[nos-bbs] Setting up for basic packet radio

[Brett Friermood]

Hello all.

I'm just starting out getting my own packet radio station on the air.
I have a Byonics TT4 connected to the rear data port of an Alinco
DR-135T. I have the TT4 running in KISS mode and have verified my set
up does work by using Xastir to receive and transmit on APRS.

I am attempting to use JNOS for packet but I'm not sure if I have
everything configured correctly yet. My autoexec.nos file contains the
following:

    ax25 mycall KC9MWG
    attach asy ttyS0 - ax25 radio 4096 256 4800
    start ax25
    ax25 retries 3

I could not get anything to work until I added the "start ax25" line.

When I try to connect to a local node my station transmits, but I do
not hear a reply. The JNOS screen shows the connection attempt and
counts down to the next try. It will keep doing this until I kill the
window. I added the retry line to attempt to avoid this but it does
not seem to work.

If I hear other stations on the frequency I am able to type ax25 heard
and get a list of stations so I am able to receive. By the way, is
there a monitor command or similar to see the actual packets being
heard?

I've looked all over for documentation about setting up a simple
packet station but have not been able to find much. Most of what I
find is for more advanced configurations as part of a large tcp/ip
network.

I have no other way to decode packet right now so I can't check to see
if my outgoing packets are even readable.

The only real experience I have in packet is a couple demonstrations
using "real" TNCs so I'm having some trouble taking what I learned
there and applying it with JNOS.

Appreciate any help you can give me,

Brett
KC9MWG