On Tue, 27 May 2008 19:38:13 EDT, Michael Coslo wrote:

Now let us turn to our D-Star equipped repeater.

What will communicate with it:

Icom D-Star Equipment
Kenwood ( a rebranded Icom, sold only in Japan
Moetronix Can hear and talk D-Star on the internet.

That is a pretty short list. One for all practical purposes You buy the
equipment and you use it.

The "leadership" of our ARES/RACES group are D-Star fanatics. They
claim, though, that the ICOM equipment does have an FM mode to pass FM
signals through. I have no idea how that works (dual detection
channels?).

As I understood it, D-Star is a set of open protocols generated by
individuals in the Japan Radio Club (or whatever the formal name is)
and ICOM was the only one so far to implement them in hardware. If
someone else wants to implement them, a good IP lawyer can steer them
in the direction of non-infringement. A good (non-ham) friend of mine
is the IP attorney for Nikon USA and he is always checking to see that
the newest stuff proposed does not infringe patents by Canon and
others, yet digital photography uses open standards that everyone
implements in their own way.

One of our club members is the author of D-Rats (that's Star spelled
backwards), a set of open-source applications for functionality of
D-Star radios. There's nothing proprietary about what he is doing or
its applications, and he comes out with updates weekly. I'm not a
software person so I can't comment on hooks and APIs and such.

Hey, I would be a D-Star "nut" also were the radio fairy to deliver
four dual-band mobiles and an HT on my doorstep one night. We'll
leave the light on for ya'.
--

73 de K2ASP - Phil Kane

From a Clearing in the Silicon Forest
Beaverton (Washington County) Oregon

e-mail: k2asp [at] arrl [dot] net