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The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

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Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#31

Post by dmix »

rsuelzer wrote: post #26
dmix wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if you can't run any modern internet what would you use the mesh network for? Some of Google's traffic charts show up to 90% of traffic is TLS in the US for Chrome users.

It's an intranet. Sort of a backup internet that would allow for data to be sent at a much higher rate than just voice. Here is the map in So Cal of the active nodes. https://mapping.kg6wxc.net/meshmap/map_display.php#8/33.970/... Also, in emergency situations regular FCC rules are suspended so encryption is not a problem. We actually used this mesh to provide internet to hams working emergency communications in a fi…

That's way bigger than I thought it would be. Neat.

Also good point about emergencies and backups.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#32

Post by zippergz »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #19

I can't help but feel the amateur radio community could have used a rebrand for the internet age. I understand there's a lot of history but it's hard to get young people interested in being _hams_, a word that has not aged well. I got my licence about a decade back and really loved the technical pieces - learning about how radio waves worked, propagation with different bands, the ability to (try) to build your own mo…

I agree. I have my license, but I never really use it. However, I greatly value the things I learned in the process of getting my license. Understanding how RF works is really helpful for making WiFi work better, for example.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#33

Post by Karunamon »

rsuelzer wrote: post #22
Karunamon wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in the US, encryption of any kind on amateur bands is prohibited. Hams tend to be really good at self-policing, so if a curious person horns in on your traffic and discovers that it's encrypted, you can expect a knock on your door, if you're lucky from the guy that looked up your license from the public database (you're required to transmit your callsign at regular intervals) to ask you to fix it, if you're…

Correct, although there are a group of us looking to change this rule and the FCC seems receptive. It is the AARL that is a bit slow on this issue. The original rules were drafted during the cold war, so times have changed. More importantly, we believe it is possible to not hide the intent and recepient of a message, while still protecting sensitive content using open source encryption methods. There are cases that e…

>If someone wanted to monitor RF packets they could see that I am logging into my administration console, but they don't really need to see the password.

Interesting note.. some regular analog repeaters do something similar to this. If someone needs to make a settings change, they're managed via DTMF (dialpad) sounds. Normally the repeater would relay everything, but it can detect the DTMFs and just replace them with beeps or silence before rebroadcasting.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#34

Post by [deleted] »

rsuelzer wrote: post #9

as an aside, I got my ham radio licence because of my interest in long distance microwave mesh networking. there is a group called aredn http://www.arednmesh.org which uses wifi devices modified to run in the Amateur portions of 2ghz and 5ghz to create massive mesh networks. The lack of noise on our allocations means we can make really long connections. I personally have a 50 dollar Microtik dish that makes a 25 mile…

[deleted]

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#35

Post by madengr »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #30
kylehotchkiss wrote: post #19

I can't help but feel the amateur radio community could have used a rebrand for the internet age. I understand there's a lot of history but it's hard to get young people interested in being _hams_, a word that has not aged well. I got my licence about a decade back and really loved the technical pieces - learning about how radio waves worked, propagation with different bands, the ability to (try) to build your own mo…

> other people just wanted to talk about radios. I felt the same disappointment when I got into amateur radio just before the modern internet took off. I loved the idea of talking with people around the world and maybe even practicing some foreign languages, so I immediately set up a station for DXing. All those people from exotic foreign countries just wanted to make a few quick remarks about their radios. No one wa…

Well at least with SSB and CW you have a short conversation. JT8, etc, have reduced “contacts” to a few bytes.

Don’t get me wrong, pushing the Shannon capacity limit is great, but I’ll wager many stations are not even running QRP for the newer digital modes.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#36

Post by moftz »

throw0101a wrote: post #16
t0mas88 wrote: post #3

The proposed frequency is just above the aviation VHF band (108 to 136Mhz) so it makes sense to use it when aviation runs out of frequencies to use. However... EASA has made all aviation radios switch from 25Khz channel spacing to 8.33Khz channel spacing, essentially tripling the available number of frequencies for everything between 118 and 136Mhz. So I cannot imagine there is a current lack of frequencies for aviat…

