Here is a short status report on the development of ARDOP, a new, flexible protocol for messaging.
Read about ARDOP (Amateur Radio Digital Open Protocol).
The Yahoo ARDOP forum site (which has beta downloads and documentation) is at https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/ardop_users/info
The ARDOP Developers forum (installs, docs and sources) is at https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/ardop_development
At the end of 2016, we are near the end of beta testing for the ARDOP_Win TNC (protocol optimization). John Wiseman has also written a version of ARDOP that works with BPQ32 (Server or Client) and can connect to the Winlink system. We are working on integration into Winlink Express and RMS Trimode which will provide client and portals into the Winlink system. Eventually, ARDOP is planned to replace WINMOR (more robust, more bandwidth options, faster) but that won't happen until we have really wrung out the above implementations and optimized the protocol. The conversion from WINMOR will be a simple software change and resetting the setup parameters.
Also, a future (now in testing) hardware implementation (in C operating under Linux on a Teensie quad core processor) will be announced next year. It will permit seamless (no additional sound card or external hardware) and easy integration with other protocols like Pactor and Packet.
Watch this space for more news. 2017 will be the year Winlink moves to ARDOP.
Rick KN6KB
Winlink Development Team
