[amsat-bb] Re: help with wisp

[cathrynham]

laura halliday wrote:
> Gordon wrote about WiSP and some other programs:
>   
>> Yes, but they're Windows-only, and there is no source code available.  I
>> don't want to have to buy a very expensive piece of software (which is
>> closed-source, and therefore insecure and unmaintainable) to run another
>> piece of closed-source software.
>>     
>
> If you see a need, start writing. This software doesn't appear
> magically, out of nowhere. Somebody has to write it. Why can't
> that somebody be you


Is pbpg  still being developed?  wasn't that open source?  This might be 
a good start, if not.  I always thought the pacsat
protocol was a very interesting concept and is a piece of technology 
that deserves to live on.   Maybe even
has uses for distributing content via low bandwidth channels on other 
ham bands.   It'd be nice, maybe
to have a raw library that just did the pacsat protocol alone, without 
all the other stuff, as a basis for building
other apps.     With a single common cross-platform library as the basis 
for pacsat protocol programs, that
would allow us to more easily improve the system, by updating the 
library, and then everyone's application is
upgraded.  (This of course, would take some time to build, which 
unfortunately, I have none of -- baah, for
real life interfering with such plans.)

With libraries for the 'weird stuff' then, I think more user apps would 
pop  up.  Hamlib, I believe is
a good example,and is still maintained, as far as I know.