Here’s an old concept re-instituted. This past weekend I pulled my THD-7 out of storage, along with the Garmin GPS and made some cables. To do what you ask…
We’ll, the D-7 has a built in TNC. This means it can parse data input from a serial device and modulate it over the 2 meter airwaves, for location, bearing, temp. and a few other variables. All this is done using the APRS protocol.
After getting things connected, and waiting awhile for the GPS to boot and lock onto several birds, I was transmitting my location for the world to see! Several folks have been kind enough to write modules that interface with Google Maps service, so you can log onto their site and view your current location in real time! How cool is that.
You can also broadcast text messages to your friends using the APRS protocol. I haven’t tried this yet, but will later this week. From what I understand, if you know the route between you and your friend, and you’re close enough, you can specify a route for the packets to take and ease the load on the network.
More later…
Squirrel