[chirp_devel] Updates to ICOM IC-Vx Radios

[Kosta Arvanitis]

On Tue, Sep 28, 2021 at 6:06 PM Dan Smith via chirp_devel <
chirp_devel at intrepid.danplanet.com> wrote:

> > You have probably noticed that I have pushed a couple changes to support
> a few older Icom handheld radios and marked them as experimental.  The
> memories and banks have been mapped and the basic functionality (excluding
> extra settings support) have all been added.
> >
> > I have marked them experimental with an alert to users for the reason
> that I do not actually have access to these radios for validation purposes,
> however I am fairly certain that these drivers are functionally accurate in
> their initial state.  The only action that I cannot confirm is the actual
> write to the radio, which would require inherent knowledge of the specific
> icf end frame marker for these models . To complete this would require
> access to the unit (which I do not have) or a lucky guess (which I have
> attempted).
>
> Okay, I'd rather not apply them to the tree until someone has actually
> tested these drivers with a real radio. They also look very similar to each
> other -- is there room for re-use here instead of copying the code to each
> driver?
>

[kosta] They are similar, however given they each differ in some uniquely
inconsistent way from each other I did not bother encapsulating the common
components as I felt that the logic was simple enough that doing so would
only complicate it unnecessarily.  It may be worth revisiting this idea
again should Icom decide to make a bunch more IC-V8x models... but given
their current cadence I am not overly concerned.

>
> > When I get a moment I can also send along a couple manufactured image
> files for these radios to be added to the test base, however real images
> would be preferable (maybe someone on the list has these radios?).  But in
> the meantime please advise if you have any questions or concerns with these
> drivers, as they have been requested by many users in the past and may
> prove useful to some.
>
> We definitely need test images from these, and definitely as captured from
> real radios. I think I can also spot a couple of ways that these will not
> pass the driver tests. Before I review them, I'll want to see them pass
> tests.
>
> [kosta] I have tested them against the ICF files, which plainly put is
simply a hex dump representation of the binary image..  Currently ICF files
are opened as read only, so in theory if we had a mechanism to serialize
from image to ICF we could run the tests?


> So, I'll hold off on these and hopefully someone can provide some images
> with which to test them.
>
> [kosta] I can certainly understand the hesitancy, however given that they
are clearly marked as experimental could we consider releasing these in
hopes that some user may attempt to run them and thus is more likely to
provide an image? As it stands with no support for these radios, users are
not provided any mechanism in which to generate an image to begin with...
By releasing the experimental drivers we increase the likelihood of
potentially receiving feedback and/or getting an image from some user - and
assuming their expectations are tempered, impact to the community should be
low.  This does not alleviate our desire to test on actual hardware, but
considering the scarcity of some of these radios it may be  something to
think about...


Thanks!
>
> --Dan
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