Hi David,

Thank you for reaching out to the global AMPR community with a tool to begin including us in the grant process. I hope this openness will expand as we had been completely removed from all previous grant processing.

Happy to do it. The aim here is to open up communication, and I'm glad to see it's already working!

I have completely your survey but one thing seems to be missing: How some of this grant money can be given back to the 44Net group (aka.. the people who use this 44.x.x.x address space) or projects that interface with it. After all, it was the substantial sale of this 44.x.x.x IPv4 address space that made all this possible and we should invest some of it back into what remains.

Copy this. One of the questions in the survey is something like, "What are the questions we should have asked and what are your answers?" I appreciate you offering your answer regarding the supporting the 44net address space here.

• Fortification of AMPR infrastructure
  • Ensured 44.x.x.x gateway access to the Internet (currently UCSD

hosted) - Investment into the AMPR portal, wiki - Consider hosting a VPN service for those who cannot get IPIP

working through their ISP

- Consideration of solving the pending rPKI issue for our BGP

users

• Investment in other projects that use AMPR 44.x.x.x services
  • AREDN mesh
  • Linux AX.25 stack (in poor shape)
  • RoIP communities like Allstar, IRLP, Echolink, DV-Switch, etc

(no specific order)

These are all excellent ideas and speak to some that I've also heard come up internally.

Thank you again, David! Looking forward to hearing from others on 44net as well.

Warmly, Rosy

Rosy Wolfe Executive Director Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) ampr.org

On 9/29/20 8:42 AM, David Ranch wrote:

- Consider hosting a VPN service for those who cannot get IPIP working through their ISP

Hi all,

Le 29/09/2020 à 22:30, pete M via 44Net a écrit :

Allstarlink are using 44 net space and are giving a great service to link repeaters. I already give to them from time to time.

The Brandmeister server team could also be supported. (As an admin of the canadian server I do have some personal interest. )

Here in France, AllStar, Brandmeister, but also most of digital voice things such as Echolink, D-Star, DMR, XLX, DVSwitch, SVXLink and so on, are mostly using public Internet connections. Maybe because it's easier, and because lots of Plug-and-Play images are available for tiny computers such as Raspberry Pi.

As we are a "closed" community, and most of those systems must be restricted to licensed HAMs due to regulations, having most of them connected through AMPRNet / HamNet addressing would IMHO have a sense.

But in fact, very few of us have their digital voice systems connected through AMPRNet / HamNet addressing.

Why ?

Here are some guesses :

- AMPRNet / HamNet routing is quite complicated for a non-IT guy. BGP requires huge equipment and skills. IPIP requires hacking protocol redirect on Internet boxes. Those are not easy things for people operating a voice repeater or hotspot. They just build a Pi image, plug the machine, and it works. Why should they bother with complex addressing ?   -> Maybe we should target Plug-and-Play system makers (such as Pi-Star for ex.) so that AMPRnet addressing is integrated in a plug-and-play manner

- Make things simpler and easier to use. We often discussed about that. Here, in Corsica (a tiny island in the Mediterranean sea), we've been experimenting a new approach :     - Plug-and-Play boxes (basically, OpenWRT, making 5 GHz connection to a peer, or building a VPN tunnel to a central gateway). It's an outgoing VPN, so that it works behind any Internet provider (without opening ports and so on). The first tries were using OpenVPN, but we are now migrating to Wireguard (light abd efficient).     - A central gateway on the islans, which manages the complex routing to "the rest of the world". We loose the full-mesh capability of IP-IP, but we get Plug-and-Play. And that's great !

- This is our approach at TKNet, but there are other implementations elsewhere in the world. The common idea is a decentralized network by geographic areas : a central gateway for the area (ie, a country, a region, an island), managed by a regional team, and local users connecting to this gateway in a Plug-and-Play manner.

