As I document the GoBox build using the traditional waterfall Vee (V-Model) design pattern, and develop the AI Partnership Handbook, I wanted to ensure these logs serve as a reliable, verifiable knowledge base—not just for human engineers, but for the next generation of AI-assisted design. This includes plans to use AI for designing a 3D-printable enclosure and laser-cut acrylic bottom plate for the Nanuk 920-based portable Winlink/VARA-FM prototype, followed by formal testing per the system test plan.
llms.txt file that provides a direct, machine-readable gateway to my core projects and documentation standards.robots.txt now clearly defines how leading AI agents (Gemini, Grok, Copilot) can index these technical logs.My goal remains the same: proving that amateur radio and RF engineering benefit immensely when we use LLMs as true engineering partners—not just for code generation, but for systemic problem-solving.
Browse the updated GoBox Build Series at wa4osh.com.
73, DE WA4OSH
Konrad Roeder (WA4OSH)
Licensed since 1976 in Knoxville, TN (original callsign). Upgraded to Extra class (pre-COVID) from Advanced held since 1978. Systems and RF engineer, ARES/EMCOMM volunteer. Writing about HAM radio projects, AI-assisted systems engineering, and the GoBox build. Co-author of the McGraw-Hill Wi-Fi Handbook. Upcoming book: AI Partnership Handbook.
#SystemsEngineering #AmateurRadio #GoBox #AI #RFEngineering #WA4OSH #WaterfallVee
]]>The last several months have been deep in the GoBox build — a portable emergency communications station built around the Icom IC-2820H, packaged in a Nanuk 920 case with a Windows mini-PC running Winlink, VARA-FM, and supporting digital modes.
What makes this build different from most GoBox write-ups is the documentation discipline. Every component, every design decision, and every test has a requirement behind it — REQ-xx identifiers, TEST-xx test plans, and a Requirements Traceability Matrix linking them. Systems engineering methodology applied to amateur radio hardware. The kind of rigor I’d apply to a satellite ground station, applied to an ARES deployment kit.
The GoBox is designed to support two distinct operational profiles:
Both from the same box. REQ-OPS-003: rapid mode transition between profiles.
The GoBox is also the primary worked example in a book I’m writing — the AI Partnership Handbook, targeting McGraw-Hill.
The thesis isn’t about AI generating code. It’s about AI as a thinking partner on hard engineering problems. The leverage isn’t in automating the obvious — it’s in asking the question that used to get left unanswered because the cost of exploring it was too high.
These sessions are both the laboratory and the source material. I’ll be posting excerpts and case studies here as the book develops.
If you’re an ARES operator, a systems engineer, or someone trying to figure out how to actually work with AI on technical problems — this site is for you.
73 de WA4OSH
]]>Jekyll is a static site generator. It takes plain text files and converts them into a static website or blog. It’s great for:
Posts in Jekyll are written in Markdown, which is easy to learn and use. Here’s how you can format text:
**text** or __text__*text* or _text_Code: ` code `- item1. itemI’m looking forward to writing more posts!
]]>_posts directory. Go ahead and edit it and re-build the site to see your changes. You can rebuild the site in many different ways, but the most common way is to run jekyll serve, which launches a web server and auto-regenerates your site when a file is updated.
Jekyll requires blog post files to be named according to the following format:
YEAR-MONTH-DAY-title.MARKUP
Where YEAR is a four-digit number, MONTH and DAY are both two-digit numbers, and MARKUP is the file extension representing the format used in the file. After that, include the necessary front matter. Take a look at the source for this post to get an idea about how it works.
Jekyll also offers powerful support for code snippets:
def print_hi(name)
puts "Hi, #{name}"
end
print_hi('Tom')
#=> prints 'Hi, Tom' to STDOUT.Check out the Jekyll docs for more info on how to get the most out of Jekyll. File all bugs/feature requests at Jekyll’s GitHub repo. If you have questions, you can ask them on Jekyll Talk.
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