Amateur radio

Related articles
GNU Radio
RTL-SDR
Amateur radio enthusiasts (sometimes called ham radio operators or "hams") have been at the forefront of experimentation and development since the earliest days of radio. A wide variety of communication modes are used on a vast range of frequencies that span the electromagnetic spectrum. This page lists software related to amateur radio. Some of it is stand-alone while the various digital communication applications require interfacing to radio hardware and possibly the computer soundcard. Interface hardware can be purchased from vendors or home-built.
Warning
International treaties require that users of amateur radio frequencies have a government-issued license. This only affects you if you have a transmitter and an antenna, receiving amateur radio or just downloading amateur radio software is not illegal.
Getting started
Many of the following programs will need to access a serial port to key the transmitter (eg.
/dev/ttyS0
). This requires that the user to be added to
uucp
user group
.
Hardware
A common interface for various radio hardware is
Digirig
. Although there are several models, they will all generally present to the operating system via
ALSA
as a "C-Media Electronics USB Audio Device", with two channels for both audio input and output. Rig control is also provided by the Digirig via the
/dev/ttyUSB0
serial device.
Other devices, such as the
ICom IC-705
have built-in soundcard and CAT control. You can directly connect to the transceiver via USB, which should be exposed as USB audio (via Burr-Brown USB Audio) and serial devices (via
/dev/ttyUSB0
and
/dev/ttyUSB1
)
Software
Analysis tools
adif-multitool
— CLI validator/converter for ADIF and Cabrillo logs.
https://github.com/flwyd/adif-multitool
||
adif-multitool
AUR
gpredict
— Real-time satellite tracking and orbit prediction.
https://gpredict.oz9aec.net/
||
gpredict
AUR
hamsolar
— Desktop widget showing current solar-terrestrial indices.
http://hamsoftware.org/old_index.html
||
hamsolar
AUR
splat
— RF propagation, loss & terrain analysis (20 MHz – 20 GHz).
https://www.qsl.net/kd2bd/splat.html
||
splat
AUR
sunclock
— Astronomical world-map (day/night, Sun/Moon) useful for grey-line work.
https://www.spinnaker.de/debian/sunclock.html
||
sunclock
AUR
xnec2c
— GTK+ GUI for the NEC-2 antenna-modelling engine.
https://www.xnec2c.org/
||
xnec2c
AUR
AX.25 & Packet
AX.25
is a data link layer protocol used extensively in packet radio networks. It supports connected operation (eg. keyboard-to-keyboard contacts, access to local bulletin board systems, and DX clusters) as well as connection-less operation (e.g.
APRS
). The Linux kernel includes native support for AX.25 networking. Please refer to
TLDP's Amateur Radio AX.25 HOWTO
for more information.
aprx
— Light-weight APRS digipeater / i-gate.
https://thelifeofkenneth.com/aprx/
||
aprx
AUR
ax25-apps
— Essential user-land utilities for AX.25 networks.
https://linux-ax25.in-berlin.de/
||
ax25-apps
AUR
ax25-tools
— Low-level tools to configure AX.25/NETROM/ROSE interfaces.
http://www.linux-ax25.org
||
ax25-tools
AUR
direwolf
— Sound-card software TNC, APRS encoder/decoder, digipeater & i-gate.
https://github.com/wb2osz/direwolf
||
direwolf
AUR
libax25
— Run-time library for AX.25, ROSE, NETROM, KISS, 6PACK.
https://linux-ax25.in-berlin.de/
||
libax25
AUR
soundmodem
— Multi-platform sound-card packet-radio modem (KISS, AX.25).
https://web.archive.org/web/20130824024508/http://www.baycom.org/~tom/ham/soundmodem/
||
soundmodem
AUR
xastir
— Full-featured GUI APRS mapping & messaging client.
http://www.xastir.org/
||
xastir
AUR
Digital voice
codec2
— Open-source speech codec (450-3200 bit/s) used by FreeDV.
https://github.com/drowe67/codec2
||
codec2
freedv-gui
— FreeDV narrow-band digital voice for HF.
https://freedv.org/
||
freedv-gui
AUR
mumble
— Low-latency VoIP client (also usable for HamWAN / DMR bridges).
https://www.mumble.info/
||
mumble
Digital weak-signal modes
fldigi
— Multi-mode GUI modem (PSK31/63, RTTY, Olivia, MFSK, CW…).
https://sourceforge.net/p/fldigi/wiki/Home/
||
fldigi
AUR
flamp
— NBEMS Amateur-Multicast-Protocol client.
http://www.w1hkj.com/
||
flamp
AUR
flmsg
— Forms manager for NBEMS/ICS traffic.
http://www.w1hkj.com/
||
flmsg
AUR
flrig
— CAT / rig-control frontend (works with fldigi).
http://www.w1hkj.com/flrig-help/
||
flrig
AUR
flwrap
— File encapsulation/compression utility for fldigi.
http://www.w1hkj.com/
||
flwrap
AUR
js8call
— Keyboard-to-keyboard chat built on FT8 protocol.
https://bitbucket.org/widefido/js8call
||
js8call
AUR
jtdx
— High-performance WSJT-X fork optimised for contest/ DX-pile-ups.
https://github.com/jtdx-project/jtdx
||
jtdx
AUR
jtdx-improved
— Enhanced JTDX by DG2YCB (two GUI layouts).
