[drats_users] Ping

[Dan Smith]

> So the question is what is the purpose
> of "ping". In the IT world I can ping a computer to see if it is seen  
> by the network. Can I ping a station to see if he/she is on line.

Yes, that's the idea.  The other person has to be running D-RATS 0.2.3
or later.

> My other quick question is can an operator who is running D-Chat  
> communicate with someone using D-RATS. I think so but I just want to  
> make sure. Here in LA some of us are trying to set up an EC network  
> system using D-STAR.

To some degree, yes.  The d*Chat program just dumps raw text out on the
wire, which is indistinguishable from garbage by a machine.  D-RATS
intentionally does not encode or compress chat traffic to make it
somewhat readable by programs like d*Chat.  There will be some gunk
around the message, but you can at least see what someone said.  If you
want to see d*Chat traffic (and garbage as well) you can turn on
"Receive raw text as chat data" in D-RATS.

Hope that helps!

-- 
Dan Smith
dsmith#danplanet.com, s/#/@/
www.danplanet.com
KK7DS