New Features and Changes for 4/9/2009

I'm pleased to announce two new features and updates to the Web site:

1. Premium Subscribers can now set their default display for input frequencies. See the "Database" tab under your account settings page.

2. We will now be moving all unstructured content (links, maps, logos, code lists, files etc) to the Wiki for each county/agency/trs page. Each entity's new wiki page can be accessed by clicking the "Collaboration" tab on any agency, county, or trunked system page. For information on this can be found here: Collaboration Tab.

Hopefully these changes will make it not only easier to view data in the database, but also easier for every person in the RadioReference community to contribute all kinds of revelvant information for their areas. Don't forget, anyone with a RadioReference.com account can edit and add content in the Wiki, so please use this resource to its fullest.

Enjoy!

RadioReference.com 2009 Spring Updates

RadioReference 4.0 is Live!
After months of hard work, the new complete site redesign, titled RadioReference.com 4.0 was recently released to the community. This new version of the site highlights the most important and significant changes to RadioReference.com since inception.

Some of the new features and functionality with the 4.0 release include:

• A complete new theme, graphics set, and common design across all site components.
• Users can now see their submissions and status at the Your Account - My Submissions page.
• New common top menus for easier navigation across different site components.
• FCC license display settings are remembered on county FCC license listing pages for Premium Subscribers.
• Premium Subscribers have a better view of their subscription status across the site.

...and many other features. If you haven't already seen the new design, stop by and take a look!

RadioReference Senior Leaders
Because of our significant growth over the past year, we recently announced three leadership positions on RadioReference.com. These three individuals, all highly experienced folks in our community, take responsibility for key components of RadioReference. They are:

• Eric Carlson (ericcarlson), who takes lead responsibility for the RadioReference Database.
• Wayne Hayes (wayne_h), who takes lead responsibility for the RadioReference Forums.
• Mike Agner (ka3jjz), who takes lead responsibility for the RadioReference Wiki.

For more details on their activities and responsibilities, see the Blog Post regarding this announcement.

Database Team Updates
From Eric Carlson, Lead Database Administrator and Manager

The RR Database continues to expand its coverage of conventional and trunked data around the world. Additionally, we are continuing to supplement existing data with alpha tags, function tags and geographic tags. All three types of "tags" are intended to make it much easier to program scanners via computer software. If you see missing tags in any area of the database, please let us know what we're missing by clicking the "Submit Info" link on the toolbar at the top of any page.

Also, you may have noticed we are now tracking Project 25 trunked system zone IDs separately from site IDs and also showing all trunked site IDs in both decimal and hexadecimal format. These enhancements allow us to properly track site information and help mitigate confusion that arises from different scanners showing site IDs in different formats.

In addition, we've heard from many asking "Where have input frequencies gone?" in the new release of the database. Don't worry, they are still present. You can enable viewing of input frequencies by choosing the "Enable Input Frequencies" option at the top of any frequency list in the database.

The database administration team is also steadily moving toward standardizing the database organization across all regions. We are developing internal standards and documentation to facilitate a consistent structure to the database as you browse from region to region. Please bear with us as we continue to improve the quality of the database. The database administrator "handbook" will be posted shortly for you to review if you wish to see exactly what our policies and procedures are.

Forums Team Updates
From Wayne Hayes, Lead Forums Moderator and Manager

With the growing interest of the RadioReference forums and our dedication to being the source for radio related discussions, we've added many new topic areas. Areas such as Amateur Radio, New Scanner Users, GMRS and subdivided the Tavern (formerly "The Wasteland"), to name a few. It's an overwhelming expansion but with growth comes reorganization. Stop by, maybe there's something new that will pique your interest.

Wiki Team Updates
From Mike Agner, Lead Wiki Administrator and Manager

We have heard a number of comments about how the wiki is very difficult to navigate, and how the current Wiki homepage is cumbersome. While we tend to agree, it does link to and categorize a number of topics. As this is being written we have well over 1200 articles making it the single largest radio related wiki in the world.

