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EMAIL OVER APRS

Courtesy of John - VK5ZTY

"Another AR Innovation!"

The APRS to Email Server provides a method to gate an APRS message to an Email address.  A typical use of this would be a station remote from the APRS network sending an email via one of the digital satellites or via the International Space Station.  Another use would be to send email messages when the Amateur Radio Service is used to provide emergency communications.

 

The server primarily covers  Australia and New Zealand. It should be accessible from other areas, however this can be subject to APRS filters that may be in use.

 

This email server has two modes. Single line and multi line.

 

Single line mode.

 

Destination address is VKMAIL

Alternate destination address is V

Either will work.  The latter being easier for D700s etc.

Email address is specified as  -  recip@host

Alternate email address is specified as  - recip at host

 

An example single line email recip@host<space>message text

 

Mutli line mode.

 

To the specify a multi line email the ! character is used as the first character in the message text e.g.

 

LINE 1 - Contains the email address and some message text and would be entered as recip@host<space>!message line 1 text (NOTE THE EXCLAMATION MARKS IN RED)
LINE2 to LINE n-1  contains the ! character as the first character in the message.  For example line 2 would be entered as - !next line 2 text

LINE 3 entered as -  !next line 3 text

To terminate the message, simply leave out the ! at the start of the message line.

LAST LINE would be entered as -  end line text.

 

AN example of a Multi-Line Email would be ...

 

TO: VKMAIL

 

jonn@world.net !Hello John how are you etc.

!I hope your fine etc.

!Keep on inventing great new innovations for AR etc.

Be good ... Rob

 

The email message will then be sent.

 

Remember that APRS messages are restricted to 67 characters. Your APRS client will probably allow you to go over that amount and the client will separate the text into multiple APRS messages.  In this case the email server will do it's best to process what it currently has and either send the email or respond with an error message.

 

For people using D700s etc. while mobile (but not driving) or perhaps sending a message via one of the digital satellites, there is a message timeout set to 4 minutes for multi line emails.  This timer is reset on receipt of each valid APRS message. So for instance the server does not receive the last line of your message, it will send the lines received on expiry of the 4 minute timer.

 

 

MORE INFO ....      JOHN VK5ZTY ...          

    

 

APRS is short for Automatic Position Reporting System, which was designed and is copyright to Bob Bruninga, WB4APR, and introduced by him at the 1992 TAPR/ ARRL Digital Communications Conference.

 

BE NICE,  IT'S A HOBBY!

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This Page was Last Updated on Thursday, 02 March 2006