- Only one VPN server in the East coast of the US does not have much sense in terms of latency for world-wide users, mostly for VoIP applications. Pings are far too long. To be efficient, VPN servers must be closer from people (by country, or at least, by continent)

- Some interesting ideas about IPv6 have already been submitted here. I'm not using IPv6 at all in my job, so I never tried experimenting with it for HAM networks. But there's room for investigation.

As a conclusion, the main idea is : - Make use of AMPR addressing simpler, so that *every* HAM application using Internet can be migrated to AMPRNet / HamNet. - "Evangelize" AMPRNet addressing, so that every software developer / integrator (people who build ready-to-use RPi images) can implement it

73 de TK1BI

Part of the BrandMeister network is using some of the 44 range. The main bm webpage is using it. I also use a /24 from the East Coast of the USA for digital voice dmr services. That is also broken out to smaller dinners so that different users and developers who only wanted to be in the 44 range for testing.

Corey n3fe

On Sat, Oct 3, 2020 at 12:48 PM Dave Gingrich via 44Net < 44net@mailman.ampr.org> wrote:

For the IRLP network, in the last roughly 18 months, we have issued VPN connections for over 230 repeaters, plus roughly 60% of our backend infrastructure is using BGP routed 44-net addresses. Basically from service providers in Chicago, Sydney and Indianapolis.

Those cities were chosen because the lion's share of the IRLP network is in North America and Australia. There are a number of IRLP nodes in .UK, but we found that performance through Chicago is more than adequate. We could light up service from additional locations in the future, but we try to use our existing infrastructure locations, to keep the costs down.

We started using 44-net for IRLP back in 2015. A few folks have been using 44 for far longer.

-k9dc

...

On Oct 3, 2020, at 04:05, Toussaint OTTAVI via 44Net <

44net@mailman.ampr.org> wrote:

...

...

Hi all,

...

...

Le 29/09/2020 à 22:30, pete M via 44Net a écrit :

...

...

Allstarlink are using 44 net space and are giving a great service to

link repeaters. I already give to them from time to time.

...

...

...

...

The Brandmeister server team could also be supported. (As an admin of

the canadian server I do have some personal interest. )

...

...

But in fact, very few of us have their digital voice systems connected

through AMPRNet / HamNet addressing.

...

...

• Only one VPN server in the East coast of the US does not have much

sense in terms of latency for world-wide users, mostly for VoIP applications. Pings are far too long. To be efficient, VPN servers must be closer from people (by country, or at least, by continent)

...

...

73 de TK1BI

...

---

44Net mailing list

44Net@mailman.ampr.org

https://mailman.ampr.org/mailman/listinfo/44net

Le 03/10/2020 à 18:55, Corey Dean via 44Net a écrit :

Part of the BrandMeister network is using some of the 44 range. The main bm webpage is using it.

Here are some quick and dirty stats :

XLX is an open-source digital gateway used all over the world to interconnect D-Star and DMR repeaters (and many other protocols) XLX API provides a "hosts" file of all registered XLX nodes with their IP This file has approx. 1700 lines. Due to triple REF, DCS, XRF naming, we can assume there are roughly 560 independent nodes. The file contains only 36 entries using AMPR 44.x IP addressing, and among them, only 12 are unique

*-> Only 2% of the XLX-connected reflectors are using AMPR addresses !!!*

And this is only for reflectors (=servers), who are managed by people with more than average skills. I didn't find how to obtain stats for all the repeaters connected to all the reflectors, but adoption rate will be even lower !

COMMENTS : - AMPR addressing is used on country-wide servers, and by isolated teams around the world (including myself, HI)  mostly because people who maintain servers have the skills and equipment to do that. - We still have some work until mass adoption by the local reflectors and repeaters SysOps - And even more work for mass adoption by any HAM in the world...

CONCLUSION : As I already said, IMHO, our #1 goal should be : make AMPR addressing easier to use, both for local SysOps/teams, and for end users.

