EasyPal Lite - version 08/APR/07 Beta EasyPal Lite is the work of Erik VK4AES from Australia. Erik has discontinued work on his HamPal program and is now working on the new EasyPal Lite. This software uses the DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale) encoding to allow the sending of image files over an HF voice channel. This is known as Digital SSTV. The GUI was written with Delphi and compiled on a Windows Vista system. It works best when run on a two GHz or faster CPU with Windows Vista. Although less stable, it should run on most fast PC's with Windows XP. It is designed to be easy to setup and use. Keep in mind that it is still in beta testing. Links for downloading the latest version are available at this URL: http://kb4yz.ham.org The download is a two MB ZIP file that contains only one file: "EasyPal_Lite.exe". This file should be placed into it's own folder and a shortcut to it should be put on the desktop. Help from other users is available from the Yahoo Groups newsgroup "DIGSSTV": http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digsstv Setup - Use this drop down menu to make your selections for Callsign, Soundcard, and CommPort. The setup for CommPort includes options for "FAC Green". Using an external circuit this option could be used to mute the speaker while receiving the digital signal. It is recommended that you close the program and re-start after setting up or making changes to the soundcard settings. RX Input - Allows quick access to Recording Control. Select the input where the received audio comes into the soundcard. TX Volume - Allows quick access to Master Volume for soundcard. All inputs should be Muted except for the Master Volume and Wave. RX Input and TX Volume are not shown when running under Vista. Expanded GUI - EasyPal Lite runs in a window that is 925x566. The user may optionally select the "Expanded GUI" which will resize the window to fill out the available space on screen. Generally, this will be a 4x3 aspect ratio but the actual number of pixels would be determined by the screen resolution. HiRes - Allows loading of images larger than 640x480 and keeping the original size when converting to JPEG2000. Send Text - Turns the TX window into a text editor for the sending of text. Text may be typed, pasted, and edited prior to transmitting. Callsign - The callsign of a transmitting station will appear in the upper left corner while receiving an DRM transmission. RX input bargraph - There will be more green area with increasing audio amplitude. Signal Quality bargraph - There will be more green area with increased signal quality. Total - "Total" is the number of segments in the image file being received. OK Segs - "OK Segs" is the number of segments successfully decoded so far. Position - "Position" is the segment number that was last decoded. Missing Segments - This is the number of segments that still need to be received. TX - The inital DRM Mode is Mode B, Bandwidth 2.5 KHz, Error Protect HI, QAM 16, and LeadIn 24. These settings are the best choices for general use on the HF bands. To make changes, place mouse pointer over the name of the setting and click the mouse to toggle through the available choices. Any changes to the mode are saved for future sessions when the program is closed. Interleave is always Long and cannot be changed. Using a LeadIn of 12 will reduce transmit time by reducing the number of redundant segments. For very short transmissions such as Text messages, a LeadIn of 12 may be too short a time for all stations to achieve MSC sync before the transmission is finished. In this case, select a Start Delay of 24. RX - The DRM mode received. FAC must be green before the mode can be detected and the callsign decoded. In addition to those mode settings that may be changed on transmit, the RX will also reveal the interleave setting. Lng for long and Sht for short. The receive mode settings are automatic and do not require the operator to make any changes for receiving any DRM mode. Red/green bars: Green light by "IO" indicates Soundcard is active. Green light by Time - Time Sync locked Green light by Frame - Frame Sync locked Green light by FAC - FAC has lock (Fast Access Channel) Green light by MSC - MSC has lock (Main Service Channel) Data cannot be decoded until the MSC has a lock. So the MSC must be green before you will be able to copy anything. TRANSMIT - Starts the transmission of the DRM encoded picture file. Nothing is sent in the waterfall before the data unless you wish to play a short wave file such as a waterfall ID. This file must have the name "BEGIN.wav" and it must be in the main EasyPal Lite folder. BSR - "Bad Segment Report" Starts the transmission of a short text file that lists the segment numbers that were missing on the last received file. During this transmission, many instances will be sent to ensure that the information