[nos-bbs] NOS and Airmail

[Jay Nugent]

Greetings Maiko,

On Fri, 14 Mar 2008, Maiko Langelaar (ve4klm) wrote:

> 
> > received from the WL2K was "use B2F - goodbye"
> 
> Understood.
> 
> I was actually given the spec for B2F by one of the WinLink people
> quite some time ago and started doing some stuff, but I got stuck,
> and frankly a bit disinterested too. The spec was not complete, so
> that was a big part of it, ie: the compression part wasn't there.
> 
> Just recently I was given another contact regarding the spec, so
> maybe I'll try again and see what info I can get.

   The compression used by B2F is 'LZW' and is documented here:

      http://marknelson.us/1989/10/01/lzw-data-compression

   But LZW *was* already coded into JNOS years ago.  We used LZW to
compress our links between nodes when doing hourly mail-forwarding.  
Greatly reduced the time needed to send 'bulk' data.  However, I don't 
know how many 'bits' of compression the WL2k folks utilize.

 
> > It'll be incentive for us/me to both finally get B2F working and to
> > work with the multitude of other NOS/AX25 based modes.
> 
> Agreed. Forcing the B2F is a very good incentive if the NOS community
> wants the ability to integrate their NOS based systems into the WinLink
> and Airmail systems out there.
> 
> That keeps the *dinosaur* alive a bit longer I suppose :-)
> 
> BUT, how many NOSers out there are really interested ???

   The Michigan AMPRnet (which is now up to 19 Hamgates and a couple dozen
home JNOS stations) *was* planning to deploy the "TelPac" support you had
written into JNOS to all of our nodes during this Winter (upgrade from
JNOS2.0a to your latest release).  But since WL2K changed their network,
those plans fell by the wayside.

   So we (Michigan) would *definitely* be interested in seeing full B2F
protocol support coded into JNOS :)

   As always Maiko, "he who codes - rules!"  And if we must ship you a
case of your favorite beer to keep you at the keyboard, we will do it!!!
;-)

   Keep up the great work!

      --- Jay Nugent  WB8TKL
          o ARRL Michigan Section "Digital Radio Group" (DRG)
            [www.MI-DRG.org]
          o Michgan AMPRnet IP Address Coordinator

"Getting rid of terrorism is like getting rid of dandruff.  It cannot
 be done completely no matter how hard you try." -- Gore Vidal
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