The mission of the ARETF is to make Amateur Radio Networks work better by producing high quality, relevant technical documents that influence the way people design, use, and manage Amateur Radio Networks.
Amateur Radio Engineering Task Force
The goal of the ARETF is to make radio networking better
Amateur Radio Engineering Task Force 
Standards/Algorithms/Protocols/Formats we need:
Format for storage of IQ data along with metadata, for software defined radios (SDR).
Protocol for transporting IQ data through the internet for remote access to and control of stations
Protocols for multiple access to RF media (sharing) for TCP/IP networking
Protocols for (mobile?) ad-hoc mesh networking
Algorithms and protocols for moving off-frequency to pass traffic, in order to increase aggregate network bandwidth
Algorithms to measure and predict bandwidth requirements in the near future, for automatic reconfiguration of networks (in order to increase aggregate network bandwidth)
Authentication protocol — using crypto (but *only* for signatures on each packet) — to allow securely logging into a remote computer via a plain-text amateur radio RF link. This would prevent unauthorized access, session hijacking, playback attacks, etc. Perhaps it should be called stelnet.
Ken,
Sorry for not replying sooner. I realize the project stalled for the last year, but I hope to get things started again. The first proposed draft is actually on authentication, please go check it out and provide some feedback at the forum discussion. (https://forum.aretf.net)
73,
Kenny, KU7M
Unless we have a very good reason not to, we should probably start by considering the following standards (already developed, or in development):
VITA 49.0 Radio Transport Protocol
VITA 49.2 Transmit & Control Extension
Here are a couple links for VITA 49.0:
http://Vita.OpenSystemsMedia.com/articles/standards-software-defined-radios-expand/
Click to access SDROoverWEB-VITA.pdf
I could not find any good links for VITA 49.2. But let me caution you. The obvious link — the first one found on Google for VITA 49.2 — is a useless trap. I strongly recommend AGAINST clicking on it.
In fact, ARETF should petition VITA to become a free member of VITA. (We can’t afford anything more expensive.) But I also recommend that if ARETF does become a free member of VITA, we REFUSE to sign any NDAs, and make it very clear that we *will* freely publish standards and documentation amongst the amateur radio community. If VITA can’t live with that, then ARETF can’t live with VITA.
I’ve been searching for it without success, but I recall that Flex
announced at DCC that they would Open their network protocol. If this is the case, then an abstracted version of that should be the first item on the agenda for consideration of standards by the ARETF (aka Fred).
I would also like to see a standard for SDR components, and a protocol for loading SDRs with them. Here is what I’m thinking. Some SDRs are glorified sound cards, and while they have an RF-capable ADC, they depend on a host machine (running say GNU Radio) to implement most of the functionality WRT (with respect to) DSP functions. Some SDRs have built-in DSPs and others have much of the horse-power in FPGAs. If there were a standard protocol for the boards to inform the host of
it’s capabilities, and a protocol for loading modules in to the SDR (that makes sense, or is user configurable), then the host SDR software could become more standardized. with this system, there could be knowledge about how much horse-power is available on what systems (SDR hardware, host computer) such that one would know that he can run
X mode A and Y mode B receivers, and Z mode C transmitters on SDR brand F model 6500 with his I7 based laptop. This should enable the user flexibility in dynamically switching-in alternative modes, etc.
Fred could propose a network standard for interop on the back-end of VHF-UHF DV systems. There may be modules that interface with the current networks that can provide that interop, such as the DMR talk-group, etc. If we can establish a nice set of features that map to existing features of some of these systems, and provide shims for those systems missing some of those features, that would be a good thing. So example, while DMR doesn’t know about call-sign and both Yeasu-Fusion and D-Star do, there could be a database in the DMR shim
that does a transform of MAC to call-sign and back. We could map talk-groups to the systems that support it directly, and virtual chat-rooms for those that don’t. There are a lot of features in each of the three systems that we could standardize on at the network level, and therefore bring that feature-set to all three systems.
Scott,
Those are all great ideas, but the ARETF is always going to consider standards relevant to ham radio. But we will not be able to ‘produce’ one without people willing to author and contribute.
What is the first space you are willing to draft up a spec for?
73,
Kenny, KU7M
73,
Kenny, KU7M