Search the Community

Hello everyone, I’m hoping to pick your brains as to how to possibly accomplish some PC/API integration or otherwise perform some function triggering based on various inputs from a PC or other microcontroller (hell, even PLC’s would suffice.) I have been in high level IT for a couple decades and I have no problem prototyping my own boards or writing my own scripts, but I’m unfamiliar with the ways folks have found to interface with the radios. All of our (my) radios can receive an alarm or alert tone and that tone or sequence of tones can sound the alarm, disable the radio, re-enable the radio, etc. What I would like to do is use a PC or microcontroller to interface with the radio to automatically send alerts or alarms to our radios. Possibly expanding this out to use DTMF tones to change channels, reboot devices, etc. For example, I write a small script that runs on the attached PC to query the MyShake earthquake prediction network, when the API returns a possible earthquake is eminent, to blast the alarm to all of our radios on our preconfigured family channel. This would give us 30-60 seconds of notice before the shaking begins and enough time to get outside or under cover. I am NOT trying to link repeaters, OR to transmit over VOIP/POTS/etc but rather use a device (the PC) to physically key up the radio, send the alarm tone sequence or whatnot, then unkey the radio. In my opinion, this falls much more under “accessibility options” rather than “digital GMRS.” I could even try to have the system do a bit of audio analysis on the front end to ensure there is no traffic at the time. Another example, we’re talking simplex from the home base station to the mobile base station and I’m getting out of simplex range, I could use the DTMF tones to send a request for the attached PC to change to the repeater channel that’s most appropriate for where our mobile is currently located. There are a hundred different ways I could see this being used, while hopefully still staying “true” to the rules and regs, but y’all are much, much more knowledgeable than I am. What do you think?