73 de TK1BI

On 8/10/20 12:27 am, Toussaint OTTAVI via 44Net wrote:

Here are some quick and dirty stats :

XLX is an open-source digital gateway used all over the world to interconnect D-Star and DMR repeaters (and many other protocols) XLX API provides a "hosts" file of all registered XLX nodes with their IP This file has approx. 1700 lines. Due to triple REF, DCS, XRF naming, we can assume there are roughly 560 independent nodes. The file contains only 36 entries using AMPR 44.x IP addressing, and among them, only 12 are unique

*-> Only 2% of the XLX-connected reflectors are using AMPR addresses !!!*

I don't think you can draw any concrete conclusions from this.  The reasons are likely to be multiple.  My XLX (XLX432) doesn't run AMPR addresses, because AFAIK, BGP is not available on that VPS.

However, my older VPS is hosted at a provider run by another ham, and he's organised BGP routing of a 44.190.x.x/24, on which runs an IRLP reflector, several Echolink conferences and a DPlus reflector (REF023).  That VPS also runs a ton of Echolink proxies (~150-200), the majority of them public for anyone to use.

Would I like to run more on AMPRnet?  Sure, but a number of conditions need to be met:

Must have a datacentre in Australia (latency, you know) Offer BGP routing (obviously!) Be in a reasonable price range for a small-mid sized VPS.

Those are the main conditions.  I have one VPS that meets all 3 criteria, which came on a "It's who you know" basis. :)

On 4/10/20 3:46 am, Dave Gingrich via 44Net wrote:

For the IRLP network, in the last roughly 18 months, we have issued VPN connections for over 230 repeaters, plus roughly 60% of our backend infrastructure is using BGP routed 44-net addresses. Basically from service providers in Chicago, Sydney and Indianapolis.

Those cities were chosen because the lion's share of the IRLP network is in North America and Australia. There are a number of IRLP nodes in .UK, but we found that performance through Chicago is more than adequate. We could light up service from additional locations in the future, but we try to use our existing infrastructure locations, to keep the costs down.

We started using 44-net for IRLP back in 2015. A few folks have been using 44 for far longer.

I've been pretty happy with my BGP routed 44net space.  Been a couple of years now.  It's also helped my provider, as he doesn't need to allocate any of his IPv4 space to me.  And the bigger allocation has enabled me to provide a significant number (~150) of public Echolink proxies, to help those stuck behind CGNAT and similar.  There's also several private proxies for myself and a number of local hams who needed a dedicated proxy.

Hey folks,

First, thank you so much for all of the ideas that have been shared here and to those of you who have filled out the survey. So far we've had 41 people fill it out! I'm looking very forward to compiling everything and going over the results on next week's call.

If you haven't filled out the survey yet, I highly encourage you to do so. The more voices we hear from, the better.

Also, as someone asked me in a DM, in addition to reviewing the results on the call, I'll also make sure to share results on this list and on ampr.org.

To answer Tom's question:

I am wondering if you can describe the ways you have been able to utilize the ARDC Technical Advisory Committee related to these ideas that you have heard come up internally and how you plan to use the TAC going forward.

Tom KD7LXL

The TAC is inactive at this time, however two of its members - John Hays and Tim Pozar - currently serve on the Grants Advisory Committee.

Have a great weekend, Rosy

Rosy Wolfe Executive Director Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) ampr.org

K4BFH here. For what it’s worth, I’m a Microsoft, Cisco, and Citrix instructor and architect for a large MSP. I’d be glad to help with the infrastructure any way possible. I offered to Brian back in the day but it never got much traction.

