Using the MOQP Live APRS Tracker

This year the Missouri QSO Party participants have a new tool available for our use:  The MOQP Live APRS Tracker. If you have the ability to run APRS, this will fetch your position from the APRS database and show which county you are in on a small Missouri map. It will work with APRS data sent via RF (as long as you are in range of an APRS gateway) or with the array of smartphone or tablet apps that support APRS position reporting. See it in action here:

http://nbtmo.com

The displayed map shows stations beaconing position data with the text  MOQP included in the BEACON TEXT. Click on a color county for its name and 3-letter designator (shown under C&IC in the map table). Click on a colored circle (green, yellow, orange, red) to zoom and expand a closely grouped set of APRS stations to reveal their individual callsigns. Use the buttons on the left of the map to focus on a certain area of Missouri (N, SE, C, SW).

The table shows MOQP station callsigns, their 3 letter county or independent city (C&IC), their time spent in the C&IC (C&IC AGE) and the age (minutes) of their most recent GPS beacon spot (SPOT AGE) will be embedded in the map view as well as accessible as a standalone page for mobile devices. Automatic detection is triggered by adding MOQP in your Beacon/Text message below.

Stations in a new C&IC less for less than 30 minutes are displayed in bold italic. Stations are sorted newest to oldest by their last GPS beacon time. Lines are color coded green, yellow, pink and red for ages <1, <2, <3 and 3> hours according to the age of the GPS beacon message. Calls are aged out if they haven’t generated a beacon in more than 4 hours.

Setting it up

To hunt for stations in the MOQP, just click on the link: http://nbtmo.com

Stations wishing to report their position via ARPS:

  • RF users simply need to add the text MOQP to “Beacon message” or “Comment field” and beacon your postion periodically.
  • Smart device (phones, tablets, etc):
    • Those using an Android phone, grab APRSDroid from https://aprsdroid.org/download/ or Play Store (for pay). Any other APRS-IS compatible Android apps should work too.
    • iPhone users must purchase the APRS TX IOS app, which seems to be the least expensive app and supports APRS-IS. NOTE APRS.FI app does NOT work directly with the APRS-IS network so it will not work with the MOQP APRS Tracker system.
    • Smart device app users: be sure to get your APRS pass code at https://apps.magicbug.co.uk/passcode/ by entering just your call sign and retrieving the 4-5 digit code. Enter the code into the smart phone APRS app so your location is sent through the APRS-IS network.
  • RF and smart devices must add MOQP (case insensitive) into your periodic APRS Preferences “Beacon message” or “Comment field” broadcast text so the tracker will automatically  track your location.

About

Thanks to K1RA for creating the VaQP Tracker, to KB5YZY for modifying it for MOQP use and hosting the service providing it, and to KT0AA and N0MII for suggesting we link it here.