APRS MESSAGES: Operations 16 Jan 2008 -------------------------------------------------------------------- WB4APR The limitations of a message-ACK system is detailed in my page: http://www.aprs.org/txt/messages101.txt It also discusses severe problems in many clients that did not fully implement the full APRS packet protocol. It is these clients that can make APRS message performance appear abismal. The following paragraphs offer the proper operations techniques to not only make messages work very well on corretly implemented systems, but also at least be useable on some of the poorly implemented ones. MESSAGE OPERATIONS: There are several things EVERYONE is supposed to be doing to make APRS messaging work best. 1) Never try to message beyond 1 or 2 hops reliably. 2) Recognize that your message had 2 to 4 times higher chance of getting through then you will ever see in getting an ACK back. 3) If you think the other guy got the first message, kill it so that the next line can go out even if the first ACK never got back. 4) When you see an INCOMMING message. ALWAYS answer it (human response). This accomplishes MANY things in a real-time network: (A) Messages are for HUMANS. Give the HUMAN response! (B) outgoing messages have double the reliability of an ACK via 1 hop and FOUR times the reliability via 2 hops! This tells him you got the message even if the ACK didn't make it. (C) if you are using one of the fully implemented APRS clients, then this same multiplication in success will get his ACK back to him so his system will send the next line. 5) If you must use a 3 hop path for a special message from point A to point B, then use WIDE2-2,DIGI3, never WIDE3-3! The directed hop on the end will have little more QRM than 2 hops, but will improve the reliability that DIGI3 gets it. NEVER use W3-3 or the QRM kills the network. 6) NEVER use REPLY-MSGS. They are Just QRM. They do NOT have any of the above advantages because they are not "pushed" but are just like another ACK, but one that does absolutely nothing. The only time to use REPLY-MESsAGES are in a REAL time event, when the operator might need to disappear for 20 minutes. Then a REPLY-MESSAGE saying "Ill be back at 1330" is a GOOD use of this capability. In the original APRS, any such REPLY message is automatically canceled whenever the sender returns and touches his keyboard. IE, we never want reply messages that are not providing REAL-TIME INFO to the other end. These rules above about messages are fundamental to real-time APRS. For UIview users, there is an add-on fix to apply the DECAY rate to messages: Use M0CYP's UI-Instant Messenger. Bob, Wb4APR