Hi George--

I'm not entirely certain what's behind the scenes of the current APRS plugin, but based on Kim's remarks, I'm guessing you're currently grabbing the data from dcc.openaprs.net port 2620.  (I only discovered that facility today.)  It's an interesting approach, quite a bit different than other APRS net feeds.

(Stop me if I'm wrong...)

Here's an example of a more typical TCP APRS feed (I am leading up to the COM port, I promise!):

$ telnet second.aprs.net 14579
Trying 134.173.254.38...
Connected to socal.aprs.net.
Escape character is '^]'.
# javAPRSSrvr 3.14b04
user foo pass -1
# logresp foo unverified, server CORE-2
NG6B>APOTC1,WIDE2-2,qAR,KD6DCN-5:!3301.28N/11656.41W_271/007g...t063P000h69b10177OD1w
K6GTZ-1>S3TWVV,N6EX-4*,qAR,N6EX-3:`.Ytl#Mk/]"3{}BIODIESEL F-250
WD5EHM-3>APT311,WB6JAR-10,N6EX-1*,qAR,KB6TWC-3:>
W6MAF-3>GPSSU3,K6IXA-3,W6CX-3*,WIDE2,qAR,KE6ZBX-10:$GPRMC,222214,A,3430.9340,N,11724.1550,W,0.0000,297.0,070409,,E*73

(you have to type the user/pass line to get things going.)  This is a real-time aprs feed while openaprs's system is a database query against previously captured data.

OK.  Assuming you were capturing realtime data via TCP like my example, I was going to ask you to add the ability to capture the same data, formatted the same way, from the COM port.  External hardware would feed the text to the port, just like a telephone modem would.  You wouldn't actually worry about the radio, just like you wouldn't worry about the phone company.

But.

If you're using dcc.openaprs.net and parsing their output, what I'm asking for doesn't make as much sense.  Openaprs is preparsing raw data (captured much like I did above) into something that's easily absorbed into any other database, which is cool.  It might solve a capture problem I've been thinking about for other reasons.  But without this, you would have to write or steal buy an APRS parser yourselves.  After that, you'd write TCP and COM: port captures.  It's quite a bit of work, and I had initially guessed that two out of three of those tasks were complete.

It's certainly possible to generate a live-update style email from each packet, but they can come in pretty fast and furious, several packets per second.

I still think a live APRS connection would be cool, (both over TCP and the radio) but I understand if I'm asking too much.  (It would be too much for me to take on as a third party plugin side project...)

Clear as mud, yet?  (I'm certainly clouding the issue with unfounded guesses and assumptions...)

Best,

Chris

We are working on the APRS piece. Click here to sign up to beta test the add-on in progress.
Many people have expressed interest in DSTAR and Depiction, so there may be a future add-on there. Stay tuned!

Happy Depicting!
George
Depiction Support