Here’s a few notes I sent to someone else earlier today.
M17 is a very NEW project with a great deal of traction just recently. https://m17project.org/faq/ has some details about what is happening. This is a completely open source project using David Rowe’s Codec2 for the encoding scheme. Much like the FreeDV for HF we have been using for many years. They have modified the back-end around Dstar for the reflectors and modules, using a very slightly modified version of the xlxd software for building reflectors. Seems that the reflector count has risen from 3 to 12 in the past 3 days, so the word is still getting out to others. https://m17project.org/reflector/ There is no commercially available radio, but the TR-9 is the radio that has been designed for it today. I understand they just got their alpha pc-boards barely a week ago, and are still sourcing the components for it. But there should be some RF available in a week or so. Jonathon Naylor has just updated the MMDVM code to support M17, and the hotspot devices and the gateway components are being worked next. His early comment below. Hi All I've just finished the first round of developing M17 support for the MMDVM. It is based on the current specification of M17, but it is a dynamic protocol so it may well change before long. I've raised some issue with the M17 developers which may mean changes to address those issues. Currently M17 won't work with MMDVM hotspots based on the chip modem/radio, only those systems based on MMDVM modem boards. In theory the levels are correct and you should be able to load the modem code, and the MMDVM Host from the M17 branch and off you go. I don't know if it works as I have no M17 radios. Once we get hotspot support for M17 then I think it'll be possible to use them as low powered M17 transceivers. On the networking side, it only connects to one M17 reflector, and that is set in the ini file. Currently it's set to M17-USA module A. If things move on with M17 then I will create a proper M17 Gateway program with echo functionality to allow for dynamic control of the reflector, but that is far off at the moment. I have tested my code against itself, and most of it seems to work, some corners have not been tested yet, but they will be in due course. If anyone has an M17 transceiver and wishes to play with the code, I'd be interested in what happens. Jonathan G4KLX So it is early in the development stages, but things are indeed moving fast, as of just the ast few weeks. Walter/K5WH From: Adrian Musceac <kanto...@gmail.com> Sent: Saturday, October 24, 2020 3:27 PM To: freetel-codec2@lists.sourceforge.net Subject: Re: [Freetel-codec2] Comments on the M17 project Hi Walter, Is there like a mailing list of the project or something? Adrian On October 24, 2020 4:13:56 PM UTC, walt...@k5wh.net <mailto:walt...@k5wh.net> wrote: Several of us have been working with M17 for the past week, using the Mvoice linux client, and it's working quite well with the reflectors they have in place today. The number of reflectors have increased from 3 early last week to 9 as of this morning, with a couple more that should show up today. Since it uses the Dstar concept for reflectors, each one can support modules A-Z, so 26 different sets of qso's if it ever gets that busy. 😊 I am greatly looking forward to seeing the TR-9 radio on the air before too long, to really exercise the mode, as the MMDVM and hotspot code gets updated by Jonathan. Once the gateway option is available, then cross-modes of DMR/Fusion etc.. to M17 should will ramp things up until more radios are available. It's really exciting for me to see yet another opportunity for David's Codec2 to truly shine for us. M17 is another great victory for the Open Source World! Walter/K5WH -----Original Message----- From: Al Beard <bear...@unixservice.com.au <mailto:bear...@unixservice.com.au> > Sent: Saturday, October 24, 2020 12:52 AM To: freetel-codec2@lists.sourceforge.net <mailto:freetel-codec2@lists.sourceforge.net> Subject: [Freetel-codec2] Comments on the M17 project Hi all, I was looking at the M17 project and noticing their discussion on callsign sending. Suggesting in 48 bits for Src and Dest, packing the characters as RT11 filenames used to do. (Digital PDP-11 of 1975) What I notice in our HF mode 700D, it has quite poor data reliability particularly in the "Txt MSG" which is where the Src and Dest data may well be. Adding 96 bits to every frame is in my view way too many bits. In our current modes eg. 700D, could we sacrifice every tenth frame for source and destination? Thoughts? --------------------------------------------------- Alan VK2ZIW Before the Big Bang, God, Sela. OpenWebMail 2.53, nothing in the cloud. _______________________________________________ Freetel-codec2 mailing list <mailto:Freetel-codec2@lists.sourceforge.net> Freetel-codec2@lists.sourceforge.net <https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freetel-codec2> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freetel-codec2
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