With the new implementation of 4.0, a new dropdown menu structure has been implemented for navigation. If you examine the blue toolbar at the top of each page, you will see a "Wiki" menu item in the center of the toolbar. The topics in this dropdown menu are good starting points, and far simpler to navigate than the huge first page. From time to time, we may move topics in and out of the dropdown menu to give a little variety to what is presented. Your suggestions as to what topics you would like to see presented are solicited.

In addition, some months ago, with a release of a popular freeware software package for the Uniden DMA scanners called FreeScan, a user manual was developed to advertise the package as well as to create a user-maintained reference manual. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first scanner software application to have its documentation placed into a wiki. Since the wiki is all user generated content, every RadioReference subscriber has the opportunity to contribute additional content to this online manual.

Finally, don't forget that the Wiki can be edited by anyone with a RadioReference user account. You are encouraged to use the wiki to document local content, scratchpad information about a trunked system or communications network, or start your own reference source for something radio related. See the New Article Guidelines page for information on how to create and edit articles on the wiki.

XML1.1 Web service deprecation pushed out to July 30th, 2009

At the request of a few software developers, I've agreed to push out the
retiring of the existing "1.1" version of the Web service, currently in use
primarily by Starsoft and Butel. The new deprecation date is now July 30th,
2009. This push back should hopefully give these application developers the
time they need to convert to the new Web service, which provides additional
features and functionality.

It is important to note that this will be the only push out of the date.

RadioReference Senior Leadership Position Announcements

RadioReference Members,

As you know, RadioReference has grown from a small radio communications oriented Web site to one of the larger sites on the Internet, requiring a tremendous amount of care and feeding to keep growth strong and participation high. There is no doubt that RadioReference is the "go to" destination for anyone looking to participate online regarding scanning and radio communications.

With this in mind, I've decided to form and staff 3 new senior leadership positions reporting to me that will take on formal responsibilities for different components of the Web site. This will allow us to have a group of individuals that will help drive how we bring great features, functionality, and a good end user experience across the database, the forums, and the wiki.

I take great pleasure in announcing the appointment of these three individuals into the following positions:

Lead Database Administrator and Manager - Eric Carlson (ericcarlson)

Eric has agreed to take the position of Lead Database Administrator, and will be responsible leading our database administration team, developing and formalizing policies and procedures for database management with your involvement and mine, and recruiting and making sure that our approach results in quality and accuracy in the database.

Lead Forums Moderator and Manager - Wayne Hayes (wayne_h)

Wayne has agreed to take over the head moderator position for our fast growing and very active forums. He'll be responsible for leading our team of moderators, making sure that we are on top of rules in the forums, and recruiting a team of focused and localized moderators that can make sure that the forums remain a friendly and welcoming environment. Expect to see great changes in the near future in the forums as we focus more time on improvement and growth.

Lead Wiki Administrator and Manager - Mike Agner (ka3jjz)

Mike has agreed to take the lead on wiki administration duties, which he's already been doing very well. The Wiki has become a very important and go to reference source for radio related information, and Mike will be working to better promote the use of this important reference source so that more folks participate and we continue to integrate more components of the Wiki into the overall Web site.

Please join me in welcoming these folks to their new formalized roles, and support them as much as possible as they begin to execute on their responsibilities over the next few months.

RadioReference Records It's 200,000th Registered User

RadioReference.com reached an important milestone on January 12th 2009 registering it's 200,000th member.

Some other notable statistics for 2008 include:

11,926 submissions of radio communications data were sent and processed
53,124 new members
277,254 posts to the user forums
41,220,258 page impressions
244,082 changes to the RadioReference Database

2009 will bring even more exciting statistics and changes for RadioReference, as we release a new branding and Web site, new features and functionality, and a better overall user experience!

XML 1.1 Web service deprecation notice

The existing REST based RadioReference.com web service (XML 1.1) will be formally deprecated on April 1st, 2009. The script will be removed from service at midnight on that date.

I encourage all developers of applications that are using this interface to to migrate support to the new SOAP based Web service, documented at:

http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/RadioReference.com_Web_Service3.1

The WSDL for the SOAP based Web service is at:

http://api.radioreference.com/soap/?wsdl

We are deprecating the REST based Web service because it makes no sense for us to duplicate maintenance and new feature releases across multiple Web service types.