Ryan O’Connor K4BFH

Sent from my mobile device. Expect strange words and horrendous misspelling. ________________________________ From: 44Net 44net-bounces+slowgto=outlook.com@mailman.ampr.org on behalf of Bdale Garbee via 44Net 44net@mailman.ampr.org Sent: Tuesday, September 29, 2020 3:52 PM To: David Ranch Cc: Bdale Garbee; AMPRNet working group Subject: Re: [44net] Inviting you to ARDC Grantmaking Survey + Community Jitsi Call

David Ranch via 44Net 44net@mailman.ampr.org writes:

How some of this grant money can be given back to the 44Net group

As Rosy said in her reply, thanks much for jumping in with these thoughts. I'll add comments about two specific things we've already done or are doing specifically in support of 44Net that may not be top of her mind.

One of the first things we worked on after Brian passed was formalizing our relationship with Chris, G1FEF, who had taken on various 44Net admin responsibilities as a volunteer. We now pay him as a contractor to administer much of our infrastructure. That includes core 44Net assets, as well as some software we're using to run ARDC itself. Part of our statement of work with Chris relates to possible 44Net improvements, and I'm sure that we can and will allocate funds to address some number of such improvements over time. More discussion about what's actually needed and with what sense of priority would be awesome input for us to hear through the survey, upcoming "town hall" meeting, etc.

Second, we're currently working through the legal issues associated with making grants to non-US entities, specifically in support of a grant request for hardware improvements to packet infrastructure in Europe. As we've previously communicated, broadening the scope of grant recipients beyond other 501(c)3 charities or equivalent tax status recipients in the US requires significant legal and financial process work. There are several "categories" of recipients, each of which will require different chunks of work on our part to set up.

ARDC is determined to get to the point where we can make grants to non-incorporated groups and potentially even individuals in large part because that's what we need to be able to grant funds more broadly for things like on-air 44net assets around the world. Rosy and I are "on it", but it's neither easy nor fast... and my part of the work is being done 100% as a volunteer. Thank you all for your continued patience!

73 - Bdale, KB0G ARDC Treasurer / CFO

Hi Lori,

On 10/8/20 4:35 AM, Lori Guidos via 44Net wrote:

Are you only interested in the input of people licenced in amateur radio?

I ask because I know a number of unlicensed people who would be interested who I would like to invite.

As one of ARDC's granting goals is about inspiring more people into amateur radio, a license is not required to join one of these calls.

That said, Saturday's call is primarily for folks on the 44net mailing list. If the people you're inviting are or want to be part of it, absolutely invite them! If not, then they are still welcome to come, but I'd ask to give the floor to 44net folks first.

It's also worth noting that, assuming we have decent attendance (which is looking good), this will likely not be the last call like this that we do.

Hope this helps, and looking forward to seeing you Saturday.

All the best, Rosy

Rosy Wolfe Executive Director Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) ampr.org

On Tue, Sep 29, 2020, 7:21 AM Rosy Wolfe via 44Net 44net@mailman.ampr.org wrote:

...

Hello 44net!

Hope you are healthy and well wherever you are. I'm writing to invite you to a couple of things.

1. ARDC Grantmaking Survey

The first is an invitation to take this survey about ARDC grant making, which you can find here:

https://www.mysurveygizmo.com/s3/5789610/ARDC-Grantmaking-Feedback-Survey

The survey covers our existing granting goals and some of the kinds of projects that we've funded so far. What do you think? What other grants would you like to see? Do you know of organizations, either in the US or abroad, that you'd like to see us fund? Let us know - it shouldn't take more than 5 minutes, more if you decide to give some longer written-out answers.

2. 44net + ARDC Community Video Call

We'll go over the results together in a community video call, happening Saturday Oct. 10, 2020, at 17:00 UTC (10am PT / 1pm ET / 6pm BST / 7pm CEST).

On this call, we'll introduce ARDC Board members, grants advisory committee members, and staff; go over the survey results together; talk about our grants made to date; and talk about any questions you have. If there's anything in particular you'd like ARDC to cover in the call, please let us know by responding to this mail or sending me a message directly: rosy@ampr.org.

