Category: New Features

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New Philippines Master Server 5151

The BM team is delighted to announce a new Master Server 5151 deployed in the Philippines, hosted on the island in the Eastern Telecoms datacenter. With the server physically located in the country, hams from the Philippines and nearby regions can enjoy lower latency, fewer hops, and thus better performance during QSOs.

The server address is at BM5151.hamradio.com.ph; Fixed IP address at 120.89.61.77. It should already be present in the BM Masters list for all hotspots that auto-update their master server list.

For more information on talkgroup lineup, local BM team, nets, etc. please refer to the wiki page.

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Helpdesk platform for BrandMeister users and repeater sysops support

Should you need support in utilizing the BrandMeister DMR network, support to BrandMeister users, the team has put together a commercial-grade platform that combines bug tracker, documentation and ticketing.

The ticketing platform is accessible in English at this address: https://support.brandmeister.network/servicedesk/customer/portals

(you will also find this link at the bottom of the brandmeister.network website, by clicking on the word “Support”).

A team of hams is watching the ticket queue to assist you, respond to your questions, escalate possible bugs and organize feature requests.

Support’s answers can turn into knowledge documents, which will show up as possible answers as you type your question for the support.

So the more this platform is being use, the more help it will provide to the entire user community!

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Talkgroup traffic exchange between BrandMeister Master and IPSC2 servers

A couple of months ago Artem/Brandmeister and Kurt/IPSC2 have worked together to create a new protocol to interconnect BrandMeister Master Servers and IPSC2 servers, for the purpose of exchanging TalkGoup traffic: OpenBridge.

Since version 20180610,  BrandMeister master servers can be interconnected with IPSC2 servers to exchange talkgroup content. Talkgroup numbers are configured on both sides, and traffic goes both ways with the ability to have traffic on multiple TalkGroups at the same time.

While you can check for the presence of an OpenBridge connection on a BrandMeister master’s status page, the protocol does not include any connection-establishment, nor keep-alive.

If you have an IPSC2 server and would like to interconnect it with the BrandMeister network, please contact the BrandMeister Master Server of your country (or the closest one if there are none in your country) to request the connection.

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LastHeard Back-end Redesign

The BrandMeister database back-end for the last-heard application has been completely redesigned, bringing more speed and storage.  You can now enjoy a much more responsive last-heard with 30 rows history, and a near-instant call statistics and contact export !

The last-heard back-end is now powered by MongoDB: 3 configuration servers, 2 query servers, and 4 shards !

We want to sincerely thank Daniel – YO5DSG and Cafe Gratis Sports Club – YO5KFG for their contribution of all resources involved in this new backend platform.

 

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BrandMeister DMR supports the new Hytera PDC-760 LTE/3G/Wifi radio & cell-phone device !

Hytera PDC-760

This new Hytera radio combines a conventional Analog FM radio, a DMR Tier I+II+III radio, and a cell phone !

The PDC-760 can connect to the BrandMeister DMR network over the air (repeater or hotspot) and over an IP network (WiFi , cellular 3G and LTE ).

This IP67 dust and waterproof radio is running an android operating system, a color 800×480 gloves-compatible touch screen with shatter-resistant Gorilla® Glass 3, and features a 128×96 top LCD display for easy reading from above.

You can configure Talkgroups from the front screen or the codeplug.

When using an IP network, you can connect to the BrandMeister DMR network and use Talkgroups, Private call, and Private messages as you would normally over the air or with a hotspot. Two BM modes are available:

  • Automatic: incoming traffic for talkgroups, private calls and sms messages.
  • Exclusive: once you select a private or group contact and push PTT, you will be placed in an exclusive mode where no one else can disturb you. You can press the hang up button to exit. It’s like having a private half-duplex phone call !

This new radio includes Hytera’s latest smart battery fast charge technology, 3 times faster than regular batteries allowing an 80% charge within 30 minutes. Full charges can be achieved in 1 hour !

The BrandMeister master servers running version 20180601 and above support this device. Below is a video clip of the device connected to a BrandMeister network over IP:

Notes: BrandMeister does not support video calls nor phone calls (PSTN). The switch between over-the-air and over-ip is done manually by the user.

