THE HISTORY OF APRS

This history was written in response to some grumblings originating in
California questioning the origins of APRS.  This bibliography chronicles
only my development of APRS, and does NOT include DOZENS of other amateur
publications and articles that I have authored for the benefit of amateur
radio, the growth of packet, the development of packet HF modems, and the
origin of SAREX.

The Automatic Packet Reporting System (APRS) software has evolved over the
last sixteen years of my involvement in amateur packet radio.  For years, I
was on the AMRAD board of directors, the Amateur Radio  Reasearch and
Development group that was instrumental in the original specification for
AX.25 written by my good friend Terry Fox, WB4JFI and published by AMRAD in
1984.  In 1978 I had built the first digital on the air automatic message
system which became a dual port phone and packet radio BBS for the AMRAD
group when ASCII first became legal in the late 70s [1].  Isolated without
packet in Japan in 1982, I wrote my first data maping program, which took HF
position reports off the air and displayed them on an APPLE-II computer.
From the beginning, I was always making packet maps of the growing packet
network [3,5,6].  In 1983, I wrote a gateway/BBS program on my VIC-20
computer to permit simultaneous operation of both HF and VHF ports for
exchange of packet messages and pioneered the use of 200 Hz shift for packet
on HF with cross-county links to W0RPK, W9TD, and K7PYK [2].  We used 10.149
MHz.  To my knowledge, this was the first amateur HF BBS/GATEWAY; and it
remained on the air 'round the clock for 5 years through 1989 under the FCC
STA for automatic packet HF operations.

     My APRS connectionless protocol idea was first used in a program I
wrote on the VIC-20 for reporting the position and status of horses in a 100
mile cross country endurence run for which the AMRAD organization was always
tinkering with new and better ways to use packet for public service [4].  I
spent two years improving the idea for amateur packet radio support of the
National Disaster Medical System exercises sponsored by FEMA [7,8,9].  During
this time frame I called it the Connectionless Emergency Traffic System
(CETS).  At the end of the second national exercise I realized that the
number of C-64 computers was dwindling and that I should re-write the
software for the new IBM PC that was entering the HAM community.  I also
began to integrate packet mapping into the program to add to the tactical
usefulness.  Throughout this time period, HAMS on the local repeater will
recall my constant chatter about the need for a packet maping program.  We
were beginning to see street map software in the stores, but none of the
off-the-shelf packages appeared to offer any hooks for the user to tie this
maping software into packet radio.

     During 1990 I got tired of trying to inspire someone else to find a
source of maps and began to digitize the East Coast myself.  I decided to do
all the maps by hand and designed a map data format so that any HAM could
draw a map for any local packet application using only a text editor.  The
idea was to "roll our own", so that as a HAM community, we could be self
sufficient and develop maps for any application and share them within the
community.  Once that maping decision was made, APRS evolved daily as I began
to play with it on the air, and realized its potential.  Every idea that I
could think of to facilitate communication using APRS was added to the
program.  For four years now, APRS has consumed thousands of hours of
evenings and weekends as I tweaked the program and drew maps.  This time does
not include the hundreds of hours spent at the Naval Academy to modify the
APRS concept to operate on the Naval Academy boats for summer cruises.  In
that environment, I had to modify APRS to operate on a fiber-optic Local Area
Network, instead of the radio environment used in HAM radio.  Throughout this
timeframe, I have been preaching to the amateur community the tremendous
potential for using packet radio networks (like APRS) for disaster
communications and public service.   APRS is 100% my own work.  If someone
else claims to have written APRS, then I sure would have liked to have known
about it 10 years ago.  It would have certainly saved me 4000 programming
hours and a lot of grief from the family!

