What would everyone suggest as far as hardware to start using JS8Call/FT8?

I think I have just enough room for a 40m inverted V (a dipole might be a little tricky since I don’t have trees in the yard).

I don’t have any transceiver yet, so completely open on that front!

Thanks!

  • Jason - VE3MAL@lemmy.radioEnglish
    3·
    9 months ago

    That manual is written by Jordan, but the key point is not the manual, it’s the software and protocol.

    JS8Call has a few bits it can devote to “special” group calls that save a lot of bandwidth, and saving bandwidth improves how much you can send in a single cycle, improving both communication speed AND fidelity. But there are only a few of them because they are limited by the protocol design, so Jordan necessarily has to be selective. He chose to devote one of those to a group with christofascist and insurrection ties. That is an implied endorsement, or special assistance rendered to that group that turns off a LOT of hams. It’s quite literally baked in to the software. If that doesn’t bother you, fine, but I hope you can see why many of us would rather just stay clear of something like that.

    The relaying is also a problem. Though most people don’t automatically relay, it’s worth being aware that if you turn that feature on, you could be carrying water for AMRRON. It could also be illegal at a point. Without the network features of JS8Call, it doesn’t actually bring a while lot of fancy features beyond existing digimodes.

    • MonochromeLadybug@lemm.eeEnglish
      2·
      9 months ago

      Thank you very much for taking the time to respond and explain a bit more to connect the dots for me. I didn’t notice the built-in @AMRRON group name nestled in the rest of the special purpose groups. I definitely don’t appreciate their inclusion, since it is tacit approval of the group, as you alluded to.

      Yeah, the FCC document definitely made the potential to leave relaying enabled iffy. I really wish I was a better coder, or I’d fork the code, remove the @AMRRON group and pop up a prompt of whether to allow a relayed message, or only allow to/from trusted parties.