A bit late getting this updated and no pictures 🙁
During this meeting, Bob, KB3KOW, described his home Echolink node set up and how he leaves Echolink turned off until needed, however, he often forgets to start it up before leaving home, so he investigated ways of automating the process.
He is currently using an app called “Trigger Command (Triggercmd)” which allows you to ‘trigger’ different commands on your computer. In this case he configured a trigger to start the Echolink program, but now how to trigger the ‘trigger’ if not at home.
Luckily the TriggerCMD is intergrated into “If This Then That (IFTTT)” web site. In this case, he made use of the ability of send an email, with a specific subject line and body, to the IFTTT system. When the email received and processed, IFTTT then makes a connection to the TriggerCMD on his computer and starts the Echolink programming running.
So far it has been working about 90% of the time with a few glitches, but overall it has been successful.