The computer age has come even to amateur radio, in the form of digital modes such as APRS and WinLink, and Echolink, which is software that allows a ham with a computer to access amateur-radio repeaters via the internet. This way, one doesn’t have to be in range of the repeater’s airwave signal to use it for communications.
Both Chris and I have the software, but so far she hasn’t been successful in using it. This afternoon she and I tried to QSO between my home-office bugbox and a computer at the NWS office where Chris works, but while I could hear her just fine, she couldn’t hear me—or even receive the text-chat messages I tried to send her via the program. We think there’s probably an unresolved firewall issue, since she was able to hear all other Echolink-generated system sounds just fine.
I’ve used Echolink multiple times now to check in to the weekly local ARES net and to monitor the Georgia SKYWARN severe weather nets when there’s dangerous weather in the area. Both are also available by way of a nearby repeater that gets linked in for these nets, but when I’m at the computer I’m far from the radio.
Not all repeaters can be reached by Echolink; the two repeaters owned and operated by our ham radio club don’t have it, but it could be done without adding equipment to the repeaters themselves—someone would just need to set up a dedicated radio connected to a computer, with the radio keying up the repeater like any other ham.
Of course, having the extra radio and computer to dedicate to Echolink access is the tricky part.
Anyway, Chris is going to continue troubleshooting her connection at work, and probably we’ll try to get her home-computer setup working too since we know it can work from here. We also have it on our laptop so we can check in to the ARES net even if we’re across the country—as long as there’s a good internet connection where we are.
