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Our mission is to connect to and converse with the regional DMR Ham community by openly sharing our network resources and talkgroups to enable dynamic connections to all regional radio amateur DMR groups. We are no longer actively involved in national efforts due to the politics and divisiveness shown by several major c-Bridge groups.
Our main pursuits are to actively participate in the growth of the Amateur DMR regional community generally and MotoTRBO networking more specifically, to learn more about the "c-Bridge" and promote linking via the c-Bridge and other 3rd party efforts that can expand the abilities of TRBO networking. Independent network growth is very easily implemented with the c-Bridge making it no longer necessary to share authentication keys with other IPSC networks. We also desire to have in place the ability to work emergencies and nets with redundant talkgroup servers to insure smooth day-to-day communications as well as during priority and emergency events as they occur.
Simply being able to load the time slots in the ham DMR world quickly is a great reason to reach out to all the groups. Other reasons are to explore DMR and TRBO as well as learning more about the technology, but also, connections can be simply for special functions such as hamfests, conventions and other demonstration events. The connections can be short or long term, scheduled or impromptu. The beauty of the c-Bridge is that connections can easily be severed, made dormant until needed and then reconnected, manually or dynamically. Any administrator or manager of an ISPC network knows how that can be problematic when adding or trying to delete repeaters from an IPSC network. But also, this method requires no trips to the hilltops and no worry about the network security being compromised by a disgruntled repeater owner or system operator. This helps to insure that our approach remains politically neutral across all the independent Ham DMR groups. Political neutrality has become astonishingly difficult in the past few years.
Important Caution: Do not buy any equipment, especially DMR repeaters, before you know it will do what you want to accomplish. Read this simple Ham DMR GUIDE or ask around first. Motorola repeaters are the standard in Ham DMR networking and no other manufacturers are able to network to Motorola's MotoTRBO repeaters (directly) though gateway projects are appearing.
DCI has c-Bridge connections to many other c-Bridges. DCI actively supports the c-Bridge and the philosophy of connecting IPSC networks for many reasons and more especially now, since the creation of talkgroup servers. Most importantly, peer slots on a simple IPSC network were finite and operationally, more problematic as the number of repeaters grow on a single IPSC network. The c-Bridge broke that limitation wide open and now offers so much more than a simple party line on 2 time slots. Talkgroups can be used for routing and this enables the use of more than a single Talkgroup on a Timeslot. While not the complete answer to TRBO's IPSC limitations, it is a quantum improvement.
DCI is active in the alpha and beta testing of the c-Bridge and has several in addition to our main c-Bridge. Occasionally, new software will hit the main c-Bridge, cause issues and must be rolled back. Member repeater users are encouraged to report problems to help us be able to better assist the developer better their product. The latest versions/issues are reported on our Netwatch page.
If you already have a TRBO repeater or you are part of an IPSC network, you are welcome to explore bringing your repeater or IPSC network onto the DCI Open IPSC network. DCI can also peer in (join) to your network of 1 or more repeaters. Whether to simply get your feet wet as you get up to speed and then move off into some other direction or you may desire a long term affiliation, our network managers are available to use and gain experience with TRBO networking.
If you have a c-Bridge, then it can easily link to our c-Bridges for talkgroups not available via the talkgroup servers and these types of links (conference connections) are preferred over that of putting a c-Bridge peer on your network or your repeater on our networks. If interested in exploring these options, please Email us at: DCI Linking.
DCI would encourage other c-Bridge operators and their repeater owners to adopt the international "iCall Talkgroup" as well a nationwide "Emergency Talkgroup".
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