    Finally, I am not doing this to make money on amateur radio!  I ask for
a registration contribution to help defray all the mailing costs and the
psychological burden of having hundreds of HAMS all across the country call
me at home at all times of the evening with repititious and continuous
questions.  I learned this lesson the hard way by releasing my C-64 BBS
source code to the HAM community in 1984 for free.  Now, 11 years later, I
still get phone calls, letters without SASE's, and registered letters from
third world countries (requiring a trip to the post office) asking questions
about this obsolete software!  The code has been so modified by hundreds of
other people, that I can scarcely recognize it.  Yet, folks expect ME to tell
them why it doesn't work on their c-64 that they got for $5 at a local yard
sale!.

The following is a bibliography chronicling the development of APRS:

[1] MULTI-USER DATA NETWORK OVER VHF RADIO, Bruninga, AMRAD Newsletter, Mar
78.

[2] HF PACKETS, MODEMS and GATEWAYS, Bruninga, Third ARRL computer Networking
Conference pg 6-7, 15 Apr 84. (HF packet specification for 200 HZ shift)

[3] EASTNET - AN EAST COAST PACKET RADIO NETWORK, Bruninga, p 9-11, Third
ARRL
Computer Networking Conference. 15 Apr 84. (First MD, NJ, NY, etc packet map)

[4] THE RACING PROBLEM: A PACKET SOLUTION, Bruninga, p 12-15, Third ARRL
Computer Networking Conference, 15 Apr 84. (A connectionless protocol for
reporting the location and status of Horses on a 100 mile endurence run.
*(the original APRS concept)

[5] EASTNET - A YEAR LATER, Bruninga p 15-24, Fourth ARRL Computer Networking
Conference, 30 Mar 85. (More maps of the East Coast and the first USA HF map)

[6] LINKING PERSONAL COMPUTERS BY PACKET RADIO, Bruninga, Proceedings, IEEE
COMPCON 84 16 Sept 84, (Published the USA packet map, and amateur HF packet
standards)

[7] CONNECTIONLESS EMERGENCY TRAFFIC SYSTEM, Bruninga, Packet Radio Magazine,
pg 4-5, July 86. (details the design of the connectionless position and
status reporting system)

[8] AN UPDATE ON THE CONNECTIONLESS EMERGENCY TRAFFIC SYSTEM, Bruninga,
Packet
Radio Magazine, Aug 86. (more of the same)

[9] CONNECTIONLESS PROTOCOL for the NDMS, Bruninga, p 19, Packet Radio
Magazine, Nov 86. (using the connectionless protocol for emergency comms)

[10] PACKET RADIO AT THE WRECK OF THE AMTRACK COLONIAL, Bruninga, P 13 Packet
Radio Magazine Jan 87. (using portable packet for disaster comms)

[11] LANS and WANS, Bruninga, 7th ARRL Computer Networking Conference,
1 Oct 88 (First DC/BALTIMORE area packet maps with APRS symbols)

[12] A WORLDWIDE PACKET RADIO NETWORK, Bruninga, Signal Magazine, June 88,
(shows HF map of 10.149 MHz activity.

[13] PACKETRADIO IM NOTFUNKEINSATZ BEI EINEM ZUNGUNGLUCK, RTTY magazine
18 Jan 87. (translation of article on APRS packet at the AMTRACK train wreck)


CURRENT:

[14] AUTOMATIC PACKET LOCATION SYSTEM (APLS), Bruninga, ARRL Gateway/QEX,
Feb 1991. (early specification for position and status reporting formats)

[15] GROUND STATION TRACKING VIA PACKET RADIO, Bruninga, AMSAT Journal, Pg 1
May/June 93

[16] TRACKIT RADIO, Stan Horzepa, p 92, QST, July 93

[17] UPFRONT IN QST, p 11, QST, August 93. (excellent pictures)

[18] A DESCRIPTION OF APRS by WB4APR, AND MORE!, PACKET USERS NOTEBOOK, Buck
Rogers, CQ Magazine, Dec 93

[19] INTERFACING GPS/LORAN DEVICES TO PACKET RADIO, Bruninga, pg 9-14, QEX,
Feb 94


