Now we have reached the cloud with ham radio. They talk about cloud computing, this is cloud contesting..

WTG

Dave sold about a month ago.... new company seems to be keeping quiet about the sale but continuing to produce products.

http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/dxbase

New owner on the list there

I've always promoted that the logbook and radio control in Digital Desktop was basic.  The design of DD is to be Host Mode terminal program for digital communciations, not a full blown logbook or full blow radio control. It's a full blown digital control program.

Dave,

Yours is a terminal mode app, mine is a host mode app.  Lets do some one on one comparisions. 

Modes: DD: CW, packet, RTTY, SSTV, ASCII, FEC, SIAM, ARQ and FEC Pactor and Amtor, MT63, PSK-31/63/125.
           WW: CW, Phone, RTTY, PSK-31/63/125

Host mode: DD: Yes
                WW: NO

Access to CMD: Prompt when xmitting:  DD:Yes
                                                      WW:NO

Can do soundcard RTTY and PK-232 RTTY at the same time: DD: NO
                                                                                  WW: Yes

Can run one TNC for Packet and another for digital modes at the same time: DD: Yes
                                                                                                       WW: No

Has waterfall for RTTY and others modes: DD: Yes
                                                        WW:Yes

Built in logbook: DD: Yes
                      WW:yes

Radio Control    DD: Yes
                     WW: Requires another program

Cost: DD: $99.95 new, $79.95 competitive upgrade, $49.95 upgrade
        WW: Free

Support:  DD: Phone, web, email
              WW: Web, email


As we've discussed before, you have a nice retirement from your days at Rose and IBM.  I'm 50 and have 17 more years to retire.

Many EOC's are setting up packet networks in their area for EmComm as a backup to normal communication.  You also have APRS on 144.39 and you can do Packet to the ISS, as they have a BBS and digipeater on the space station.

EmComm Ops for Kantronics is a $29.95 piece of software for your TNC, and will work with Packet TNCs with version 5.0 or greater.

http://www.w4pcsoftware.com/Emcomm_Ops.html

Rick - W4PC

No DOS or 16 bit program will run under the 64 bit version of Windows 7, only 32 and 64 bit programs will run.

Dan at Associated Radio
http://www.associatedradio.com

Rick - W4PC

http://www.cssincorp.com/ROC_Digital_Desktop.html

Which radio do you have?

Don,

Im the only one doing TNC software anymore and mine is the only one that works with Windows 7 32/64.  I also own the rights to Pakratt (which is on the 25th anniversary CD) and Im disappointed you took a pirated copy, since I do have it available again. (And to Mel, who gave it to you  ). It is not pubic domain or freeware.

Im not a big company, just 3 of us, me myself and I.

Let me know what I can do for you.  You can get the cross upgrade for $79.95 for Digital Desktop. It's at http://www.cssincorp.com/cgi-bin/store/commerce.cgi?pid=36. As long as you have 12/93 firmware, you're good to go.  If you need upgrade firmware and hardware (soundcard interface, DSP, USB, etc), check with Timewave at http://www.timewave.com

Best

Rick - W4PC

W6HLH, 10 KC wide signal on top of DX....

SK in 2005, got a warning in Jan 2005 before his death.

Has anyone written a book on these?  Seems that would be very interesting reading...

which bulletins are you looking for?

oh and a google search turned up this.

http://db0lj.prgm.org/db0lj-tn_g.htm

and this

http://www.dmnet.ca/ve/hamtelnet.shtml

and this..

http://ve9dx.weblink.nbtel.net/telnet/sites.html

and so on......

QRZ is Fred LLoyd, one man, one administrator. He and his wife keep the site going, almost at a loss.

Met him in person the first time in Hunstville this year, but have spoke with him by phone and email many times.

Bought banner ads from him too (as well as eHam from a great SK guy, Bill Fisher, W4AN).

I keep saying hams expect the same level out of one person as they expect out of a Microsoft or Yahoo.  The market is tiny.  When I worked for MSN we had almost 1,000,000 in the first few months and the data center has LOTS of outages (continues to this day, almost 15 years later).

So if Microsoft can't keep their servers up as much as QRZ does, your expectations are too high.

So you expect a company of 15 people to be able to have bug free software?  Even Microsoft with it's 32,000 people.. many of those are development and QA, can't even do that.  IBM can't do that. No company can do that, not even hardware companies.

Look at Yaesu, Kenwood, Icom, they all have issues and problems in hardware, as well as design flaws in the hardware.

Back in the early '90s, IBM had OEMed processor chips from Cyrix (now defunt), we couldnt figure out why PC-Mos was failing on only that processor until we put an ICE on it and found out there was a masking but error in the MICROCODE of the processor.  Bad code from IBM.  The big boys. (this was before they and MSFT split).

Do hams really expect small ham companies to be able to do things even the BIG companies cant do, which is bug free software AND get great service and low prices? Take Ford, GM, Toyota for example for hardware.  Toyota had a 'little' design flaw in the defective accelerator pedals.   

So why dont you apply to be their QA person? Which methodolgy would you use to QA the software and hardware? Do you know which model they are using for the software development cycle? Seems you could help them if you have done it before.