gets through. When many segments are required, the transmission time for the BSR may be much longer. The type of BSR sent is a bit different from the BSR format used in the past. It is called a "Fast BSR" because it uses a form of shorthand to indicate contiguous segments. This new "Fast BSR" will send faster because the text file listing the missing segments is smaller. One drawback to the use of the new "Fast BSR" is that older programs such as HamPal may not recognize all the segments required and if there are many, HamPal may only be able to send fixes for two or three segments at a time. This is only a problem when pictures are sent from HamPal to EasyPal Lite. FIX - After receiving an BSR, you will have a message on the title bar: "-KB9RNB-Requests-1 missing segments for Pic-070927122834.GIF" Just click "FIX" to send the FIX. or it may be a message like this: "-This BSR is not for you" If you did not send the file, the original station may have to send the fix. or it may be the same message as before. If you sent this file, just click "FIX" to send the FIX. In some cases, the BSR does not register but you can still send the fix. If there is no message in the title bar and you got the BSR File OK, and you think that you should be able to send the FIX, go ahead and send the FIX anyway. It may work! Any station running EasyPal Lite that successfully receives an image, can send about 25 segments using "Replay RX" then using "ABORT" to stop the transmission. That station will then be in a position to send a fix for any other station that sends an BSR for that same image. (The original image may be sent from any program using a compatable DRM mode.) For this to work properly, all stations should be sending in the same mode. The "Replay RX" then "ABORT" must be done BEFORE any BSR's are sent. If you load another image before you receive the BSR, here is no need to reload the previous image to fix someone. ABORT - Allows for stopping a picture, BSR, or FIX transmission. Encode - (interleaved redundancy - Reed-Solomon error correction) Encodes the transmitted file with redundant data so that the original file may be created even though not all segments were received. Click to enable. Encode changes the extension of the filename sent to .rs plus a number, one through four. Transmission time will be increased by 13% for Encode1. Transmission time will be increased by 31% for Encode2. Transmission time will be increased by 54% for Encode3. Transmission time will be increased by 86% for Encode4. There is no progressive receive in this mode. The received file will decode after a sufficient number of segments are copied and the image will appear as soon as the decoding is finished. This may happen even before the transmission is complete. Use of Encode may reduce the need for BSR's and FIX'es. Compatable only with others running EasyPal Lite. A stand alone decode program is available that will allow those not using EasyPal Lite to decode the .rs files manually. ProgRX - (Progressive Receive) Check to enable viewing image as it is coming in. Using Progressive RX may increase the chance of program lock-up or other errors. You must select the RX window to view the image. Replay RX - This will immediately replay the file just received. It will be the same file as the original and the same name. If the replay is transmitted in the same DRM mode as received, it will also repair any stations that still need segments. When there are many stations that require FIX'es, it may be more efficient for one station that received the file to do this type of replay. Multiple stations can relay the file to the next. There will be no loss in quality. Tune - Immediatelly sends the three tone tuning tone for 7 seconds. This can be used to check your transmit PTT, your audio level, and power output. Others can use it to check and adjust their frequency so that the three tones appear directly under the three green dots at the top of the waterfall. These three green dots also mark the proper frequency for the three pilot carriers that are part of the DRM transmission. LoadPIC - Allows for the loading of an image to be transmitted. Large images will be resized down to 640x480. The file will be converted and compressed into a JPEG2000 image. The filename is unchanged except for the extension which becomes ".jp2". Animated GIF's and other image types that you wish to send without converting into JPEG2000 should be loaded using LoadAny. "Click, drag, and drop" is also possible from the thumbnails found in various pieces of software. The transmitted filename and time to transmit will appear above the image. Click the "Transmit" button to start the transmission. LoadAny - Allows for the loading of most any file type to be transmitted. The file will sent just as original and will not be renamed. This is useful when sending animated GIF files. Copy - Standard image copy to clipboard from the RX or TX screen. Paste - Standard image paste from clipboard to the RX or TX screen. Paste to the TX screen will compress and convert the image to JPEG2000 format. The image will be resized to 640x480. A new filename is created. It will start with "Clip-" followed by a 12 digit number. TxModeHelp - This screen serves as a quick reminder for what DRM modes are suitable for different conditions. TX mode = RX mode This provides a way to quickly change the TX mode to match the DRM mode just received. Full Screen - Image in selected window will be displayed full screen when clicked. The image size remains the same but it is displayed againgt a black background. Animated GIF files might not be displayed. To return to the program screen, click the mouse or hit the "Esc" key. WAV - Brings up the "Play Wave File" list. Selecting a WAV file and clicking "TX Now" will immediatelly play the audio from this WAV file. Create the wav files using "W.Fall-Pic", "W.Fall-Text" or another program such as HamPAL or DIGTRX. W.Fall-Pic - (Waterfall picture) Transforms the image on screen into a grey scale image that becomes analog encoded audio to produce a like image in the waterfall. W.Fall-Text - (Waterfall text) Transforms a user provided text message with the choice of various sizes and fonts into analog encoded audio to produce the text as an image in the waterfall. To make a waterfall ID click "W.Fall-Text". Type your call into the Waterfall Text window using all caps. You may want to add a space between each character. Select a plain bold font to make it easier to read when displayed in the waterfall. Click Save and use your call as the filename. To send this, click WAV and select the file, then click "Tx Now". Clear - This will clear the RX or TX screens. About - Credits. View - "Last RX Pictures" - thumbnail view of the pictures received. These images are JPG copies and are stored in the "RXFiles" folder. Some of the images in "Last RX Pictures" may have some corruption due to missing segments. "Last TX Pictures" - thumbnail view of the pictures transmitted. These images are JPG copies and are stored in the "TXFiles" folder. These JPG copies may not have the quality and characteristics as the original file. If you want to replay any of these images with the original quality, you should use "LoadAny" and get the file from the "Autosave" folder. "Send to TX" will transfer image selected to TX window. JPEG2000 compression is applied to the JPG image. The filename extension is changed to ".jp2". The file to transmit is at this point is a copy of a copy of a copy with lossy compression at each step. Hints - Hints will appear after mouse pointer is placed over selected buttons and areas. RX tab - Click to view RX screen and RX information line. If ProgRX is on, and all segments are received, the image may appear corrupt. Use View and look at the image in "Last RX Pictures". It should appear OK. The file saved to the Autosave folder should be OK too. Gamma - Allows for the adjustment of the brightness of the received image. RX Filename - The filename of the received image. TX tab - Click to view TX screen and TX information line. Secs - This is the number of seconds it would take to transmit this image. K - This is the file size for the image to transmit. Does not apply to images loaded using LoadAny. Slider - The setting of this slider changes the level of the JPEG2000 compression that determines the file size. SET - If the slider has changed position after the image has been loaded, it will be necessary to click the SET button so that the JPEG2000 compression can be reapplied. TX Filename - The name of the file to be transmitted. The filename extension will change when the transmit starts. ===================================================== NOTES: Autosave - Received files are automatically saved in the "Autosave" folder. Corrupt - Partially received files (ones with missing segments) will be saved into the "Corrupt" folder. These files will be deleted when EasyPal Lite is closed. Image area - The size of the image area is 640x480. With the Expanded GUI selected, and using 1024x768 screen resolution, the image area will be enlarged to 728x720. Spectrum - Displays the amplitude of the incoming signal across the 2.5 KHz bandwidth. Waterfall - Displays 30 seconds of signal reception. More than 50 seconds can be displayed if the Expanded GUI is selected. The waterfall may be paused by clicking anywhere in the waterfall area. Click again in the waterfall area to restart the waterfall. Exit - When EasyPal is closed, the contents of the "Transient" and "Corrupt" folders are deleted. ===================================================== The latest version of this file is available here: http://www.tima.com/~djones/easypallite.txt Please notify Dave - KB4YZ of updates and corrections: djones@tima.com