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As an amateur radio enthusiast I have need for a few pieces of software. This is a simple guide on setting up my Arch Linux installation with the required software needed for amateur radio usage. Currently my software load out for HAM radio includes:

• Chirp: Used to program my Baofeng UV-5R+
• GNUradio: A powerful digital signal processing application
• GPredict: Used to get a fix on amateur radio satellites
• Gqrx: Used to interface with software defined radios
• Stellarium: Not really used for radio, but great for radio astronomy
• Audacity: Used for recording and manipulating audio files
• Xastir: An open-source program that provides full-featured, client-side access to APRS.
• fl_moxgen: Moxon antenna designer
• hamsolar: Small desktop display of the current solar indices
• splat: rf signal propagation, loss, and terrain analysis
• sunclock: Useful for predicting grayline propagation paths
• xnec2c: Electromagnetic antenna modeler
• trustedqsl: QSL application for ARRL's Logbook of the World
• cty: package contains databases of entities (countries), prefixes and callsigns that are used by amateur radio logging software.
• dxcc: a small program for determining ARRL DXCC entity of a ham radio callsign
• nato: Python script to convert string into NATO alphabet representation
• hamradio-menus: Ham radio (specific) XDG-compliant menu

Prepare the environment:¶

• Update the system:
  

  sudo pacman -Syu
  

• Add user bob to the tty and uucp groups for serial access:
  

  gpasswd -a bob uucp
  

  • For groups to take effect, the user must log out and and log back in.

Install yaourt to handle AUR packages¶

• Install yaourt

Installation¶

• To start, install the packages that are available from the Arch repositories:
  

  sudo pacman -S gnuradio gqrx audacity stellarium
  

• Install chirp from the AUR:
  

  yaourt chirp
  

• Install gpredict from the AUR
  

  yaourt gpredict
  

• Install fl_moxgen from the AUR:
  

  yaourt fl_moxgen
  

• Install hamsolar from the AUR:
  

  yaourt hamsolar
  

• Install splat from the AUR:
  

  yaourt splat
  

• Install sunclock from the AUR:
  

  yaourt sunclock
  

• Install xnec2c from the AUR:
  

  yaourt xnec2c
  

• Install cty from the AUR:
  

  yaourt cty
  

• Install dxcc from the AUR:
  

  yaourt dxcc
  

• Install nato from the AUR:
  

  yaourt nato
  

• Install trustedqsl from the AUR:
  

  yaourt trustedqsl
  

• Install hamradio-menus from the AUR:
  

  yaourt hamradio-menus
  

Resources¶

• https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Amateur_radio