[aprssig] Re: Proportional Pathing and Aprstracker v0.11?

[Arno Verhoeven (PE1ICQ)]

Robert Bruninga wrote the following on 2006-11-29 1:49:
> Arno,
>   
Hi Bob,
>> Aprstracker is an open source firmware for PIC based trackers 
>> like the  TinyTrak, KF161-Tracker, or KF163-Tracker.
>> ...including... SmartBeaconing...
>>     
>
> Smart beaconing was a great improvement over fixed rates.  APRS
> was never intended for fixed rates anyway, but was supposed to
> use algorithms such as "decaying" to limit duplicates and old
> data and provide priority to new and fresh data.  I am glad you
> have this in your code.
>
> But there are many user settings for smart-beaconing that need
> to be changed depending on the situation and this can sometimes
> make things worse instead of better if these settings are set
> improperly.
>   

I agree. To somehow decrease the chance of someone making a mistake with 
the setting I reduced the number of SmartBeaconing variables that can be 
tweaked in the user settings. Only Slow beacon rate (in minutes), Slow 
beacon threshold, Fast Beacon rate (in seconds), and Fast beacon 
threshold can be set by the user. Previous releases also had a setting 
that impacted sensitivity to course changes and the minimum allowed time 
between beacons.

> Would you consider adding PROPORTIONAL PATHING to your system?

It already does support proportional pathing. It does that since v0.10. 
However it can do that in combination with SmartBeaconing.
The PropPath feature does not exclud the SB feature.
If both are enabled then the SmartBeaconing algorithm determines when to 
send a beacon, but when Proportional Pathing determines which digi-path 
to use for this particular beacon.

If SmartBeaconing is disabled and Proportional Pathing is enabled then 
the Aprstracker firmware does exactly what you described.

Do you think it is principally wrong to enable SmartBeaconing and 
Proportional Pathing at the same time?

73, Arno  PE1ICQ