Workshop attendees in a conference room

Last weekend I was very lucky to get an in-depth look at RMHAM’s microwave network by being invited to a workshop on the subject. It’s an IP-over-microwave network spanning New Mexico to Wyoming and Pueblo to Grand Junction. It’s an extensive system that carries various amateur radio traffic; for example, it functions as part of the backbone for the Colorado Connection repeater network.

To complete the workshop I had to dust off a lot of networking knowledge I haven’t exercised in a long time, particularly OSPF. It’s all fun and games until a rogue static route is breaking routing everywhere!

It was a very illuminating class, and hopefully I can start to repay the kindness of the facilitators, Willem Schreuder AC0KQ and John Maxwell W0VG, by giving back in some fashion. They have some custom software which manages their configuration and tooling, maybe I can beef that up.

But Why?

We didn’t talk much in the workshop about the network’s purpose. Why not have the Colorado Connection and other clients backed by commercial internet? I guess the answer is that we want to be independent of the internet to mitigate ISP failures, but that’s increasingly rare. For me there’s a more foundational reason for the RMHAM network to exist: it keeps ham radio on ham radio.

I’ve heard of lots of hams using digital hotspots and the internet to connect to repeaters worldwide. Hotspots give users access to multiple digital modes and extend the reach of a humble HT beyond ~30 miles, so they’re great tools. But on some level it feels like cheating. What’s the difference between using a Zumspot to join a reflector vs using Discord to join a voice chat room, the fact that you’re going traveling 5 feet over ham frequencies? The advent of the cell phone, and especially the smartphone, has made the ability to communicate wirelessly to anyone worldwide a commodity; what makes ham radio still interesting is that we can do it without commercial infrastructure. I won’t knock anyone who enjoys using a hotspot as a tool to practice the hobby, but showing a non-ham a hotspot is not going to convince them to get into the hobby. We need to tout why ham radio is different from a cell phone.

That’s what makes systems like the RMHAM network worthwhile. The fact that the Colorado Connection is independent of commercial infrastructure keeps it “real” ham radio in my mind. The fact that we get to conceive, install, tinker, keep it running and are not beholden to anyone’s decisions outside our community, the fact that hams have built it from the ground up, that’s what makes it special.</div></div>