Simon Brown wrote:
If a decision is made to abandon the serial port protocol I would go for
ethernet so that the radio *can* be put on a network.
Simon Brown, HB9DRV
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www.sysgem.com, www.hb9drv.ch, www.laax.ch
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And, under my scheme, nothing whatever would stop you from doing so. It
would happen in the most natural and obvious way -- you'd hook it up to
your PC using USB, put your PC on the net (which would be smart enough
to deal with firewalls, IPv4 versus IPv6 whenever that becomes important
and a host of other things known and unknown). You'd be able to run the
regular code with TightVNC or custom code that dealt with incoming
requests more directly.
Meanwhile, you would not be _required_ to put the radio on a network to
use it in the ordinary fashion, a skill some people do not possess in
abundance or which some would not wish to exercise in their automobile
if they take their SDR mobile. There, USB is a much, much simpler
interface.
It's really a question of where the complexity belongs. Networks are
nasty little things and it's ideal for a real computer. We could do it
at the peripheral level, but for the reasons I give, I think we'd repent
of it quickly. Besides, the USB line is assuredly dedicated and it
would also simplify timing questions not to have even the possibility of
an ethernet collision.
Larry WO0Z
