[CTxDSstar] Reflections upon on a dplus

[ke5c]

Hi All (UR=CQCQCQ)!

----- Alan Isaachsen -----

Alan is now a moderator and will be responsible for managing posts 
directly related to W5HDR:

Houston, W5HDR, is operational on A, B, C modules in the Texas Med 
Center.
Frequencies are, in brief:
      146.47000 +1.000 Mhz 440.60000 +5.000 Mhz
     1293.00000 -
      20.000 Mhz 1248.20000 Mhz
Activity is shown on http://www.nj6n.com/g2/index.php?filter=w5hdr

----- REFLECTORS -----

During the next several days and into the Dayton Hamfest weekend, 
K5CTX^^B will often be linked to a reflector.  The DStar community is in 
the alpha stages of developing reflector "etiquette", and sometimes 
things are a mess, so be patient.  My last posting (see archive link at 
bottom of this message) discussed this a bit, but you can never hear it 
too much, and following these comments is a repost that NU5D sent my way 
from a UK group.  While the gateway calls are different, the substance 
of that post applies completely to us.  When operating a gateway linked 
to a reflector (and you don't always know right away if that is the 
case -  we are working on that), consider the following suggestions:

1) keep your transmissions shorter, perhaps 15 to 30 seconds maximun due 
to the possibility you may be colliding with another station., and if 
so, the longer you talk, the longer no one can hear.

2) always direct someone else whom you know to be listening to "take it" 
from you otherwise two or three people key up at once.

3) pause before you transmit 3 to 5 seconds, even if you were directed 
to transmit by someone else.  A third party may need to get in.

4) after three to five transmissions, while you are in control, ask if 
anyone else wants in and pause 10 or so seconds to give them a chance.

5) if a dongle links in and tries to talk to you, ask them to disconnect 
and reconnect directly to the reflector.  Otherwise they won't hear 
anyone on the reflector although they will still hear you.

These are just ideas to mull.  As you listen, you can tell some folks 
don't do any of these...

Much like Alan's activity link, K5CTX and W5HAT are monitored at:

http://www.bosshardradio.com/g2/

Take some time to watch this and listen to the repeater/gateway at the 
same time.  You can tell when a reflector is linked very easily by the 
appearance of a reflector "call".  Every time a transmission is made (as 
long as you have set RPT2=K5CTX^^G or W5HAT^^G) a record of that will 
appear - including kerchunks, hi hi.

Okay, here's another explanation of dplus and reflectors:

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [dstar-kent] GB7DX & GB7FK Update
Date: Mon, 12 May 2008 07:53:05 -0000
From: Declan Mc Glone

All,

Thought it was worth giving everyone an update on a few recent
developments that will enhance the functionality of both GB7DX and 
GB7FK.

Some updated software, its called dplus in case you're wondering, has
now being installed on both Gateway Servers which allows linking of
repeaters. Its possible to link one repeater to another eg GB7DX
linked to GB7FK, or you can also link to a Reflector, this acts as a
central point where multiple repeaters/dongle users can gather and all
talk to each other. I participated in a World Wide Net on Sunday, the
objective of the net was to see how many Repeaters and Dongle Users
could connect to a Reflector and to see what sort of capacity it could
take. There were 27 Repeaters, and 15 Dongle users connected. The
system performed perfectly, and no performance issued were noted. So,
this is Multicasting on a much larger scale.

There are 5 Reflectors. You might see them referred to as REF001,
REF002, REF003.........etc In addition all the Reflectors have three
Modules, A,B or C. So for example, the World Wide Net took place on
REF001 C. The main UK Reflector is REF005 A. Having Repeaters linked
to each other, or being connected to a Reflector does not impact on
other stations connecting up to your local repeater. However if
someone connects, they will be heard on all linked
Repeaters/Reflectors. The linking is currently done

The key thing to remember to make all this work, is to set your RPT 2
field to G. For example in the case of users on GB7FK,

Your CQCQCQ
RPT 1 GB7FK  B
RPT 2 GB7FK  G

This way you will be heard by all stations connected to the Reflector
or by all stations connected to the linked Repeaters. This should be
your standard setting for working your local Repeater. One of the
things you should remember is that you might turn on your radio and
not realise that you are connected up to a Reflector/Repeater, so if
you put a call out don't be surprised if you get a reply that you
weren't expecting. We are still getting used to this new
functionality, so far its working very well, and as things develop
further functionality may be added.

[-----snip-----]

Regards,

Declan.