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TNC Setup for APRS

TNC Settings

These tips may help in setting up your TNC

• Make sure HEADERLN is OFF
• Some AEA TNCs have an EXPERT mode, it must be ON
• When using DUAL MODE TNCs such as the AEA DSP-2232 and PK-900 and the KAM, there are some extra settings for switching between HF and VHF (radio 1 and radio 2). These strings can be set in the TNC settings dialog box. If you select the correct TNC button, it will automatically set these for you. If you are using non-standard, put your settings in the box. The defaults are
  • AEA are "|0" and "|A"
  • KAM are "~A" and "|A".
• If you are using a Kantronics TNC, then there are some extra settings that MUST be setup in order for Mac/WinAPRS to understand the data coming from the Kantronics TNC.
  headerln off
  mstamp off
  cstamp off
  streamev on
  mresp off
  mcom off
  pid off
   

The following TNCs have been thoroughly tested with MacAPRS and WinAPRS

• AEA PK-232
• AEA DSP-2232
• AEA PK-900
• PacComm Tiny 2
• PacComm PicoPacket - we are in the progress of testing the PicoPacket

 

Additional TNC settings STARTUP and SHUTDOWN

MacAPRS / WinAPRS will additionally transmit a text file to the TNC on startup and shutdown. These files can contain any TNC commands that you may need and may be of any length. Lines starting with "*" or "!" are comments and not passed to the TNC.

Since you can have more than one TNC in use, Mac/WinAPRS looks for several file names, the first one it finds in each catogory is the one used. Once it finds one of them, it does not look for any of the remaining names. These are determined at STARTUP of the program, to see which file is currently being used, refer to the Internal State Window. The files used for dosAPRS will work just fine for WinAPRS and MacAPRS.

• VHF Port Startup
  1. InitVHF.TNC
  2. INITTAPR.TNC
  3. INITAEA.TNC

   

• HF (Dual) Port Startup
  1. InitHF.TNC
  2. INITTAPR.TNC
  3. INITAEA.TNC

   

• VHF Port Shutdown
  1. ExitVHF.TNC
  2. RESTORE.TNC

   

• HF (Dual) Port Shutdown
  1. ExitHF.TNC
  2. RESTORE.TNC

 

TNC Selection

Under the SETTINGS Menu is "TNC Selection", this displays a list of all of the TNC setup files in the directory "TNCfiles", these files are supplied as standard TNC set up files as described above for each of several different brand and model of TNCs. Select the mode and TNC model that you will be using.

Please note: the settings contained in each of these TNC files may not be perfect for your station but are an attempt to make initial setup easier and quicker.

TNC Commands Menu

Under the SETTINGS menu, there is a sub menu called TNC COMMANDS, under this there are several commands to send APRS strings and affect the TNC.

• Send Position
• Send Objects
• Send Grid-Square Position
• Send Weather Report
• Send APRS Query
• Send WX Query

   

• VHF-Re-Initialize TNC
  Resends all of the TNC startup commands as when you first open the TNC port

   

• VHF-Exit KISS Mode
  If your TNC is in KISS mode, this will take it out of KISS

   

• VHF-Exit Kantronics Host Mode
  If you have a Kantronics TNC and it was left in HOST mode by another program, it will take it out of HOST mode

   

• VHF-Exit AEA Host Mode
  If you have an AEA TNC and it was left in HOST mode by another program, it will take it out of HOST mode

  These are the same except for the TNC connected to the HF port.

• HF-Re-Initialize TNC
• HF-Exit KISS Mode
• HF-Exit Kantronics Host Mode
• HF-Exit AEA Host Mode

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Help Window

At any time in the program you can press the F-1 key and get the help window. This is in addition to the WinHelp functionality. This help window is different in that it will take you to different parts of the documentation depending on which window you have in the foreground. The help file is the WAPRSdoc.htm HTML document. Built in is a simple HTML parser. The help file is not loaded until the first time you access it, then it is kept in memory.

The WAPRSdoc.htm file must be in a directory called "Docs" which must be in the same directory as WinAPRS.EXE
 

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APRS Frequencies

APRS is used primarily on these frequencies

• VHF - 144.390 and 145.790 MHz
• HF - 10.151.51 Lower side band, NOTE, the carrier is actually 2125 kc down from this so it IS within the ham bands even though it doesn't seem like it

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