SmartSDR 1.6 CAT Changes - a sneak peek

Drax

I don't know. The screenshots show them both as blue.

Tim - W4TME

David - the hardware com port, be it a hardware UART (com port) or a USB dongle that emulates a UART is connected to the CAT application.  CAT acts a a "Rosetta Stone" to translate serial CAT commands into the FlexLib API commands and sends them over the network connection via TCP/IP to the radio.  This will allow you to connect an amp that speaks CAT to your PC running SmartSDR CAT to facilitate the amp getting band data.

Walt - KZ1F

I agree with George, the doc is really good. Put Dave in for a raise

Simon Lewis

Without wishing to sound ungrateful Tim this is no better than ddutil now. The point is to not use a PC when Maestro comes but to drive the CAT cmds out the flex hardware ie no pc... This still ties you to a pc..sigh

Will the Flex 6000 ever support CAT out of the hardware .. NOT via a PC?

DH2ID

Hi Tim, love the way you publish the docs first ;-)
One question: Will the new CAT, DAX and profile progs work with the old settings or
will we have to set up all again? I ask, because I have quite a lot of profiles and
my CAT ports will have to take the old port numbers...
73, Alex DH2ID

DH2ID

Simon, CAT commands - and the COM ports you have to use them with - make only sense if you use external programs, as fldigi or HRD for digimodes.
As you can't run external programs on a Maestro, you always will have to
run a pc in parallel with it, if you want digimodes or logging.

Tim - W4TME

Good question.  When converting to a higher version of SmartSDR, we have a database conversion process that will convert the existing profiles to the 1.6.17 format.  However, the reverse is not true.  SmartSDR 1.5.1 is unaware of the 1.6.17 database schema, so reverting back is not automatic.  You should make a backup (export) of your current profiles before upgrading to 1.6.17 that can be used if you need to revert.  This will be covered in detail in the release notes.

DH2ID

Ok, Tim, thank you for your fast and precise answer. I always backup everything in case I need it again ;-) But a reminder is very welcome.
I'm looking forward to the new CAT program, as it gives us a lot of
new possibilities to experiment with external programs.

Simon Lewis

Sorry but that is utterly ridiculous maestro will act as a control panel the thing missing is CAT out of the hardware ..there should be no reason to rely on the pc for CAT ports ...try telling a kenwood icom yaesu or elecraft owner that ... my amp needs band data for auto switching ... as does my station controllers etc ... CAT out via the hardware is about a basic function as you can get ...why rely on 3rd party interfaces ...this is a huge gap ...and I am pretty miffed that this CAT implementation  is a fudge of some PC SSDR driven approach and does not fix the real need for CAT on a hardware port ON RADIO

DH2ID

Sorry Simon, maybe I misunderstood your question, as I have no amplifier at home, using QRP. But I have succesfully connected a friend's Expert 1K-FA
http://www.reimesch.de/expert.html using these recommendations https://community.flexradio.com/flexradio/topics/expert_2k_fa.

As you can find here http://www.flexradio.com/downloads/maestro-datasheet-pdf/ and in the Maestro specifications there will be no CAT connection possible to the Maestro itself (which IS a CAT machiche).

Al_NN4ZZ

Hi Simon,
Here is a post from 2 years back that discusses getting CAT / Band data from the radio without a local PC.   One option noted is a dedicated micro-controller that would basically be "ddutil in a box" connected directly to the radio.  The connection could be via the accessory connector or IP. 

https://community.flexradio.com/flexradio/topics/band_data-3xef1?topic-reply-list%5Bsettings%5D%5Bfi...

One of the newer station peripherals that has been discussed here and connects to the radio via IP may provide the capability.  So I think you will see some of what you are looking for but it may be a while still. 

Regards, Al / NN4ZZ  
al (at) nn4zz (dot) com
6700 - HW......... V 1.5.1.70
SSDR / DAX...... V 1.5.1.152
CAT................... V 1.5.1.0
Win10

Barry N1EU

Just to close the loop on this thread after actually testing the release, the v1.6 Winkeyer emulation apparently does not maintain PTT for the duration of a keyed cw message, which is how the hardware Winkeyer works.

Tim - W4TME

This particular feature of WinKeyer is not supported (see the CAT doc for the functions that are supported)  We emulate Winkeyer functionality by using CWX as the CW generation engine.  CWX has no PTT interface, as the keying is handled in the CWX sending logic.

If you can describe how the radio is not kept in transmit while sending, I would like to know because we have had several alpha team members use the WK emulation in contests with N1MM+ and it if did not key the radio when sending, we would have heard about it.

Barry N1EU

Tim, with all due respect, 5 days ago I said that it didn't appear that PTT was supported after reading the doc and you told me I wasn't reading it properly.

Evidently your alpha team is not using Winkey PTT.

Not only isn't Winkey PTT implemented, but the Flex 6K isn't supporting PTT as MOX with Breakin enabled.  The K3, Ten-Tec Orion (two top cw contesting radios) as well as the ANAN-100D all support this.

How this is used is simple - you want to use breakin for paddle keying and you want the rx to be muted while the computer keyer is sending a message.  When you're cq'ing thousands and thousands of times over a 48-hour period, the rx muting is highly desired relief.

Tim - W4TME

I'll add your use case as a feature request.

W9OY

I didn't realize Ten Tec, Elecraft, or Anan had any kind of Winkey emulation.  When I owned an Orion it just had a keyer.  When I owned an Anan 100D it just had a kind of standard format generic keyer. 

73  W9OY

Barry N1EU

Ten Tec, Elecraft, and  Anan  support PTT as MOX with Breakin enabled (and Flex does not), which is what I thought I said.

Steven Catani

Tim,

I would like to use VFO B but not for split. On nets that operate Voice and digital i use two slices on the same frequency so i can use USB and have EQ on voice and digu and not have it on the digital. When I send digital it switches, but without vfo B defined I does not switch back (and I don't want to spawn slices.

Steve
N2TAO