First the good news.
Allen VK3HRA and myself have put together an SMS spotter for VK amateurs. It not only handles SOTA spots but also handles VK parks & peaks spots for the local VK award scheme. Rather than re-invent the wheel Allen’s service provides a VK number and skims off incoming SOTA spots and forwards them to me for processing. The advantage of this is that spotting is now a “local” number rather than an international number.
Allen is leveraging a key part of the recent (last May) changes I put in place to my SOTA SMS spotting system. That was setting up a parallel system using a Cloud bases TaaS provider (Telephone as a Service). It means I no longer have to have a GSM dongle and a server running in the shack. For a few dollars a year, the computers and virtual phone sit in someone’s data centre instead, they get to worry about patching and maintaining the computers, not me!
The Taas provider offers numbers in many countries but they are all rather expensive compared to UK/US numbers still. If anyone wants to set up a local feed then get in touch, you’ll need something to talk SMS (an old phone/dongle) and computer running 24/7 with an internet connection.
In the USA the system is separate using Google Voice (which is free and set up for me by K1YMI) to provide a number and a server and net connectivity provided by Jeremy NH6Z. This takes a licking and keeps on ticking. However, should Google Voice close (always a problem with free Google services) then it can be moved to the TaaS system.
That’s the good news. Now for the less good news.
Once more Vodapain (Vodaphone) seem have no 2G coverage from my local cell. I’ve tried the spotter computer’s SIM in some phones and neither it or other Vodaphone SIMs will connect at 2G today. This means my original system is not functioning again. This is about the 5th time this year. It’s got to the point that I finally believe it’s time to shut down the original number and only use the “new” number. So I will turn off the original system on Jan 1st 2015. All any current user needs to do is start using the new number. That’s all. New users still need to register with me.
If you are in USA/Canada there is nothing for you to do, nothing is changing.
Your number is 1-530-430-SOTA (1-530-430-7682)
If you are VK you can use Allen’s service or mine directly. It’s up to you.
Your number in VK is +61-447-568667
If you are anywhere else you need to use the new number and delete the old number.
Your number is +44-7903-533046
If you are using +44-7733-603404 please stop now and change to +44-7903-533046.