51–60 of 79 posts
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> software Amatuer radio seems full of little software tools to do calculations that are closed source. I hope the authors can be encouraged to publish source, or it will die with them.
In many cases it already has.
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I attempted to google to guess what you meant. I found: (1) they recently removed KiwiFarms; (2) in 2020, they began labeling certain pages with "fact checks"; (3) they remove content by request of the site owner or by copyright complaint. Of those, (2) seems the most political, but it's not removing content. Was there something else you had in mind?
(1) is egregious if the goal is an archive of the internet. An archive should have everything of what is being archived, legalese notwithstanding: The good, the bad, the beautiful, the ugly, everything. E v e r y t h i n g . If it doesn't have everything, it's not an archive.
Internet Archive has begun gathering content for the Digital Library of Amateur Radio and Communications (DLARC), which will be a massive online library of materials and collections related to amateur radio and early digital communications. The DLARC project is looking for contributors with troves of ham radio, amateur radio, and early digital communications related books, magazines, documents, catalogs, manuals, vid…
https://worldradiohistory.com/
I would assume archive.org would just ask permission to hoover (mirror) it.
Probably totally digress, but I wish IA can organize their digital library slightly better. One day I was checking some manga books by ISBN on IA just out of curiosity. And for some reason, it put the ISBNs for all the volumes of a manga into one single entry ( https://archive.org/details/isbn_1919979003907 , check "ISBN" metadata section) and unsurprisingly, the actual content is only one volume, vol.43 (not even vo…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I attempted to google to guess what you meant. I found: (1) they recently removed KiwiFarms; (2) in 2020, they began labeling certain pages with "fact checks"; (3) they remove content by request of the site owner or by copyright complaint. Of those, (2) seems the most political, but it's not removing content. Was there something else you had in mind?
Removing kiwi farms was a bad decision. The copyright and site owner did not request it and the content was not illegal. So the IA is picking content to delist based on their own feelings rather than simply archiving.
> Supporters of the Drop Kiwi Farms campaign celebrated the Internet Archive’s decision. “Internet heroes right here,” tweeted Yonah Gerber, who urged the Archive to remove the site. Kiwi Farms is known for collecting and publicizing personal details about targets it holds in contempt, many of whom are transgender women like Sorrenti. While the site ostensibly discourages direct harassment, Sorrenti has faced swatting attacks and persistent threats during her campaign, and other targets have had similarly ugly experiences. Kiwi Farms has been allegedly linked with three suicides, including an emulator developer who blamed the site for a relentless harassment operation soon before their death. [1]
Yeah, I have to say that I recognize nuance and am okay with archive.org nixing content like the above.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/7/23341051/kiwi-farms-intern...
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> software Amatuer radio seems full of little software tools to do calculations that are closed source. I hope the authors can be encouraged to publish source, or it will die with them.
Not just closed source but a completely black box, like the ROS and Pactor 4 digimodes. (To be fair, the latter is a commercial product so the blame is on ham radio operators, not the company who designed it.)
I've always been curious as to how they "got away" with being proprietary: encryption isn't allowed on amateur bands, but given its black box nature, the codec (?) might as well be a cipher.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PACTOR
Has anyone reverse engineered it? It is possible to create a third-party implementation, either in hardware or SDR?
As far as I'm concerned the IA can stick this up their arse. They REFUSE to acknowlege my request to have a personal website that they've managed to archive removed. It's a person blog that I want online so I can give the URL to family and friends, but I keep it out of Google etc with robots.txt. But once during an upgrade of the backend software I stuffed up the robots.txt and they crawled it until I fixed it up. Wi…
> they just ignore I have hints that they may be understaffed. If you had a little spare time, you could lend a hand to their legendary effort, and maybe contribute in fixing a few things such as your issue.
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Not just closed source but a completely black box, like the ROS and Pactor 4 digimodes. (To be fair, the latter is a commercial product so the blame is on ham radio operators, not the company who designed it.)
> Pactor 4 digimodes. I've always been curious as to how they "got away" with being proprietary: encryption isn't allowed on amateur bands, but given its black box nature, the codec (?) might as well be a cipher. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PACTOR Has anyone reverse engineered it? It is possible to create a third-party implementation, either in hardware or SDR? * https://www.sigidwiki.com/wiki/PACTOR_IV
The ARRL petitioned for an increase to the symbol rate on the HF bands almost a decade ago. The FCC never formally did anything with it.
It was a few years back, but at one point the FCC issued a 200+ kw license for a transmitter right at the top of the 20m band. Why? I have no clue. It isn't like the operator couldn't afford a commercial license.
The FCC barely does anything about interference coming from equipment that affects amateurs. I've had substantially more luck contacting manufacturers and constructors directly. Just google "solaredge RFI" if you want more info about this.
It took a commercial radio manufacturer years of professional lobbying to convince the FCC that the CB radio spectrum could in fact be with FM. The FCC is about 50 years behind on regulation for the CB radio. There is a huge amount of very valuable spectrum that could be used for citizen radio purposes with type accepted equipment very cheaply. But the FCC does not allow it.
The FCC approved DFS for Wi-Fi, but didn't actually specify what the equipment was supposed to do when it must mitigate interference. All the equipment I've seen just switches the AP to the first 5 ghz channel and leaves it there. Forever. Likewise the FCC approved a new 5 ghz band for WiFi and similar services and puts power limits on emissions, as they should. But none of the chosen channels have a power limit of something very low like 0dbmw or similar. I have neighbors who find it fit to run an AP on every single available channel in the WiFi spectrum. I would just like one I can use in my house comfortably without getting interference. If we're going to have all this spectrum, why not take one channel and put a very low power limit on it? That way residential customers could use it in their house knowing they aren't receiving interference or generating it.
The FCC regulation is almost always lagging behind reality for spectrum they aren't paid for. Cellular and stuff gets all the attention, since that is where the money is. The transition to ATSC from NTSC for broadcast television would be a good example. That happened quickly and without endless debate as to the merit of it.
Internet Archive has begun gathering content for the Digital Library of Amateur Radio and Communications (DLARC), which will be a massive online library of materials and collections related to amateur radio and early digital communications. The DLARC project is looking for contributors with troves of ham radio, amateur radio, and early digital communications related books, magazines, documents, catalogs, manuals, vid…
> software Amatuer radio seems full of little software tools to do calculations that are closed source. I hope the authors can be encouraged to publish source, or it will die with them.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> software Amatuer radio seems full of little software tools to do calculations that are closed source. I hope the authors can be encouraged to publish source, or it will die with them.
Maybe they want it that way? Why do you always need access to someone else's work. Many of them build these apps to fund their hobbies or put a little food on the table.
- https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/regulations/sor-96-484/F...
So … you just wouldn’t be able to talk about the tools you build and charge money for… on the hobby you built them for?
Seems kind of ironic. And, imho - missing the point of the hobby.