Lester Veenstra wrote: > > I am sorry that I did not make myself clear enough. My argument > is directed to transmitted signal formats. That is, what is covered by > §97.307 Emission standards. >
All the FCC requires is that the protocol/algorithm be made available if required. Does not have to be published, and there is no requirement for every ham to be able to monitor. Just that if the FCC asks, it's made available. I know this first hand as my club worked directly with them in the mid-80's on a new modulation scheme developed by a member. We offered to provide the algorithm or keep source in escrow, and they basically said if they needed to monitor they had ways and would contact us as needed. IE: No need for source, etc. The modem was sold commercially, so the club wanted to have all above board. Even P3 is snoopable with commercial programs, so it's just a non-issue. Even hams could snoop P3 if they wanted to with the new capabilities SDR offers. Just record the data stream, and decode and work out the FEC over time. Not to defend SCS, but by providing the general description, tone frequencies, etc, for P3 there is more than enough information for the mode to be monitored by any agency who needs to. As a side note, the FCC also ruled on our new modulation scheme that randomization did not constitute encryption, nor was it considered spread spectrum. Randomization of data is both common and desired for modulation schemes as it keeps the average power up and minimizes the effect of sidebands in some schemes. (They are there, just less noticeable). If we dug very deeply I suspect we'd find P3 randomizes as well for the same reasons. To quote G3RUH who also used randomization in this modem: "Secondly, since the data stream is now randomised, its spectral energy is evenly spread out at all times. Intense spectral lines do not suddenly appear and create sporadic splatter into nearby channels. A third reason is that since the data is guaranteed to have a regular supply of ones and zeros, the receiver's bit clock recovery and demodulation circuits work better. " We had challenges from the nay-sayers on both points, so we had it in writing from the FCC engineers. So the idea that any mod scheme which does not send steady tones when sending zeros is spread spectrum is just flat out wrong. While SS can be thought of as an extreme form of randomization, randomization does not always equal SS. There are specific coding sequences used to improve decoding that are also pseudo random that are in common usage. Have fun, Alan km4ba
