lookout
 towers, tug boats and Navy ships, what looks to be home
 weather stations, aircraft, and others. Some of these show
 different identification than ham callsigns, including
 aircraft numbers, marine and commercial callsigns, and some
 kind of weather identifiers.
 
 From what I can gather, APRS depends on a lot of
 digipeaters to receive data from mobile units and both relay
 that info to other users as well as upload the data to the
 aprs.fi system, presumably via the
 Internet. I'm trying to figure out how all that aspect
 functions as well.
 
 Following the digipeater info is, what about areas out
 of range of a digi? What are the procedures for putting a
 digi in place? Do folks have portable digis that can be
 deployed temporarily to serve a non-covered area for a
 specific event or emergency? Do all digis have to be
 connected to the Internet?
 
 As you can see, overwhelmed. I know this is a lot of
 questions. I probably have a lot more, but I don't know
 enough yet to know what the questions are. Thanks for your
 time in helping me get started.
 
 73,
 Michael WA7SKG
 
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