By no means do I want to discourage experimentation. Not in the
slightest. I'm just suggesting why you're maybe not getting much traction
from the wireless guys (because I see it all the time, in many different
areas, not just ham radio).
What you're proposing seems like a good start. Access files across a
network. Start simple. Put two boxes with whatever OS you choose on a
stand-alone wired network. Two boxes plugged into a $5 garage sale
ethernet switch. Make them talk. Figure out how to do IP addressing and
get them to exchange packets. Maybe step up to setting up a DHCP server on
the network so you don't have to hard-code addresses. Then work on moving
files back and forth. There are a million ways to do that, none of them
wrong (at least not for learning). Add a camera and figure out how to
stream video from one device to another. Then convert the wired network to
wifi. There's a who new slew of problems (and benefits) to swapping out
the underlying network. Yes, in theory, it's not supposed to matter. In
reality, it does. You'll drop more packets on wireless, for example. How
do your applications react to that? Are there speed differences? Do the
apps start sending garbage or crash? They shouldn't, but sometimes they
do. Then try switching from wifi to the long-range ham wireless. More
benefits, more headaches. But get things working reliably and predictably
at each step along the way before you add a new layer of complexity. Never
change more than one thing at a time. That way, when new problems show up,
it's easier to track them down and figure out what happened and why.
None of these steps are things you can't do on your own with a little
help from Google and/or helpful people on the 'net. Each is a well-defined
problem with tried-and-true solutions. Work through them one at a time,
and a few months down the road, you'll have wireless HD video streaming
across your ham network.
Jeff N0GQ
On Sun, Sep 14, 2014 at 10:42 AM, Lloyd xr250-***@public.gmane.org [linuxham] <
linuxham-***@public.gmane.org> wrote:
>
>
> Yes, you are exactly right. I have no local interest, so I'm really
> trying to do it all myself. I think without years of professional training
> and experience, it may not be practical to go it alone.
>
>
> On 9/13/2014 3:42 PM, Jeff Francis⢠jeff-CDdbmnNP9qodnm+***@public.gmane.org [linuxham] wrote:
>
>
> I haven't been on the forum you're talking about, but I'm going to go
> out on a limb and hazard a guess as to why you're seeing what you're
> seeing.
>
> Networking is a discipline, for lack of a better word. Ultimately,
> it's an art/science of moving packets from one place to another that's
> largely independent of the underlying technology. From a networking
> perspective, a TCP packet moving from New York to London doesn't care if
> it's moving over a transatlantic cable, a satellite, a microwave link,
> WiFi/HSSM, a packet radio link, or via carrier pigeon. Networking involves
> understanding things like TCP, UDP, BGP4, IPv6, Spanning Tree, OSPF, and
> that kind of thing.
>
> Clients and servers are a whole separate skillset. It involves
> networking, certainly, but also heavily focuses on software and
> interoperability of software. It involves understanding the applications
> as well as the operating systems they run on. It involves understanding
> how to bind services to ports, how to configure services to run
> automatically, how to fail over, how to set up DNS and proxies, and a
> million other things.
>
> Finally, there's the HSMM guys. They're focused on a new way to
> provided the lowest-level connectivity for the networking piece of this. A
> way of connecting network nodes via high-power WiFi. They're heavily into
> understanding, configuring, and documenting the lowest level (Layer 1) of
> the networking stack.
>
> Given this, it's little surprise that they have little time or
> interest in helping people with the first two items. By the time you get
> to the point where you're doing things like designing HSMM networkings,
> it's assumed that you've already mastered networking, servers, and
> software. It's actually not surprising that they don't respond much to
> this, as the assumption is that if you're deploying what they're building,
> you'll already know how to run things on top of it.
>
> Here's a good analogy. A rich guy decides he wants to race cars. So
> he buys a $1m race car and has it hauled to the track on practice day. He
> rolls it down off the trailer and wanders over to the other drivers and
> mechanics who welcome him, and he asks for a bit of help. But see, he's
> never actually driven a car before...
>
> The rich guy isn't dumb, he's just jumping into the deep end with the
> wrong crowd on Day 1. Learn to operate a car. Then learn to drive in
> traffic. Then get some miles under your belt. Then try racing go-karts to
> learn how racing works. Then learn to drive a high-performance car. Then,
> maybe, it's time to go race. But starting out with racing when you've
> never driven a car before is a recipe for disaster.
