W0CHP.net

…or, “R/O no mo, yo.” 😆

Most users are accustomed to W0CHP-PiStar-Dash (and Pi-Star) having a forced Read-Only file system by default. While this can be useful, it’s unnecessary in W0CHP-PiStar-Dash and in fact, is a pain in the ass sometimes.

Soon, when W0CHP-PiStar-Dash automatically updates itself at night, or when users invoke an update, the file-system will no longer be in Read-Only mode by default.

There seems to be lots of confusion with W0CHP-PiStar-Dash (WPSD) and DMR functionality. This document serves to hopefully clear that up.

In late 2022, my personal/pet project W0CHP-PiStar-Dash, went from hundreds of users, to thousands of users in less than 3 months. A few awesome users and fans/volunteers had setup official online communities for W0CHP-PiStar-Dash support and general discussion. As a result, many repeated questions and statements have surfaced… This is a compiled list of the FAQs and FMS. Some are rather rudimentary, lazy, strange and silly; and some are merited.

Due to the (honestly, unexpected) growth and popularity of W0CHP-PiStar-Dash, two wonderful users/fans¹ have setup online support and chat communities for users of my software:

• W0CHP-PiStar-Dash Facebook Group (Courtesy of Daren, 2E0LXY)

• W0CHP-PiStar-Dash Discord Server (Courtesy of Mark, 2E1CEQ)

After many, many months of development and testing, W0CHP-PiStar-Dash now runs the Bullseye version of Raspberry Pi OS.

W0CHP-PiStar-Dash will still install and run on existing Pi-Star installations (running Raspberry Pi OS “Buster”). however, if you’d like to run the more modern and supported Bullseye, you will need to install the WPSD Disk Image. It is based on Pi-Star v4.1.6 with W0CHP-PiStar-Dash pre-installed.

Update 10/7/22:

Network move complete; all systems operational.

Beginning October 5, the various resources hosted on the W0CHP.net network will experience intermittent, and some extended outages and downtime.

The network is moving to a different physical location, but will retain the same asynchronous fiber connections speeds, IPs, etc.

I anticipate the outages lasting no more than 48 hours. Once fully complete, I will update this post accordingly.

Resources that will be affected

• This very website
• Connectivity to the XLX-493 reflector/gateway and its web-based dashboard.
• The W0CHP.net Git Repositories
• The installer program for W0CHP-PiStar-Dash will not be available (hosted on the above Git repo).
• Various backend resources that enable the auto-updates to occur on W0CHP-PiStar-Dash installations.

Greetings gracious hams! As some of you know, I operate the XLX493 Reflector. Currently, it supports both DMR and YSF protocols. However, I do not posses the necessary hardware for trans-coding the D-Star protocol.

And since my reflector has been getting more traffic lately, I’m putting a feeler out there to other hams who run a D-Star-enabled reflector to see if they’d be gracious enough to peer with reflector (more specifically, Module E, since it’s the busiest module.

I keep/use a hotspot in my truck, and I’ve always wanted a way to manage/switch/connect/disconnect from reflectors, talkgroups, etc., hands-free; using only my voice.

I’ve begun work on a small project to allow me to do just that. And no, this is not an April Fool’s joke. 😆

Check it out…

For some time now, I’ve yearned for a way to quickly link to various XLX reflectors and modules on DMR, as well as unlink from modules to “mute” a busy reflector/module.

Recently, I’ve witnessed two networks suffer from loops, caused by mis-configured hotspots. Now while Pi-Star has some rudimentary checks in place (simply a warning message for hotspots configured as “Public Nodes”), I’ve improved W0CHP-PiStar-Dash to help prevent these loops even further.