[arm-allstar] HamVoIP registration

[David McGough]

Don,

See answers to your questions, below:


On Thu, 22 Nov 2018, "Don Backstrom - AA7AU via ARM-allstar" wrote:

<snip>
> 	A few questions on HamVoIP registration:
> 1 - does the current release of HamVoip use *both* the ASL and the 
> HamVoip lookup systems for node address lookup? In what order?

Yes. Currently the priority is HamVoIP first, ASL second. In the future 
the user will be able to select the priority.



> 2 - does the HamVoip lookup prefer (and/or override) one over the other?

Yes, currently if an entry is found in the HamVoIP registration system, it 
is used.



> 3 - does HamVoip (in default mode) still download the entire ASL lookup 
> list (with resulting bandwidth implications)?

No. At of the 08/14/2018 (hamvoip-misc-scripts-0.2-05 package update), the 
/usr/local/etc/rc.updatenodelist script is completely disabled. See the 
"exit" statement at the top of this file.




> 4 - if #3 is yes, will that downloading end soon? if so, when? As you 
> have pointed out, this is a big issue for portable/HotSpot users.

N/A --- it has already stopped if you're running recent HamVoIP code.

> 5 - Will non-HamVoip AllStar users still be able to lookup HamVoip node 
> addresses in the future without changes at their end?

Yes. Non-HamVoIP users will be able to continue to use the original ASL 
registration system with no changes. HamVoIP users will *ALWAYS* be 
encouraged to register with *BOTH* systems for redundancy and 
compatibility with legacy nodes.

A source-code release of the client-side DNS lookup features will happen
soon (expected before the end of 2018). These source code changes are in
the app_rpt.c application. At that point, ASL users can upgrade to support
the HamVoIP lookup system as well, if they desire to.

NOTE that I don't expect to release code to the actual HamVoIP
registration system and any closely related code--at least not as a
"downloadable by anyone at any time package."  This software is not GPL,
is not based on *ANY* other code--it is not Asterisk, nor an app_rpt
derivative. It has been written from scratch over the last several years
by me to address the serious shortcomings I found in Asterisk when trying
to register very large groups of nodes.


> 6 - would you be so kind as to extend your answers into a more fulsome 
> explanation of how/why the node lookup processes work in broader terms?
> 
> - and -
> 
> 6 - the ability to register private node addresses soon intrigues me. 
> Could you explain that a bit more if possible now? We currently have a 
> few HamVoip installs on rasPi3 using the Ethernet connection for the 
> WAN/public (primary node#) side and an Ethernet-to-USB adapter for our 
> Mesh/private (second "private" node#) side. Do you think that this 
> approach will be impacted positively? BTW: we turn OFF the WiFi and BT 
> rasPi3 radios by hardware in config.txt setup.
> 

Yes, ultimately the rpt.conf [nodes] stanza can be made completely 
obsolete, if desired. Any, all nodes will remain completely private. 
Obviously we will never remove the [nodes] stanza functionality, so 
systems that desire to remain completely off-grid can keep this feature.

More details about private nodes will be coming soon.


> 	Thanks for all your continuing efforts,
> 	... and Happy Thanksgiving to All!
> 
> 	- Don - AA7AU
> 
> ps: if it's OK, may I please have a new HamVoip registration for one of 
> my nodes to test out, etc. If not, no problems, I can wait.


No problem. Please privately send me the node numbers you wish to have
HamVoIP registrations for?

Add these new registration statements in addition to the ASL statements in 
your iax.conf file.

73, David KB4FXC