8 Feb
2014
8 Feb
'14
7:15 p.m.
On Feb 8, 2014, at 10:40 AM, allison <ajp166 at verizon.net> wrote:
On 02/07/2014 08:51 PM, joe lobocki wrote:
Legally trivial in the USA; some other countries do restrict receiving.
If original code is in Fortran, that should be ok. If it?s in more obscure languages,
like Jovial, things get more complicated. Or assembly language for a strange machine.
But yes, emulation should be quite ok. Or new code to implement the decoding, so long as
the specs exist.
Nowadays, there are groups of scholars who build
their own sattelites and
launch them for fun, there are tinkerers, there are ham operators
everywhere still, and the internet, both for collaboration and distributed
communication via stations. We have advanced so far technologically that
wrangling the greatest minds in the US together to solve this problem, with
bragging rights alone as compensation, should be a piece of cake. I want to
see the nerds save the day here. But, in reality, I see the rule-makers
mumbling something about "Terrorism" under their breath and nothing
happening...
On Feb 7, 2014 5:06 PM, "Liam Proven" <lproven at gmail.com> wrote:
All that is needed for the Amateur radio folk so inclined is:
What Receive (RX) freq
What Transmit (TX) freq
What is the encoding scheme and protocol (command, and telemetry)
Stat-side antenna gains for TX and RX and MDS of receiver and TX power.
That is used to calculate path loss for expected RX signal and TX
power needed.
Receiving is legally trivial as no license is required. Once heard the
schema
for decoding the telemtry and data stream would e needed. Note original
Fortran or source code is fine as SIMH and a machine description can make
that go. Or likely a Raspberry Pi as that is enough compute power to out
run any thing more than 25 years old. Generally the communications side
required only limited computer support, the laster data reduction might
need much more.
One interesting things is with current SDR system that hams have
available they
can record the received signal spectra and then post process it off line
as needed.
this allows divorcing the receiving from decoding which can occur later.
Can hams do it? Most likely especially those hams that are classic comp
sorts.
Sure. Or amateur radio astronomy buffs ? I know one such. As you said, you need a
receiver (SDR or otherwise) for the right frequency, plus digital capture of the resulting
baseband signal and post-processing to extract its meaning.
The TX side is more a legal issue as one would need all the info about
how to
communicate then apply for a special permit NASA can help. The rest is
building
gear likely those vendors that built the original would help sponsor
the hams
involved.
The key is of there are enough mission connected people with enough will
to push it
forward and establish the team needed to get to the required stuff.
The biggest problem that I can see is the need for large (very high gain) antennas.
Depending on where in the sky that satellite can be found, the Arecibo dish is an obvious
candidate, and in fact it has on a few occasions been used in amateur radio settings.
Allison/KB1GMX
>> 1978 satellite returns to Earth orbit, still live - but NASA no longer
>> has transmitting/receiving equipment old enough to communicate with
>> it.
>>
>> http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2014/02070836-isee-3.html
>>
>> There might be potential for a CCmper to save the day on this one! :?)
It never ceases to amaze me when NASA says they can?t do something anymore that they used
to be able to do. There are horror stories of large stacks of magnetic tape that had to
be rescued from NASA because they didn?t know what to do with them and did not care ? but
non-government people could and did. The same sort of thing is at work here. How hard
would this be, if the agency were competent? Not very.
paul, ni1d