Some of you might have noticed that the aprs.fi statistics graphs were broken for a few days. I added some new statistics collection in the configuration on Friday, which worked just fine, but I also accidentally broke some old configuration (changed database password) on the way, and didn't notice it until yesterday.
The problem only affected the aprs.fi operation statistics collection, not APRS-IS data collection. The service itself worked just fine, it's performance data just wasn't collected too well.
The news of https://aprs.fi/ - new features and interesting attractions found in the APRS and AIS worlds.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Monday, June 23, 2008
Facelift and new buttons
Before leaving for the midsummer night's long weekend in the countryside (we had friday off from work in Finland) I did a little facelift for the main map view. After a little testing and bug fixing during sunday I'm installing this upgrade on the production servers.
I added a full screen mode (well, almost...) - click on the new "collapse" button in the top right corner to hide the menu bar. Thanks to Kauto (OH2LFM) and others for requesting this one. The new button is sometimes slightly misplaced when running MSIE6 - please upgrade to Internet Explorer 7 to get rid of that IE6 rendering bug.
I also added 'search' buttons for the callsign and address lookup input fields. They should enable Tony (VE3TK) and others to use aprs.fi on the Nintendo Wii (lacking an 'enter' key on the virtual keyboard), it'll probably help other embedded devices too. They also fix the problem of quick typists - pressing the (real) 'enter' key while the last key used in the callsign entry was still depressed failed to trigger the form submission, and you needed to press enter again. I'll add submit buttons on the rest of the forms later! Usability before coolness!
The facelift part consisted of removing the unnecessary "fieldset" box around the menu bar and adding a background image with a nice blue colour blend. Thanks to Gimp for help with the icon and background graphics!
I also added a workaround for a bug in the latest Google Maps API code, which partially broke address search. A javascript error broke the map view after about half of the address searches.
Firefox 3 was released last week, and it still seems to contain the bug which makes it break with aprs.fi every now and then. Less often, but still. Not recommended.
I added a full screen mode (well, almost...) - click on the new "collapse" button in the top right corner to hide the menu bar. Thanks to Kauto (OH2LFM) and others for requesting this one. The new button is sometimes slightly misplaced when running MSIE6 - please upgrade to Internet Explorer 7 to get rid of that IE6 rendering bug.
I also added 'search' buttons for the callsign and address lookup input fields. They should enable Tony (VE3TK) and others to use aprs.fi on the Nintendo Wii (lacking an 'enter' key on the virtual keyboard), it'll probably help other embedded devices too. They also fix the problem of quick typists - pressing the (real) 'enter' key while the last key used in the callsign entry was still depressed failed to trigger the form submission, and you needed to press enter again. I'll add submit buttons on the rest of the forms later! Usability before coolness!
The facelift part consisted of removing the unnecessary "fieldset" box around the menu bar and adding a background image with a nice blue colour blend. Thanks to Gimp for help with the icon and background graphics!
I also added a workaround for a bug in the latest Google Maps API code, which partially broke address search. A javascript error broke the map view after about half of the address searches.
Firefox 3 was released last week, and it still seems to contain the bug which makes it break with aprs.fi every now and then. Less often, but still. Not recommended.
Friday, June 13, 2008
aprs.fi presentation webcast tomorrow at 0700 UTC
I'm giving a presentation on aprs.fi tomorrow morning at the 30th Nordic VHF/UHF/SHF-meeting in Sappee, Finland. The presentations are broadcasted live on the Internet and on the 1.2 GHz ATV repeaters in Helsinki and Tampere.
My presentation will be on tomorrow morning, 14th of June, at 0700 UTC (10 AM local time).
Sorry for the late notice!
My presentation will be on tomorrow morning, 14th of June, at 0700 UTC (10 AM local time).
Sorry for the late notice!
Greek aprs.fi
Costas (SW2HUI) has contributed a complete translation of aprs.fi in Greek. ελληνική γλώσσα looks beautiful and reminds me of a few very nice holiday trips, too. Thank you, Costas!
Thursday, May 22, 2008
How to authenticate licensed hams?
It would be interesting to provide some methods for two-way communication in the aprs.fi web user interface. Say, APRS messaging from a sort of a web chat, as a simple and obvious example. Or marking their position on the web map and having it seen on APRS-IS. Having tracker devices with an open-source firmware (like OpenTracker and the Finnish HaMDR) opens up more interesting solutions, like remote control, or actively requesting information from a vehicle.
But how on earth could I figure out if an user of the web site is a licensed amateur radio operator, so that he can be allowed to transmit? Automatically, with somewhat strong authentication against an existing database or set of databases, without a need for validating each user by hand? To be useful, it would need to work for more than a few countries (Finland, USA to start with).
