How Does SuperFox Work?
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Clark L. Stewart
Jul 25, 2024, 8:55:30 AM7/25/24
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The following message from Joe, K1JT, was published on the WSJTX
email reflector.
73, Clark, W8TN
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-------- Forwarded Message --------
Understandably, a number of people have asked us about how SuperFox works. I have explained that we are intentionally moving slowly and deliberately in our early tests, and we have not published source code or specifications in part because many details may still change.
The basic SuperFox scheme has been proven to work well. It delivers the promised weak-signal gain of around 10 dB over multi-streaming FT8 with 5 streams. The present scheme will certainly be used for the Jarvis Island operations next month, but a variety of things could change after that.
Our goals for design of a SuperFox mode have included the following:
1. Constant envelope waveform, and hence up to 10 dB signal-strength improvement over multi-streamed FT8.
2. Anti-piracy feature: a way to establish legitimacy of signal origin.
3. A way to prevent (or make much more difficult) misuse or our technology by derivative or modified programs, for example enabling robotic strings of QSOs.
4. Better use of available bandwidth: Fox should use (say) at least half of a ~3 kHz slice.
5. Better immunity to QRM, including deliberate QRM.
6. Operational aids for the Fox operator, including longer free text messages.
As you can see, technical details have been important in our planning but sociological, moral, and even legal issues are involved as well. Objective 2 in the above list involves cyber security matters, an area in which we have little expertise. Our weak-signal performance requirements demand small message payloads, and these are incompatible with (for example) most public/private key schemes.
For nearly all of its 24 year history the WSJT project has been entirely open source. Ideally we'd like to keep it that way. But objective 3 in the list is especially difficult (and likely impossible) to achieve in a fully open source project.
We appreciate all the help we have received in testing an early SuperFox scheme. We hope many will work a new one when N5J operates as SuperFox from Jarvis Island. We'll continue working toward a maxmially effective SuperFox design in the presence of many challenges, including possible software licensing issues, and we welcome all
constructive input from other interested hams. As always, our efforts are intended to benefit the wonderful hobby we share.
-- 73, Joe, K1JT
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
73, Clark, W8TN
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
-------- Forwarded Message --------
| Subject: | Re: [WSJTX] How does SFH work? #TechnicalHelpQuestion |
|---|---|
| Date: | Wed, 24 Jul 2024 13:08:07 -0700 |
| From: | Joe via groups.io <joe=prince...@groups.io> |
Understandably, a number of people have asked us about how SuperFox works. I have explained that we are intentionally moving slowly and deliberately in our early tests, and we have not published source code or specifications in part because many details may still change.
The basic SuperFox scheme has been proven to work well. It delivers the promised weak-signal gain of around 10 dB over multi-streaming FT8 with 5 streams. The present scheme will certainly be used for the Jarvis Island operations next month, but a variety of things could change after that.
Our goals for design of a SuperFox mode have included the following:
1. Constant envelope waveform, and hence up to 10 dB signal-strength improvement over multi-streamed FT8.
2. Anti-piracy feature: a way to establish legitimacy of signal origin.
3. A way to prevent (or make much more difficult) misuse or our technology by derivative or modified programs, for example enabling robotic strings of QSOs.
4. Better use of available bandwidth: Fox should use (say) at least half of a ~3 kHz slice.
5. Better immunity to QRM, including deliberate QRM.
6. Operational aids for the Fox operator, including longer free text messages.
As you can see, technical details have been important in our planning but sociological, moral, and even legal issues are involved as well. Objective 2 in the above list involves cyber security matters, an area in which we have little expertise. Our weak-signal performance requirements demand small message payloads, and these are incompatible with (for example) most public/private key schemes.
For nearly all of its 24 year history the WSJT project has been entirely open source. Ideally we'd like to keep it that way. But objective 3 in the list is especially difficult (and likely impossible) to achieve in a fully open source project.
We appreciate all the help we have received in testing an early SuperFox scheme. We hope many will work a new one when N5J operates as SuperFox from Jarvis Island. We'll continue working toward a maxmially effective SuperFox design in the presence of many challenges, including possible software licensing issues, and we welcome all
constructive input from other interested hams. As always, our efforts are intended to benefit the wonderful hobby we share.
-- 73, Joe, K1JT
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
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