I have been kind of bragging on Jason KM4ACK and his Build a Pi project in this blog for a spell now. The project has had its difficulties, primarily technical surprises, but as of this morning June 23rd, 2020 – I predict that most of those have been overcome and the largest problem with Ham radio operators using it on their Raspberry Pi’s will be learning to interface their radio with the Pi. There are a brazillion different radios out there so that responsibility is pretty well on the owner. Ham Operator’s do love to help though, and as more folks successfully use this with their rig they will be happy to explain/share how they did it.
In any case, I have been following along with the development of this new version of Jason’s “Build a Pi” script – which now has over 1500 lines of code in it and I can vouch it simply works SWEET. Just yesterday I ran the last pre-release version with wonderful success. The greatest success on this particular version is, once installed, you can run “Build a Pi” again from the menu system and it will now scan your system to help identify available updates, while also giving you the ability to install packages you had previously left unchecked for install. In my opinion, that is simply a wonderful accomplishment over previous versions.
The user interface is very good – as long as you have taken the time to look into a package and decide whether or not you want to install/configure that particular one and interface it with your particular radio and the script takes over, inserting your call sign, etc., that you had previously given it upon the initial install.
This video will explain it far better than I ever could:
This one is *very* much worthwhile to have a look at if you are interested in Ham Radio v/s the Raspberry Pi
By the way – I recommend clicking on “YouTube” when that video starts so you can see the video there and be able to see the main link to the script as shown in the video. Also, below the video, click on “Show more” to find more info from Jason on this project.
73, dave/W6TUX
UPDATE: How to decide what packages to install/leave out when I run the script?
When you have viewed Jason’s video, then clicked on the github link you will see below the video, on Youtube’s presentation, suggest you scroll down and read the textual content on the resulting page for a great brief on what the project/script is about and how to get it – and way down pay attention to the part that looks like this:
Software for DS3231 real time clock (Available through update script after initial install)
Hotspot is used to generate a wifi hotspot that you can connect to with other wireless devices. This is useful when in the field so you can connect to and contol the pi from a wireless device.
This will install the needed utilities to get a GPS device configured as a time source on the pi. Helpful when you are not connected to the internet since the pi doesn’t have a real time clock and therefore will NOT keep accurate time when powered off. Confirmed to work with this GPS https://amzn.to/2R9Muup Other GPS units may work but have not been tested.
Rig contol graphical interface. http://www.w1hkj.com/
Digital Mode Software http://www.w1hkj.com/
Forms manager for FLDIGI http://www.w1hkj.com/
Amateur Multicast Protocol – file transfer program http://www.w1hkj.com/
file encapsulation / compression
Winlink client for Raspberry Pi https://getpat.io/
Menu for configuring Pat. Recommended if installing Pat. https://github.com/km4ack/patmenu
HF modem for Pat. Recommended if installing Pat https://www.cantab.net/users/john.wiseman/Documents/ARDOPC.html
GUI interface for ARDOPC. Recommended if installing Pat
Software TNC. In this setup, direwolf is used for 2M packet connection with Pat and can be used for APRS connection with Xastir. Recommneded if installing Pat or Xastir https://github.com/wb2osz/direwolf/tree/master/doc
AX25 tools for Direwolf & Pat. Recommended if installing Pat.
Rig contol software. https://sourceforge.net/projects/hamlib/
Pulse audio. Provides a way to configure virtual sound cards. REQUIRED for AMRRON ops.
JS8Call digital software https://js8call.com
Tools for working with JS8Call. Recommended if installing JS8Call https://github.com/m0iax/
FT8 & WISPR software suite. https://sourceforge.net/projects/wsjt/
Software to program radios. https://chirp.danplanet.com
GUI interface useful when configuring APRS nodes. https://sourceforge.net/projects/xastir/
Yet Another APRS Client GUI interface useful when configuring APRS nodes. https://www.ka2ddo.org/ka2ddo/YAAC.html
Logging software https://github.com/ctjacobs/pyqso
Satellite Tracking http://gpredict.oz9aec.net/
Loggin Software https://www.cqrlog.com/
Slow scan tv http://users.telenet.be/on4qz/qsstv/index.html
Propagation Prediction Software https://www.qsl.net/hz1jw/voacapl/index.html
My personal EES. Requires hotspot to be installed. https://youtu.be/XC9vdAnolO0
To access the EES, connect to the pi’s hotspot, open a web browser, and navigate to email.com
or open a web browser and navigate to the pi’s ip adderss on your local network.
Admin credentials are admin/admin by default but can be changed in the file found at
/var/www/html/config.php
For more configuration options – https://youtu.be/KaEeCq50Mno
Look amateur radio call signs
Calculate lengths needed for dipole legs
Graphic viewer to view/manage log files
Disk utility