INTERNET CONNECTIONS  EXAMPLE

Text Decoder and Transmitter Internet Connections

The SkySweeper text format decoders and transmitters supports TCP/IP sockets connections. Decoders can send decoded data to the internet to any application, which supports standard TCP/IP protocol. Transmitters are able to receive data from any application, which is able to connect to the socket port. The chat application is able to receive and transmit data to/from internet.

There are CW decoder and transmitter block in the following configuration. The internet connection server has been started in the RX and TX block with different port numbers. Two standard telnet programs are connected to the RX and TX blocks. Connection is started with the following commands.

    telnet ip_address port

Where ip_address is computer internet address or host name. If the SkySweeper and telnet is in the same program loop address 127.0.0.1 can be used. The port number has to be same which is configured in the server. Server supports many concurrent connections.

When connection has been created, RX block sends all decoded data to the telnet program. If user writes text to telnet program which has been connected to the TX block, text is copied into transmitter window and transmitter starts. The SkySweeper tells when transmission starts or stops using <TX ON> and <TX OFF> flags respectively.

 

Full Remote Use

The figure below shows the basic idea of the remote use of SkySweeper.

SkySweeper supports two main types of remote use over the Internet:

• TELNET CONNECTION over the Internet. In this case the decoded text from decoder (like CW, PSK, ACRAS etc) is sent from the PC running SkySweeper in server mode to another PC (=client) over the Internet. The client can be any software supporting TCP/IP protocol for exaple TELNET. SkySweeper server using TELNET connection can be used for example for ACARS decoding applications. There’s radio unit decoding ACARS or HFDL with SkySweeper and it is in the server mode. Then other users can connect to the server and will get all the text to their displays decoded by the original SkySweeper server.

• FULL REMOTE USE of SkySweeper over the Internet. In this case the signal is sent from the PC connected to radio and running SkySweeper in server mode to another PC over the Internet. The client is SkySweeper. This allows all SkySweeper functions (decoders, analyzers etc) to be used over the Internet and processing the signal received by the server. For example there’s somewhere radio unit receiving aeronautical HF channel and uses SkySweeper in the server mode all others can get the same signal like the received one by themselves and decode the parts they want (HFDL, SELCAL etc).

In the following exampled there are two SkySweeper applications in the same machine. The first one works as server, which sends data to clients. The second SkySweeper gets data from the server. The server and clients can be in any computers which are connected to the internet.