Here is the link to the call:

https://meet.jit.si/ardc-44net-community-meeting-oct-10-2020

A note on the times: I realize that the times listed are more convenient for folks in the Americas, Africa, and Europe. If enough people from Asia and Australia wish to join but can't for timing reasons, we may do another group call for those time zones. Part of this exercise is also learning about 44net's distribution - where is everyone located? I'm looking forward to finding out.

I'm also looking forward to better getting to know 44net and the greater ham community, and to use what I learn to help shape ARDC's 2021 grantmaking strategy. We are in a fortunate position to do a lot of good in the world - so let's do it!

All the best, Rosy

-- Rosy Wolfe Executive Director Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) ampr.org _________________________________________ 44Net mailing list 44Net@mailman.ampr.org https://mailman.ampr.org/mailman/listinfo/44net

---

44Net mailing list 44Net@mailman.ampr.org https://mailman.ampr.org/mailman/listinfo/44net

Hi Dean,

There was another meeting on Feb. 6. You can read the recap here:

https://www.ampr.org/feb-06-community-meeting-recap-2020-annual-report-new-g...

There's also a video recording of the event listed in the recap; feel free to watch if you like!

We'll do another meeting in Q2; no date set yet, but we'll announce it here and on the blog when when we do.

Hope this helps, Rosy

Rosy Wolfe - KJ7RYV Executive Director Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) ampr.org

On 3/12/21 8:41 AM, Dean LaClair wrote:

Rosey Have there been any other meetings on granting? I wasn't able to attend this one

73 Dean K2WW

On Tue, Sep 29, 2020, 10:22 Rosy Wolfe via 44Net <44net@mailman.ampr.org mailto:44net@mailman.ampr.org> wrote:

Hello 44net!

Hope you are healthy and well wherever you are. I'm writing to invite
you to a couple of things.

1. ARDC Grantmaking Survey

The first is an invitation to take this survey about ARDC grant making,
which you can find here:

https://www.mysurveygizmo.com/s3/5789610/ARDC-Grantmaking-Feedback-Survey
<https://www.mysurveygizmo.com/s3/5789610/ARDC-Grantmaking-Feedback-Survey>

The survey covers our existing granting goals and some of the kinds of
projects that we've funded so far. What do you think? What other grants
would you like to see? Do you know of organizations, either in the US or
abroad, that you'd like to see us fund? Let us know - it shouldn't take
more than 5 minutes, more if you decide to give some longer
written-out answers.

2. 44net + ARDC Community Video Call

We'll go over the results together in a community video call, happening
Saturday Oct. 10, 2020, at 17:00 UTC (10am PT / 1pm ET / 6pm BST / 7pm
CEST).

On this call, we'll introduce ARDC Board members, grants advisory
committee members, and staff; go over the survey results together; talk
about our grants made to date; and talk about any questions you have. If
there's anything in particular you'd like ARDC to cover in the call,
please let us know by responding to this mail or sending me a message
directly: rosy@ampr.org <mailto:rosy@ampr.org>.

Here is the link to the call:

https://meet.jit.si/ardc-44net-community-meeting-oct-10-2020
<https://meet.jit.si/ardc-44net-community-meeting-oct-10-2020>

A note on the times: I realize that the times listed are more convenient
for folks in the Americas, Africa, and Europe. If enough people from
Asia and Australia wish to join but can't for timing reasons, we may do
another group call for those time zones. Part of this exercise is also
learning about 44net's distribution - where is everyone located? I'm
looking forward to finding out.

I'm also looking forward to better getting to know 44net and the greater
ham community, and to use what I learn to help shape ARDC's 2021
grantmaking strategy. We are in a fortunate position to do a lot of good
in the world - so let's do it!

All the best,
Rosy



-- 
Rosy Wolfe
Executive Director
Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC)
ampr.org <http://ampr.org>
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44Net mailing list
44Net@mailman.ampr.org <mailto:44Net@mailman.ampr.org>
https://mailman.ampr.org/mailman/listinfo/44net
<https://mailman.ampr.org/mailman/listinfo/44net>