Satgen222  Standard Software and Hardware ?  by GM4IHJ        26th June 93
BID of this msg is SGEN222  Please use that BID if you retransmit the msg

A friend of mine has an excellent Macintosh computer. But it might just as
well have been invented by a Martian. It is very different from my PC, and
it is clear that we still have a long way to go before we get real inter
changeability between micro systems. Meanwhile on the Mobile Phone scene,
I hear CT2 and DECT seem to be determined to go their separate ways. So
the handie phone you use to talk to your company pabx, will be no good at
all when you leave the office. Once out the door you will need to reach
into your other pocket for your CT2, to tell your wife to hold the supper
as you are delayed in traffic. Is this really the future ? Are we crazy ?
Does this have to apply to amateur radio sats ?
Unfortunately the answers to both the latter questions seems to be yes. As
I type this , my operating bench is a tangled pile of cables serving :-
Mike for HF, different impedance mike VHF, another sort of mike SHF,
400bps modem,1200 FSK modem, 1200 BPSK modem, 9600 bps modem, headphones
small plug, headphones large plug, plus a box full of 7 different types of
telemetry software, 5 types of software operating protocol sware, and ,
last but not least - one and only one standard Navy straight brass key.
I appreciate we cannot go back and change yesterday. But surely it is time
that radio amateur builders stopped re inventing new sorts of electronic
wheels ? Has anyone counted how many different types of software we use
for sats ? Was it really necessary to go to such great lengths to make
9600 bps software so totally alien in respect of everything that had gone
before ?
Next month the great and the good of the Amateur satellite scene will
gather at Guildford Surrey, to re enact their annual ritual of inventing
whole new sets of standards. Lots of satellites will be discussed all with
different keying systems , software, hardware and telemetry formats. No
two satellites will be the same and most of them will require purchase
and/or building of new equipment at a time when few amateurs have money to
spare. Is this sensible behaviour ?
Can I therefore humbly request Ladies/Gentlemen, that you devote a few
seconds of your Surrey time to consider how your proposed highest possible
tech, gleaming gizmo, fits into the present Amateur scene. It proved
possible to standardise Pacsat/Lusat/Dove telemetry formats but only Dove
was popular . It had ASCII 1200 bps fsk - already present in most ham
shacks. The choice is yours - if you want to remain a miniscule minority
on the fringe of Amateur radio - then carry on as you are, changing
standards as often as you change your clothes. If however you wish to see
usage of Amateur satellites grow from its present totally stagnant (
roughly 3 per 1000 radio amateurs) position, please try to give us
standard software and hardware. It may look good as a project to write new
software and build new ground station hardware requirements into your new
satellite, but from the point of view of would be users the more you
standardise the less we have to pay to use it, and the more we may be able
to contribute to your building efforts. 
The future is up to you the builders. We can remain minute fish in a big
pond , lost in our exagerated mess of, a multiple standards , expensive to
enter corner, or we can make the major contribution to Amateur radio we
have always boasted about but presently have no hope of ever achieving . 
73 de GM4IHJ @ GB7SAN