https://sourceforge.net/projects/jtdx-improved/
||
jtdx-improved
AUR
jtdx-improved-jtdxgui
AUR
linpsk
— Console PSK31/63/125 and RTTY terminal.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/linpsk/
||
linpsk
AUR
wsjtx
— Weak-signal suite (FT8, JT65, WSPR, JT9…).
https://wsjt.sourceforge.io/wsjtx.html
||
wsjtx
AUR
wsjtx-improved
— WSJT-X fork with extra DX/contest features (3 layouts).
https://sourceforge.net/projects/wsjt-x-improved/
||
wsjtx-improved
AUR
wsjtx-improved-al
AUR
wsjtx-improved-widescreen
AUR
xpsk31
— GTK+ PSK31 transceiver with waterfall.
https://www.qsl.net/5b4az/pkg/psk31/xpsk31/xpsk31.html
||
xpsk31
AUR
Logging
cqrlog
— Advanced logger with MySQL/Firebird, HamLib, ADIF, LoTW/e-QSL.
https://www.cqrlog.com/
||
cqrlog-bin
AUR
fdlog
— Multi-node Field-Day logger.
http://www.fdlog.info
||
fdlog
AUR
hamrs-appimage
— Portable logger for POTA, Field-Day, etc.
https://hamrs.app/
||
hamrs-appimage
AUR
klog
— Multi-platform Qt logger.
https://github.com/ea4k/klog
||
klog
AUR
pyqso
— Light-weight Python/GTK ADIF logger.
https://github.com/ctjacobs/pyqso
||
pyqso
AUR
tlf
— Console contest logger (CQWW, WPX…).
https://tlf.github.io/
||
tlf
AUR
trustedqsl
— Sign & upload QSOs to ARRL LoTW.
https://www.arrl.org/tqsl
||
trustedqsl
AUR
xlog
— General-purpose GTK logger.
https://www.nongnu.org/xlog/
||
xlog
AUR
yfklog
— Console logbook with LoTW & QRZ support.
https://fkurz.net/ham/yfklog.html
||
yfklog
AUR
yfktest
— Console contest helper (Cabrillo export).
https://fkurz.net/ham/yfktest.html
||
yfktest
AUR
Morse / CW training
aldo
— Morse tutor with random chars & speed tests.
http://aldo.nongnu.org/
||
aldo
AUR
cutecw
— Qt6 Koch-method CW trainer.
— ||
cutecw
AUR
cwirc
— X-Chat/HexChat plug-in to send/receive CW over IRC.
https://directory.fsf.org/wiki/CWirc
||
cwirc
AUR
ebook2cw
— Convert plain-text to Morse MP3/OGG.
https://fkurz.net/ham/ebook2cw.html
||
ebook2cw
AUR
gtkmmorse
— GTK+ Morse tutor (Koch & Classic modes).
http://gtkmmorse.nongnu.org/
||
gtkmmorse
AUR
kochmorse
— Qt5 Koch-method Morse tutor.
https://github.com/hmatuschek/kochmorse
||
kochmorse
AUR
qrq
— High-speed (60-300 WPM) CW trainer.
https://fkurz.net/ham/qrq.html
||
qrq
AUR
unixcw
— Suite of CLI CW tools (cw, cwgen, cwcp, xcwcp).
http://unixcw.sourceforge.net
||
unixcw
AUR
Programming / rig control
chirp-next
— Cross-platform radio memory programmer.
https://chirpmyradio.com/projects/chirp/wiki/Home
||
chirp-next
AUR
flrig
— CAT & rig-control GUI (works with fldigi).
http://www.w1hkj.com/flrig-help/
||
flrig
AUR
grig
— Simple GTK rig-control front-end based on Hamlib.
http://groundstation.sourceforge.net/grig/
||
grig
AUR
hamlib
— Runtime library for rig control (used by most apps).
https://hamlib.github.io
||
hamlib
linrad
— High-performance SDR receiver & analysis tool.
https://www.sm5bsz.com/linuxdsp/linrad.htm
||
linrad
AUR
owx
— CLI programmer for Wouxun HT series.
http://owx.chmurka.net
||
owx
AUR
quisk
— SDR transceiver GUI by N2ADR.
http://james.ahlstrom.name/quisk/
||
quisk
AUR
qdmr
— GUI application for configuring and programming cheap DMR radios.
https://github.com/hmatuschek/qdmr
||
qdmr
AUR
SSTV / imaging
qsstv
— Slow-scan TV (SSTV) transmit/receive using sound-card.
https://github.com/ON4QZ/QSSTV
||
qsstv
AUR
VoIP / linking
qtel
— Qt GUI for EchoLink VoIP.
https://github.com/sm0svx/svxlink
||
qtel
AUR
svxlink
— Advanced EchoLink server + repeater controller.
https://github.com/sm0svx/svxlink
||
svxlink
AUR
Misc utilities
cty
— ARRL Country-files (entities/prefixes) for contest software.
https://www.country-files.com/cty/
||
cty
AUR
dxcc
— Tiny utility to resolve DXCC entity of a callsign.
https://fkurz.net/ham/dxcc.html
||
dxcc
AUR
hamclock
— Full-screen clock + solar data + band-plans.
https://clearskyinstitute.com/ham/HamClock
||
hamclock
AUR