Jack, I couldn't agree more, particularly since the Kenwood/Elecraft protocol is the only one that has commands that are human-readable (at least by this human).
For myself, the only command I want is FA [center frequency], delivered via a virtual serial port and USB. All I want to do is to QSY the SoftRock to a new band from inside the back-end software (or in my case, contest logging software). It would also be nice to be able to switch in the appropriate BPF, but that's a hardware matter, not affecting the protocol. Perhaps the new daughter board could have 4 sockets for BPFs and use PIN diodes to accomplish the switching. 73, Pete N4ZR At 02:55 PM 5/20/2008, Jack Brindle wrote: >Interesting. I would push very hard to not re-invent the wheel with >this. Existing CAT standards (there are too many already) have >frequency setting already built in. My first question would be to ask >why these commands could not be used. If using the Elecraft/Kenwood >format, the FA (or FB) command should be able to do the task quite >well to set the center frequency. Actually, this should be rather >easy to implement; the biggest problem would be the RS-232 interface >chip and its associated voltage inverters which would create noise >for the radio. There are ways around this that eliminate the problem >(think Dallas DS275). > >In other words, this is a relatively easy problem to solve, and can >be solved _very_ quickly. > >Now if you want to add the DSP routines into the chip as well, we >have more work to do. It will take a bigger processor than the simple >PIC and a good stereo CODEC. But this is very solvable as well. It >just takes ( a lot?) more time. Sounds like a good learning project, >though. > >So Pete, exactly what do you want in the interface? > > >On May 20, 2008, at 11:13 AM, kc0vkn wrote: > > > Pete and I were trading emails earlier and I think it's more along > > the lines of an SDR CAT. > > > > One way to look at it may be an attempt now to write a command > > set so that folks doing > > whatever interfacing (PIC, PicAxe, Amtel, MSP430 etc..etc) would be > > able to use a canned set > > of functions to provide some sort (serial, whatever) control over > > things like band switching. > > Assuming other folks have already broken ground by providing such > > code. > > > > We might be able to come up with a standard (or use an existing > > one), that'd let folks be > > creative in how they manage their SR's but also mean that any > > software development for the > > front-end would have a standard interface to the hardware. > > > > Is this along the lines you were thinking Pete? > > > > Joe, KC0VKN > > > > > > ------------------------------------ > > > > Yahoo! Groups Links > > > > > > > >- Jack Brindle, W6FB >------------------------------------------------------------------------ >--------------------- > > > >------------------------------------ > >Yahoo! Groups Links > > >