VHF/UHF Spectrum Analysis using the RF Space SDR-14

One of the most impressive developments in the radio communications community over the past few years is the advent of software defined receivers, which can provide great tools for spectrum analysis. Hobbyists today can not only view entire swaths of spectrum at one time to view activity, but can also record entire spectrum chunks for later playback and analysis using SDR tools.

This article will walk through the RF Space SDR-14 software defined receiver, and review how it can be used to analyze different user segments in the VHF/UHF spectrum.

To start, an introduction is in order. The RF Space SDR-14 is a 14-bit software defined radio receiver that operates in the 0.5-30 MHz band. It provides not only extensive spectrum analysis capabilities but also functions as a great receiver with numerous demodulation capabilities for the HF spectrum. Since the SDR-14 is a software defined radio, all controls and interfaces with the radio is done using software applications installed on a PC. The most popular application written to exploit the SDR-14 is SpectraVue.

As mentioned above, the SDR-14 functions as an HF software defined receiver, however it can be configured to accept the 10.7 MHz IF output from another receiver, and tune that receiver, to combine as a very powerful monitoring station and spectrum analysis platform for any band range. I have been using an AOR5000A in conjunction with the RF Space SDR-14 with excellent results, allowing me to click on certain portions of the spectrum and automatically tune the AOR receiver.

Showing some of the capabilities of this combination or AOR receiver and RF Space spectrum analysis tools, I'll review some annotated screen shots of different monitoring targets. You can click each screenshot to view the full size image.

The first we will review below is a screenshot of the SpectraVue application monitoring a 250 KHz wide chunk of spectrum between 260.350 and 260.600 MHz - where US Military UHF communications satellites have downlinks. The RF Space can realistically monitor about 10 MHz of spectrum from another radio's IF, however the narrow swath of 250 KHz allows us to monitor military satcom transponders transponders and see what is happening within each of them.

In this screenshot, we can see the 4 Active UHF SATCOM transponders:

1. Relaying unknown data bursts on 260.375
2. Relaying a Spanish bootlegger's communications on the 260.425 transponder but comms centered on 260.430 MHz. The transponder is 25 KHz wide so the communications come through loud and clear.
3. Relaying 16 KHz VINSON encrypted US Military voice
4. Relaying a Spanish bootlegger's communications on the 260.525 transponder but comms centered on 260.530 MHz.

It is interesting to note that Spanish, Portuguese, and Asian bootleggers at times use all the 25 KHz wide transponders, with communications in LSB, AM, and FM.
Next, let's take a look at the 5 KHz transponders on the Gapfiller Military SATCOM satellites. This screenshot shows (13) 5 KHz wide transponder in action, annotated with different traffic occurring on those. You can clearly see in the screenshot weaker active transponders for a different satellite on the left, and the 13 stronger transponders for the target satellite.

Now that we have reviewed some advanced monitoring targets, we can take a look at some more common monitoring targets that hobbyists focus on. Below is a screenshot of a 10 MHz wide section of spectrum in the VHF aircraft band. This shows a key benefit of using the SDR for spectrum analysis -- you can watch almost the entire VHF aircraft band on one screen, and click to tune a specific transmission on the AR5000 radio.


Further, why search the federal government VHF land mobile spectrum on a standard scanner when you can watch the entire band in one window? Below is a screenshot of the SDR monitoring 162-172 MHz, providing the ability to see all activity and click to tune the AOR radio to specific transmissions:


And finally, where I live, the federal UHF band in San Antonio TX is quite busy with a large wide area military trunking system active between 406-411 MHz. The screen capture shows activity over time in that spectrum, showing active data and voice channels.


In summary, you can see that the RF Space SDR-14 opens up a whole realm of possibilities for radio communications enthusiasts. The ability to watch entire blocks of spectrum and then point and click to tune an transmission makes finding new and unknown monitoring targets a breeze.

For those that are interested in adding this fine piece of communications equipment to their shack, Scanner Master offers the RF Space SDR-14 for sale on their fantastic Web site. Click the link below for more details on how to order.

RF Space SDR-14 on Scanner Master

Next up, we'll review the RF Space SDR-14 monitoring the HF bands. Utility, broadcast, and Ham listeners and operators will get a whole new perspective on how HF Spectrum is used.