KB0OXD wrote: ↑Sun Sep 15, 2019 11:16 pm
One footnote however...
With SEVERAL TG's (Especially those in my "Miscellaneous" zone), I've lumped in several channels with THE SAME contact & group name to avoid needless cluttering (This was especially important considering MANY have 8-10 TGs or more)
I can't make sense of that... In DMR terms, a "contact" is either A talk group or A individual. That is, it is a number with a flag for group call or private call. See the top-right window in the image I posted. A DMR contact is not "8-10 TGs".
You can use the same contact in multiple channels, yes -- but those channels will typically have different channel names AND different frequencies (representing different repeaters that carry the same talkgroups).
Since US Brandmeister does not use DMR reflectors, to access "8-10 TGs" on a hotspot WILL require using 8-10 CONTACTS (one per TG), and 8-10 CHANNELS (all identical except for channel name, and the contact name). My practice would be to also put all 8-10 contacts into a RX group list, and assign that list to all the channels -- so that inbound traffic on any active TG [BM static or dynamic] would be heard and identified on the radio. I would put all the hotspot channels into a single ZONE (well, if you have more than 16, you'll need to use multiple zones on the MD380). I don't use Scan Lists (when tuned to a hotspot, there is nothing to scan -- no frequency hopping, and an RX group list suffices). Scan lists, in my opinion, are of use if you are monitoring multiple repeaters (different frequencies) carrying different groups.
The various tables in DMR get confusing as they reference different parts...
CHANNEL(_chname_, frequency, CC, TS, *Contact, *RX group list)
CONTACT(_cnname_, ID#, group/private)
ZONE(_zname_, *channel)
RXGRPLST(_rxgname_, *contact)
{_x_ is unique name, *x is reference [ie names] of entry in other table}
So again in my configuration: I have a ZONE for the hotspot (two actually, the main channels shown in my image, and a second one with the TAC groups). I have over 20 CHANNELS (All those "DV HS xxx" -- DV-Mega HotSpot xxx) defined to allow access to 20 odd BrandMeister talkgroups (all those "BM xxxxxx" contacts).
I also have a zone for each Mi5 repeater in west Michigan (well, each zone has two repeaters since there are only 6 TGs in the Mi5 system). All the Mi5 repeaters carry the same 6 groups, three TS1, three TS2 -- and even at that, four of the groups are reserved for special events, so really only Statewide 1 (ts1) and Statewide 2 (ts2) are usable. I also have zones for the FM repeaters in each city/region. So -- with two repeaters per Zone, I do have the same CONTACT showing up twice, but on different CHANNELS to select the active repeater. These channels all share an RX group list as all the repeaters have the same contacts (talkgroups). No matter which repeater channel/contact I pick, the group list ensures I'll hear any of the other groups carried by that repeater.
). Perhaps it's something else but as I understand it, we're supposed to use CC 2 TS 1 but here's what I have in my codeplug vs. what the Dashboard is saying...
