9 April, 2005

Back In March 2000  I was a beta tester for Iphone  linking radio to the Internet ,with Bert G4NJI  Bert linked the GB3US  Repeater Here in Sheffield , To the Ham radio Room of Iphone, and this gave us the System to Talk to Station in USA  Australia and Round the World .

Then we got to know about a new system Called IRLP internet Radio Linking Project Started by Dave VE7LTD in Vancouver .So we ordered an Irlp Board from Dave .

Then that was the Big Start and all the late Night’s came as this was on a OS  Linux  Red Hat at that Time , Well we got a Node up and Running on 145.287.5 and  at the same time I had a Ilink Gateway Running as well on 434.475  Simplex. 

This is now My Echolink Node 18424 and as been running since 2000 .Then in 2003  the Ilink Program Shut Down and that became the Echolink with its own server’s.   Most of my time was spent  installing IRLP Nodes up and Down the UK.

Also on request from Clubs I provided Power Point presentations and talks about ECHO / IRLP in the UK, and from this I found that there was a lot of response from Club members, that had Radio Hams on Echolink but could not work them as they only had IRLP Nodes in and  round there location.

So I contacted Dave VE7LTD the designer of IRLP and asked him if there was any way of changing the software on Echolink to run within Linux.

So we could have one Node that would be able to connect to the Echolink system and also IRLP.

So the team involved with the IRLP project set about re writing the Linux codes needed for the merger of Echolink. An issue that was raised was the security of Echolink, having a form of security that would stop un licensed users gaining access to the Echolink system as well as the Amateur frequencies, such as Echolink and IRLP. Also the IRLP includes its own security PGP key.

This is now completely new software within Linux and known now as ECHO / IRLP. Nodes and Repeaters with both Echolink and the IRLP software installed you can now connect to either the Echolink or the IRLP servers, but not at the same time, this is a form of cross linking, which is not yet possible.

There are many confusing issues that have been brought up in the past about the cross linking, when a user

Connects to a repeater that has Echo / IRLP installed, via his computer using Echolink, the Repeater will change within its Linux software to the Echolink Side stopping any connections from IRLP.

Then when the QSO has finished the Repeater / Node will reset itself to Idle and set itself to either system automatically. I hope this will help you to understand the System a Little bit better.

Copy write Steve M1ERS