In 1999, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has approved a request for a Special Temporary Authority (STA) to establish and operate a 1000-watt Radio Teletype (RTTY) Broadcast Station on 6994KHz and 13972KHz. The purpose of the proposed operation is to ascertain whether or not there is any significant interest on the part of those interested and active in RTTY operation to receive regularly scheduled transmissions of material not specifically amateur radio oriented. FCC rules prohibit such transmissions within the amateur bands. Included in the application was data allowing use of Frequency Shift Keying (FSK) shifts of 170, 425, and 850 Hz., at BAUD rates of 45.45, 50.0, 56.9, and 74.2. via an RS-232 16550 UART compatible COM port. The proposed transmissions would be clear text utilizing the ITA#2 5-level international Teletype code, more commonly referred to as BAUDOT or the Murray code. PSK-31 and 45.45 BAUD sound card support were later added. The above set of requirements was used to develop an operations concept for a 24-hour a day, 7 days a week RTTY transmitter and scheduler maintainable by a single operator. Operations would be automated, text transmissions would be scheduled per the clock, and operation would be autonomous. Morse code (CW) identification would be used once per hour to allow for station identification. Thus was the beginning of RTTYApp, controller software for a 24/7 shortwave broadcast transmitter bulletin scheduler and controller. The concept would be simple, a remote monitoring station would submit articles to the Scheduler via SMTP or telnet which would be monitored by a control operator. The control operator also had the capability to submit news articles. The Scheduler would queue the received broadcast bulletins and transmit them via Frequency Shift Keying (FSK) to remote receivers around the world.
The software is available for download for non-commercial applications at no cost, but the user is requested to register the copy with software developer so that product updates can be made available to the user. The development history white paper is also available. Feel free to visit the BSDL Software Library link below. |