VAPO MINUTES FOR THE MEETING HELD DEC 05 1998

The meeting was held at the Panorama Church's Ministry Center, Surrey, B.C..

The meeting was brought to order by the Organizations President Lane VE7IHL at a very prompt 10:00. There were 29 VAPO members present and 1 guest. Lane started of with an introduction to the building and moved quickly into the Sysop's reports.

VE7IHL/VE7VBS BBS only one event has occurred of note that was the Power Failure. The UPS on the system just about lasted long enough for Lane to try to shut down the BBS system before it ran out of power. Unfortunately the turning on of the monitor was more than the UPS could take. So the IHL/VBS computer had one of the dreaded power down shutdowns. This is normally not a recommended method to shut down LINUX computers. Fortune was on the side of VAPO and Lane, as there appear to have been no bad side effects of this unconventional shutdown.

VE7KIT/VE7CC/VE7CQD BBS Lee VE7CC was better prepared for the power failure. All of the packet equipment is on a very large Battery and UPS system. However its considerable size was not large enough to keep the large packet network going at his QTH. If Lee had been able to stay in town for the remainder of the power failure he would have been able to keep the system all working. Unfortunately Lee had to leave town on for a few days. With 4 days and no power and no sign of the Hydro work crews in his area Lee and Lane made the hard decision to do the controlled shut down instead of gambling on a possible uncontrolled shut down. The decision was good Hydro would not have restored power in time to save the KIT/CC system from the scary uncontrolled shut down. The automatic restart of the VE7DXC packet cluster worked fine however Lane hasn't perfected an automatic startup for the LINUX FBB/TNOS systems. The startup of the LINUX FBB system had to wait until Saturday when Lane VE7IHL was able to make the trip out to Lee's home and do the startup.

VE7SRY James VE7JMS reported that SRY appeared to make it through the power failures without one. This could have been due to its close proximity to the main Surrey Hydro yard and probably the same grid as their office? There have been no noteworthy failures of the BBS.

VE7NSR Bill VE7QC reported that there had only been one minor glitch at VE7NSR. Bill also gave a report on the newly created, and currently being BETA tested Emergency Packet Communication Program. There are a few Hams in the Vancouver area that is currently BETA testing the program. Some things have been found that need to be addressed and there will be a follow up meeting in the New Year of the BETA test group. It is still being determined as to how the program will be distributed some negotiations between the program developer and PEP and ESS are currently ongoing and seem to be going well. The distribution looks like it will be through PEP/ESS. Bill indicated that he would keep us advised.

VE7CMR, Lane VE7IHL gave the report. Gerry VE7IIR was unable to come to the meeting today do to a family member's medical problem. The VE7CMR BBS has been having very severe problems that the Maple Ridge Crew have not been able to solve. They appear to have tried everything to solve the problem with some success. But the BBS is still having regular failures. Lane is in the process of getting the old VE7VBS machine on line and is considering loaning them it until they can solve the problem.

Lane then called a brief break in the meeting before the elections to allow all to get a stretch and get some coffee and donuts.

After many donuts and lots of coffee was had Lane brought the meeting back to order. The next Item on the agenda were elections for the follow positions Secretary, Treasure, and two 1-Year directors. First Lane wanted to elect the Two 1-year Directors. There were nominations for a few people however only 2 agreed to stand for the positions. The new Directories are Fred VE7EE, and James VE7JMS. Lane next called for Nominations for the position of Treasurer, again there was only one nomination. Tom VE7DID was returned to his position as Treasure of the Vast VAPO bank. Lane next asked for nominations for the position of publisher/editor of the VAPO gazette. There were a few nominations, however there was only one that would stand for the position. Jerome VE7ASS is now the Editor of the VAPO gazette. There was some conversation on different ways to distribute the gazette. The majority of the people Voted against the use of Snail mail. There will be a version of the gazette posted to the VAPO WEB pages, and there will be a few E-mail / Packet distributions of the Gazette. There was a vote held on the Gazette. 6) Voted for gazette in paper form 7) Voted for download text only packet version 11) Voted for on the VAPO WEB page

Next Lane started to discuss plans for next year. The recent power failures have shown that the VAPO packet network has a few weaknesses. Actually one common weakness electricity, or rather a lack of backup electricity. For the new year Lane would like to work on getting all the VAPO BBS running on adequately sized UPS / Battery backup systems. The plan is to buy some inexpensive UPS and make up a simple voltage monitoring device that can connect to the Printer port of the BBS. It was suggested that serial port devices already are available. Lane then pointed out that most of the packet BBS systems have already used up all of the serial ports for the TNC connections. The only reasonable port to access is the Printer port and most BBS don't have local printers hooked up. For the LINUX computer Lane will then write a small program to monitor the voltage and when it reaches a minimum voltage that the UPS will no longer run at it will conduct a proper shutdown of the computer. This project will cost VAPO $200 and the cost of batteries, to which we already have a few that have been donated by Mike VE7IKB. Eventually some golf cart batteries will be needed to carry the load. Eric VE7MDL suggested that there might already be a board made for this project. He suggested that a WEB Site "FAR CIRCUIT" might just have the board designed and available.

The next project Jerome VE7ASS and Lane will be attempting to create a gateway through a Rogers Wave connect which Jerome has recently gotten. This project could aid in the reconfiguration of the VE7SFU gateway, which is having some trouble forwarding some of our Internet mail. Apparently some of the Internet mail systems are refusing to receive connections from Amateur Radio TCPIP Stations. It has something to do with the Internet systems trying to stop what they call SPAM (junk) mail.

Tom gave a reminder to all that VAPO is a TAPR member and as such it gets a 10% discount on purchases from TAPR. Anyone looking at TAPR stuff should contact Tom VE7DID for further info.

Next on the agenda was the 50/ 30/ 20/ SNIF/ wine/ wine/ wine/ certificate/ certificate/ 386/ Draw. And here is how the booty went.

1st ticket was 172425 which was won by a guest of VE7HYI and collected a SNIF wireless security system

2nd ticket was 172388 which was won by VE7QC and collected a 10baseT network hub

3rd ticket was 172441 which was won by VE7AVM and he collected the first cash prize od $20.00

4th ticket was 172422 which was won by VE7HRA and he collected the second cash prize $40.00

5th ticket was 172399 which was won by VE7APM and he collected a 386 computer

6th ticket was 172421 which was won by VE7CFF and he collected a LARGE bottle of Wine

7th ticket was 172390 which was won by VE7CFU and he collected a bottle of Wine

8th ticket was 172433 which was won by VE7DID and he collected a bottle of wine

9th ticket was 172419 which was won by VE7AKW and he collected a personal packet/computer help certificate

10th ticket was ?????? which was won by VE7CXB and he collected a personal packet/computer help certificate

After distribution of the prizes was complete Lane started his technical talk. T.N.C. L.E.D.'s What they mean in both KISS and Native mode.

Next Eric VE7MDL asked for a few minutes to give an update on high-speed packet. Dennis Rosinower is doing some work on 56K packet. He is now in Seattle. He is attempting to make an easier to build version of the current 56K system. Oh for those that didn't know there is a 56k Amateur Radio system in town with repeaters on Mt Seymour, Mt Sumas and a gateway and repeater at SFU. The new version would be operating on 70 and 23 cm Bands and would be fare easier to build.

TAPR is also working on a High Speed 900 MHz Spread Spectrum 128K, which might be available for purchase from TAPR mid to late next year.

There is a News Group on the 128K TAPR unit for those with Internet access.

VE7JMS James