aprscot

aprscot - APRS Cursor-on-Target Gateway.

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.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ampledata/aprscot/main/docs/screenshot_1637083240_16797-50p.png :alt: Screenshot of APRS PLI in ATAK. :target: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ampledata/aprscot/main/docs/screenshot_1637083240_16797.png

The APRS to Cursor On Target Gateway (APRSCOT) provides beyond line-of-sight blue force tracking capabilities using commercial off the shelf components. This gateway uses the Automatic Packet Reporting System (APRS) and APRS-IS network to forward APRS position reports to Cursor On Target (COT) clients such as the Android Team Awareness Kit (ATAK), WinTAK, et al. Other situational awareness & common operating picture platforms are supported through use of COT, such as TAKX & COPERS.

APRS Frames can also be transformed or callsigns normalized before forwarding as COT. Almost any network destination is available, including TCP & UDP Mulitcast.

Features of aprscot:

• Handles APRS-IS transported APRS Frames from over-the-air or Internet-based stations.
• Can transform APRS station callsign, COT Type and COT Icon for display in TAK systems.
• Can run as a service ('daemon') on any Linux system.
• Can send COT Events to any destination supported by PyTAK <https://github.com/ampledata/pytak>_: TLS/SSL, TCP, UDP, UDP Multicast.

See also:

• Hayt's APRS-TAK ATAK Plugin <https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1o8tsalgxUGxdg2HiDw5xVu_-bnr63F3d>_
• Alan Barrow's aprstak: https://github.com/pinztrek/aprstak

Concept:

.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ampledata/aprscot/main/docs/aprscot-concept.png :alt: APRSCOT concept diagram. :target: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ampledata/aprscot/main/docs/aprscot-concept.png

Support Development

Tech Support: Email [e-mail] or Signal/WhatsApp: [phone]

This tool has been developed for the Disaster Response, Public Safety and Frontline Healthcare community. This software is currently provided at no-cost to users. Any contribution you can make to further this project's development efforts is greatly appreciated.

.. image:: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/assets/img/custom_images/orange_img.png :target: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/ampledata :alt: Support Development: Buy me a coffee!

Installation

The APRS to COT gateway is service started with a command-line tool called aprscot. There are three options for installing aprscot, in order preferred option they are:

Option I: Install as a Debian / Ubuntu Package::

$ wget https://github.com/ampledata/pytak/releases/latest/download/python3-pytak_latest_all.deb
$ sudo apt install -f ./python3-pytak_latest_all.deb
$ wget https://github.com/ampledata/aprs-python/releases/latest/download/python3-aprslib_latest_all.deb
$ sudo apt install -f ./python3-aprslib_latest_all.deb
$ wget https://github.com/ampledata/aprscot/releases/latest/download/python3-aprscot_latest_all.deb
$ sudo apt install -f ./python3-aprscot_latest_all.deb

Option II: Install from the Python Package Index (PyPI)::

$ python3 -m pip install aprscot

Option III: Install from this source tree::

$ git clone https://github.com/ampledata/aprscot.git
$ cd aprscot/
$ python3 setup.py install

Usage

The aprscot program has one command-line argument::

$ aprscot -h
usage: aprscot [-h] [-c CONFIG_FILE]

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -c CONFIG_FILE, --CONFIG_FILE CONFIG_FILE

You must create a configuration file, see example-config.ini in the source repository.

An example config, COT_URL is our COT destination server or client::

[aprscot]
COT_URL = tcp://takserver.example.com:8088

APRS-IS Server-side Filter Commands <http://www.aprs-is.net/javAPRSFilter.aspx>_ can be used to filter incoming APRS Frames::

[aprscot]
COT_URL = tcp:takserver.example.com:8088
APRSIS_FILTER = f/W6PW-10/50

PLI Transforms can be created using per-station sections. In this example, we're overriding W2GMD-9's COT Type & Callsign, and NB6F-2's Callsign::

[aprscot]
COT_URL = tcp:takserver.example.com:8088

[W2GMD-9]
COT_TYPE = a-f-G-U-C
COT_STALE = 600
COT_NAME = Medic 52

[NB6F-2]
COT_NAME = Transport 2

Source

Github: https://github.com/ampledata/aprscot

Author

Greg Albrecht W2GMD [e-mail]

https://ampledata.org/

Copyright

• APRSCOT is Copyright 2022 Greg Albrecht [e-mail]
• Automatic Packet Reporting System (APRS) <http://www.aprs.org/>_ is Copyright Bob Bruninga WB4APR (SK) [e-mail]

License

Copyright 2022 Greg Albrecht [e-mail]

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.