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Support for NXDN reflectors and NXCore

Support for NXDN (NX-REF and NXCORE) has been added in the latest version of BrandMeister DMR Master Server.  Master server administrators can assist you in setting up a gateway.

Here are important considerations to know about the NXDN implementation.

NXDN protocol

Keep in mind that unlike DMR, the ID numbers on NXDN are limited to a 16-bit value.  Everything above 65519 will not be recognized.

BrandMeister Server

BrandMeister does not do any ID translation between DMR<->NXDN :

*  When you receive NXDN traffic on BrandMeister, the original NXDN IDs will be showing up as the source and the talkgroup.

* When you transmit on a BrandMeister talkgroup that is bridged with NXDN, only the last 16-bits of your DMR ID will be kept and used as a the source on the NXDN network.

There is also no translation between the two systems Talkgroup IDs. Only Talkgroup numbers between 91 and 65519 are supported.

BrandMeister currently only supports the ICOM implementation of NXDN.

BrandMeister has implemented private calling support for NXDN, but at this point neither NX-REF or NXCORE have implemented this feature on their end.

NXCORE

NXCORE only supports 1 concurrent call (half duplex). This means that if several people are transmitting on a talkgroup connected to an NXcore, only one transmission will go through, and all others will be discarded until the gateway path becomes available.

You will not be able to setup multiple NXCORE on the same server to the same BrandMeister master server (by using different port numbers for example). NXCORE recognizes a BrandMeister master server as a repeater; and NXCORE identify repeaters by IP only (not by ID, not by IP/PORT).

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xlxd 2.2.1 interlink now supported on BrandMeister Master Servers

Update: XLX 2.2.2 now fully functional with BrandMeister DMR, including D-Star traffic originating the inter-connected XLX.

The new BrandMeister Master server version 20180116-121244 brings the ability for a master server to establish an interlink with xlxd 2.2.1 . For reflector administrators, one of the major benefits of xlxd 2.2.1 is the ability to handle both D-Star and DMR audio flows with the ability to leverage AMBE transcoding.

When an interlink is established between a BrandMeister TalkGroup and xlxd 2.2.1, it is important to know that xlxd will only perform  D-Star~~DMR AMBE transcoding when sending D-Star audio to the BrandMeister master server. Outbound audio from BrandMeister DMR to the XLX server intended for D-Star traffic is not being AMBE-transcoded by the XLX server.

Below is a technical explanation of the reason. If you are planning to request an interlink, please also take notice of the current xlxd issues.

Continue reading “xlxd 2.2.1 interlink now supported on BrandMeister Master Servers”

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New BrandMeister master server in mainland China

We are very excited to announce that a new BrandMeister master server 4601 is now operational in mainland China. This has been made possible with the help of Michael BD7MQB.

The  server is hosted at the multi-carrier Alibaba Cloud, offering low latency and fast data transfer to all users in mainland China.

For any assistance or further information, please check the BrandMeister China Wiki page, or check the QQ group 欢迎加入BM China 服务器讨论群，群号码：327069058.

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New BrandMeister Last Heard : Better & Faster !

The BrandMeister DMR Last Heard has been nearly completely rewritten; for a more stable, reliable, and faster experience. It also includes new features !

Seriously Faster !

The last-heard has been rewritten and streamlined, from 500+ lines of code down to only 300 ! A significant gain of speed has been added with the elimination of all external lookups, which are now done ahead of time by the master servers.

More Features !

New features have been added to the Last-Heard. You’ll see a new Talker-Alias (TA) column, as well as c-Bridge names in the source column.

BrandMeister DMR Last Heard - New features

A feed is now built-in with more updated news !

Give it a try !

Go to https://brandmeister.network, and click on “Last Heard”. If you experience any error, please make sure to clear your web-browser cache !

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Talkgroups numbers below 90, Clusters and Reflectors

As you may know, Talkgroups below 90 are reserved and do not route between BrandMeister master servers. Traffic stays within repeaters on the master. As of version 20171029-191416, the talkgroups below 90 should not be configured as static for any repeater.

For cluster usage, BrandMeister recommends to use Talkgroup 2 and Talkgroup 8.

Reflectors use TalkGroup 9 on Timeslot 2.