Radio Shortest Path First (RSPF) FAQ

RSPF Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

This document describes some of the frequently asked questions about Radio Shortest Path First (the protocol) and RSPFd (the program). While I can only claim authorship of the program, I get lots of questions about the protocol as well, so we'll just bung them all together hey?

1. What is the difference between RSPF in NOS and RSPFd?

The RSPF you will find in NOS is protocol version 2.1 while the one in RSPFd is protocol version 2.2 While I have (hopefully) made the daemon able to read v2.1, the NOS version doesn't understand RSPF v2.2 and in fact gives an incorrect error message (see Question 3).

2. Is there plans to put RSPF v2.2 into NOS?

There are some long-term plans to code RSPF v2.2 into NOS. It will essentially be a major rewrite of the entire RSPF code and most probably be for TNOS as this runs and compiles quite nicely in Linux.

3. NOS decodes my packets with RSPF: bad packet type

This is a bug in most flavours of NOS. What it is really trying to tell you is that it has received a packet with a more modern version of the protocol and cannot handle it. There was some talk that this had been fixed in some versions of NOS to display the correct message.

4. Why doesn't NOS send my RSPF packets?

The way that NOS is coded is that it will not send any RSPF packets out any port that it has not heard any other RSPF router. With RSPFd, it sends any RSPF packets out any defined interface. If it is not, you probably have not configured RSPFd properly or it is not reading the configuration file.

5. RSPFd doesn't seem to read my config file

The old location of the RSPFd configuration file was /etc/rspfd.conf. If you have a real old RSPFd program (around 0.04 or so) then it may be called /etc/rspfd.cfg, upgrade it now! The current location of the configuration file, since 0.08, is /etc/ax25/rspfd.conf I hope this never changes again.

6. What is the significance of the admin port (9006)?

There is no real significance except that it is the first four digits of my student ID number when I was an undergraduate at UTS.

7. I run RSPFd with ax25rtd and

You don't read the man pages do you ;) These two programs don't work well at all with each other. It is basically due to the fact that they are trying to do the same thing in different ways.

8. Does RSPFd work over Ethernet?

The short answer is no. If you really need to do this then you may consider using an BPQEther device (AX25 other Ethernet). See the AX25-HOWTO on how to configure one of these beasties.It's likely that if you are trying to use RSPF over ethernet then you are probably configuring something wrong.

9. How do I contact the author?

To contact me (Craig VK2XLZ) directly you can email csmall@small.dropbear.id.au or if you want to get on a mailing list about amateur radio on Linux then read all about it in Terry VK2KTJ's most excellent HAM HOWTO. We're all very friendly there on the linux-hams mailing list and I prefer to send my replies there to help others out.