>
> Likewise, setting up a network for events is a solvable problem. But
> the HSSM stuff really isn't your problem. Learn networking first. Not
> everything there is to know, but learn about addressing, routing, subnets,
> broadcast addresses. The basics. Then understand the problem you're
> trying to solve at the event. Find (or write) software that solves that
> problem. Then learn how to set it all up and get it to run reliably on a
> wired network. If it won't run right on a wired network, believe me,
> you're not going to be happy over wireless. Master getting your software
> to do what you want and when. Now that you understand your software and
> the networking required for the pieces to talk to each other, it's time to
> look at moving it off the wired network to the HSSM network, and all the
> new problems associated with flaky connections. Of course, you don't have
> to do all of this yourself. Break it up. One guy learns networking. The
> next guy learns servers. Third guy learns the software. And the four guy
> learns HSSM. Put them all together, and you've got a solution.
>
> You'll find hams (and non-hams) happy to help with every piece of
> this. But if you don't get the fundamentals down before trying the
> esoteric stuff, you're going to end up very frustrated.
>
> Jeff N0GQ
>
>
>
> On Sat, Sep 13, 2014 at 1:04 PM, Lloyd xr250-***@public.gmane.org [linuxham] <
> linuxham-***@public.gmane.org> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> Yes, that is the idea. Live video feed and other high data rate uses
>> would be great. And, although recreating the internet from scratch would
>> be alot of work!!; the good news is we don't need any consumer frills and
>> silly stuff. Just simple access between machines.
>>
>> Unfortunately, I have to say the Austin folks are great at giving away
>> freeware to hack the routers, but they refuse to help in the networking
>> aspect. This probably means it is harder to do than I'd like. If you read
>> their forums, there are countless questions from people regarding how to
>> actually USE the stuff. If you search the internet, you'll find 4+ hour
>> long conferences on how to flash the routers and you still don't learn how
>> to implement a network. They will even tell you that if you don't know how
>> to make it work, then that is your problem.
>>
>> Actually, I bet one of you could build a Linux system that one could
>> download and have the functionality required. It is probably a money
>> making opportunity. Of course, if there isn't enough demand, it may not be
>> practical for the time you invest.
>>
>>
>> On 9/13/2014 2:53 PM, 'qrv-JH0e/***@public.gmane.org' qrv-JH0e/***@public.gmane.org [linuxham] wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> A non-proprietary/free OS that loads on commonly-available routers
>> & can auto-connect to others for an instant-network that's self-healing
>> and robust (e.g. 50mb/s) is a very useful tool.
>>
>> Have you also considered that you can use the camera feed from a
>> quad-copter or other vehicle via the Broadband-Hamnet to share it?
>>
>> The folks on the http://www.broadband-hamnet.org/ Forum used to be
>> very helpful back when I was experimenting with it - have you not
>> found that to be the case?
>>
>> At least some of the Hams there were always excited about new
>> adopters and delighted to share what they have accomplished -
>> which includes the apps you listed.
>>
>> They had a demo set-up at Dayton and I believe many of the other
>> larger Fests across the USA. I think they were at Stone Mountain
>> last year -- I believe it's Nov. 1 & 2 this year.
>>
>> David KD4E
>>
>> > Lloyd xr250-***@public.gmane.org [linuxham] wrote:
>> >
>> > Yes. I'm using the firmware from the Austin ham group. As an example
>> > of use, when covering a tree-at halon event, the Austin group is able to
>> > send live video feed from a remote part of the race back to the starting
>> > line. They get 50mb/s at line of site distances nearing 10 miles.
>> > (Using dish antennas) This is in back country with no internet.
>> >
>> > I would like to have it for email, file transfers, video, audio
>> > conferencing, etc., during an emergency when internet and cell service
>> > is down. It will only work between fellow hams with similar equipment,
>> > but the idea is to make it a field deploy-able, stand alone network.
>> > The routers already see each other, and I can log in to either router
>> > from both computers. So they work, but you can't actually "do" anything.
>> >
>> > Here is the problem: I'm a computer novice. I don't know what I need
>> > to make one machine act as the server, with the other machines clients.
>> > I need to learn about port forwarding, and advertising the service.
>> > What I need is someone with network experience who can create a stand
>> > alone network from scratch. Most people don't understand why I want to
>> > "re-invent" the internet since it already exists.
>> >
>> > Windows 7 is supposed to offer this kind of machine to machine
>> > networking, but I couldn't get it to work. Now that I'm learning Linux,
>> > I figure it is a natural for stand alone networking. I just have a lot
>> > to learn!
>>
>> --
>>
>> David Colburn, KD4E - Nevils, Georgia USA
>>
>> Safe & Secure Search Engine: duckduckgo.com
>>
>> Android for Hams: groups.yahoo.com/group/hamdroid
>> Creative Tech: groups.yahoo.com/group/ham-macguyver
>> Raspi Alternative: groups.yahoo.com/group/beagleboneblack/
>>
>> Restored to design-spec at Heaven's gate 1Cor15:22
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> -=jeff=-
>
>
>
>
--
-=jeff=-