Bluetooth Headset Quest 2007

My wife was kind enough to assist me in my quest for the perfect Bluetooth headset by giving me an Aliph Jawbone for Father's Day. I spent some time wearing it and came to the conclusion that the ear fit wasn't optimal. Maybe I just have weirdly-shaped ears? A quick Google search revealed that no; I'm not the only person having trouble.

It also revealed a very simple and elegant hack; replace the stock ear bits with Jabra Eargels such as those for the BT250. I happened to have a spare set of Jabra Eargels (for my backup wired headset, ironically) which did in fact fit and it presses the headset hard enough against my skin (essential so that the "jawbone" pickup microphone works) so I was able to do away with the sproingy behind-the-ear wire loop in the process. I actually shook my head hard (like a dog after a bath) and the thing stayed put without the ear loop. Added bonuses; the incoming audio is much louder since I can rotate the Eargel to align with my ear, and I can slam the thing into my ear within one ring versus time wasted fiddling with the ear loop.

Remains to be seen how it works in daily operation. I'm already missing the audio feedback tones I got with the Plantronics 645. For example when you dial a call with the P645 it gives you a tone sequence to tell you the call is connected, disconnected, etc. The Jawbone is just basically an audio conduit. You get tones for things like volume up, power on/off, Noise Shield on/off, etc but no tones for call processing status. On the other hand; I can already tell the Jawbone's range is better; which isn't hard to do given the unbearably short range of the P645. I once had the P645 go out of range on me while the phone was on my belt.

101 Essential Freelancing Resources

Recent article over at FreelanceSwitch listed a huge pile of tools and resources for freelancers. Having gone independent myself as of January 2007, I found this article interesting and shared it with a few other freelancers. It's been universally well-received, so figured I'd just post it here so everyone could benefit.

101 Essential Freelancing Resources

Note: Reader contributions have driven the count up to 126 resources, from what I understand. And the article has been translated into a few other languages; sounds destined to be a classic!

Amateur Radio: 5,200 miles on 50 watts and a $2 antenna

Lately I have been getting prepared for the annual ARRL Field Day, which is an annual operating exercise and public showcase event for the amateur radio world. Amateurs all over North America will set up in campgrounds, parking lots, and fields and attempt to make as many contacts as possible using various "modes"; everything from Morse Code and "phone" (what normal people would call voice, talking into a microphone) to exotic digital setups which use computers connected to radios. My club (the Northern California Cactus Radio Association) will operate as K6SRA from a campground in Henry Coe State Park, near Morgan Hill CA.

I'll be running the digital station this year, and plan to use (in addition to the usual PSK31 and RTTY setup) a very new mode called JT65A-HF. JT65A isn't new to amateur radio as it's been used for a while for "moon bounce"; and yes, I mean literally for bouncing signals off the moon. Earlier in 2006, a few people decided to transmit JT65A signals over the HF bands; primarily 20 meters (14.076 MHz) and 40 meters (7.076 MHz). In only a few months this new mode has exploded in popularity, primarily due to the very high sensitivity afforded by a Reed-Solomon forward error-correction algorithm implemented this mode. It's mathematically provable that JT65A signals can be detected with 100% certainty even if the received signal is -22 dB under the noise floor.

In preparing for working JT65A-HF on Field Day I've been learning to use an application called WSJT which is used mostly by the moon bounce and meteor-scatter folks but now also HF enthusiasts. I've made some amazing contacts this way; just tonight I logged a contact with a guy in Australia using only 50 watts of power and a homemade antenna I built with $2 worth of parts I had lying around my garage. This is the equivalent of someone being able to see a 50 watt light bulb from space at a distance four times that of the International Space Station, or of someone talking from San Jose CA to San Diego CA on a CB radio. I expect we'll be seeing a lot more of JT65A in the HF bands, especially as radio amateurs suffer through the poor radio propogation conditions created by the current solar minima.

Update (15 June 2007) : I just beat my Australia record with a solid contact to ZS6WN in South Africa. 10,526 miles, same power, same antenna!

Update (24 Sept 2007) : WA3LTB has created a video demo of WSJT and posted it to YouTube.