It's quite unlikely that the issuers of the licenses (like the FCC in the USA, Ficora in Finland) would bother to create Internet authentication services for their license databases. But the amateur leagues (at least ARRL in the USA, and SRAL in Finland) are already giving out accounts to their web sites ("for members only" features), and I suppose they also know whether each member is licensed or not.
What if the leagues would provide an authentication service using the OpenID protocol? An user would first type in their ARRL or SRAL email address (oh7foo@sral.fi, or n1example@arrl.org), then provide their sral.fi or arrl.org password to SRAL's or ARRL's site, and the authentication result, together with licensing status, would be passed back to aprs.fi (or another "licensed hams only" site).
This would require for the users to be members of one of the organizations providing OpenID authentication. But maybe some individual or organization could set up a trusted OpenID-enabled amateur database, charging each user $2 for the work of validating their license status.
Please, post a comment if you have any ideas for automatically validating the license status of a web site user.
But how on earth could I figure out if an user of the web site is a licensed amateur radio operator, so that he can be allowed to transmit? Automatically, with somewhat strong authentication against an existing database or set of databases, without a need for validating each user by hand? To be useful, it would need to work for more than a few countries (Finland, USA to start with).
It's quite unlikely that the issuers of the licenses (like the FCC in the USA, Ficora in Finland) would bother to create Internet authentication services for their license databases. But the amateur leagues (at least ARRL in the USA, and SRAL in Finland) are already giving out accounts to their web sites ("for members only" features), and I suppose they also know whether each member is licensed or not.
What if the leagues would provide an authentication service using the OpenID protocol? An user would first type in their ARRL or SRAL email address (oh7foo@sral.fi, or n1example@arrl.org), then provide their sral.fi or arrl.org password to SRAL's or ARRL's site, and the authentication result, together with licensing status, would be passed back to aprs.fi (or another "licensed hams only" site).
This would require for the users to be members of one of the organizations providing OpenID authentication. But maybe some individual or organization could set up a trusted OpenID-enabled amateur database, charging each user $2 for the work of validating their license status.
Please, post a comment if you have any ideas for automatically validating the license status of a web site user.
Ham::APRS::FAP 1.12 released
On monday evening I uploaded the new version of our APRS parser on the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network.
Version 1.12 includes a parser for the !DAO! extension, which can be used in uncompressed and mic-e APRS packets to report the datum and an additional digit of position resolution. It also reports the position resolution (in meters) for parsed position packets, depending on the type of the packet (compressed, mic-e, uncompressed), the presence of DAO and the amount of position ambiguity. These improvements were implemented by Tapio, OH2KKU.
I felt an urge to do some slight improvements on it myself before releasing it, and couldn't come with anything that would be both quick to implement and actually useful, so I just added some tests, cleaned up the API and packaging slightly, fixed POD documentation style, upgraded MakeMaker, and added a little example script, just to make CPANTS happier and increase the Kwalitee rating a bit. :)
Version 1.12 includes a parser for the !DAO! extension, which can be used in uncompressed and mic-e APRS packets to report the datum and an additional digit of position resolution. It also reports the position resolution (in meters) for parsed position packets, depending on the type of the packet (compressed, mic-e, uncompressed), the presence of DAO and the amount of position ambiguity. These improvements were implemented by Tapio, OH2KKU.
I felt an urge to do some slight improvements on it myself before releasing it, and couldn't come with anything that would be both quick to implement and actually useful, so I just added some tests, cleaned up the API and packaging slightly, fixed POD documentation style, upgraded MakeMaker, and added a little example script, just to make CPANTS happier and increase the Kwalitee rating a bit. :)
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
!DAO! support for greater precision
Tapio Sokura, OH2KKU, implemented the APRS precision and datum option (DAO) in the Ham::APRS::FAP parser last night. Looking at the IRC channel log, he started working on it at around 01:40 AM local time, and finished at 04:33 AM.
A few minutes ago I installed the new parser code on aprs.fi, so those of you transmitting uncompressed or mic-e packets with the DAO extension should now see the improved precision.
Compressed format packets have enough precision (around 1 foot) already, so DAO is not useful with it. aprs.fi properly decodes compressed packets (including speed and course), and compressed packets are the smallest ones (they help conserve valuable channel time on 144.39 and 144.800 MHz), so I would recommend using the compressed format instead of uncompressed or mic-e with DAO.
The only supported datum is still WGS84, no conversion from other datums specified by DAO is done.
A few minutes ago I installed the new parser code on aprs.fi, so those of you transmitting uncompressed or mic-e packets with the DAO extension should now see the improved precision.
Compressed format packets have enough precision (around 1 foot) already, so DAO is not useful with it. aprs.fi properly decodes compressed packets (including speed and course), and compressed packets are the smallest ones (they help conserve valuable channel time on 144.39 and 144.800 MHz), so I would recommend using the compressed format instead of uncompressed or mic-e with DAO.
The only supported datum is still WGS84, no conversion from other datums specified by DAO is done.
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