> So I cannot imagine there is a current lack of frequencies for aviation in France (or anywhere in Europe). This isn't about voice / ATC, but rather about up/downlinks for drones and such. From the background on the proposal: > The decisions of previous conferences have introduced some restrictions to the use and have imposed constraints on the development of aeronautical mobile applications within some existing mob…

Why would you want to try to pump video over VHF? You have line of sight to everyone when you are in an airplane. Use a higher frequency band that allows for much more bandwidth and therefore higher data speeds. The little 1.2GHz video transmitters can easily reach 10km. That is cruising altitude for a commercial airliner. Having the proper license would get you even greater distance with a higher transmit power. Have the drone/UAV transmit ADS-B data and use GPS position to point a high-gain directional antenna at it, that should get you even more bandwidth.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#37

Post by quotemstr »

howard941 wrote: post #25
quotemstr wrote: post #15

Unpopular opinion time: spectrum is a limited resource. We shouldn't waste it on efficient analog technologies like conventional commercial and amateur radio. We've already ceased conventional broadcasts: that's a step in the right direction, but there's more to do. The entire RF spectrum should be devoted to LTE-like efficient, packetized, and secure communication. I'd make small exceptions for things like radio ast…

I'm saddened that your unpopular opinion targets the very people who pioneered efficient, packetized secure communications, but reminded that there's a reason why we hams lost 220-222 to UPS - we failed to exploit it when we had it. There's nothing between 54Mhz and 222 Mhz for hams other than the 2m allocation. Please pick on someone else.

One of the most important problems with discussion today is people seeing personal attacks where none exist. I'm stating a policy position, not "target[ing]" people. Conflating policy and personal attacks makes it impossible to discuss policy in a reasonable way.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#38

Post by quotemstr »

geggam wrote: post #27
quotemstr wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People have been bringing up the solar flare electromagnetic boogeyman for decades. It's never been an actual problem

Maybe not your lifetime but it has happened and we have been damned lucky more than once recently https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_1989_geomagnetic_storm https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/2...

I was around for that. Civilization did not end. Services were not disrupted.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#39

Post by logfromblammo »

dmix wrote: post #18
Karunamon wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in the US, encryption of any kind on amateur bands is prohibited. Hams tend to be really good at self-policing, so if a curious person horns in on your traffic and discovers that it's encrypted, you can expect a knock on your door, if you're lucky from the guy that looked up your license from the public database (you're required to transmit your callsign at regular intervals) to ask you to fix it, if you're…

So if you can't run any modern internet what would you use the mesh network for? Some of Google's traffic charts show up to 90% of traffic is TLS in the US for Chrome users.

You would use it to talk to other amateur radio operators about amateur radio operating and amateur radio equipment, obviously.

The prohibition on encrypted content is a deal-breaker for me, and a lot of other people, who might otherwise want to experiment with connecting to the Internet from difficult locations.

But since the Internet runs on encrypted protocols now, using unencrypted amateur radio transmissions potentially means eavesdroppers and man-in-the-middle attacks, so you can't do anything sensitive or personal, or even anything requiring login credentials.

And since hams are very likely to narc, snitch, or grass on you to defend the sanctity and integrity of their hobby, you can't do anything interesting or unusual for long before someone finds a rule that forbids whatever it is you were doing and forces you to stop.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#40

Post by lawfulcactus »

madengr wrote: post #35
Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> other people just wanted to talk about radios. I felt the same disappointment when I got into amateur radio just before the modern internet took off. I loved the idea of talking with people around the world and maybe even practicing some foreign languages, so I immediately set up a station for DXing. All those people from exotic foreign countries just wanted to make a few quick remarks about their radios. No one wa…

Well at least with SSB and CW you have a short conversation. JT8, etc, have reduced “contacts” to a few bytes. Don’t get me wrong, pushing the Shannon capacity limit is great, but I’ll wager many stations are not even running QRP for the newer digital modes.

>JT8, etc, have reduced "contacts" to a few bytes

I think you mixed up FT8 and JS8 there. :)

FT8 is the (effectively) zero-interaction DX mode. JS8 exactly the opposite-- a weak signal mode based on FT8 tailored for ragchewing.

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