KB1OIQ - Andy's Ham Radio Linux DVD

RELEASE_NOTES ============= If this file looks improperly spaced, choose a fixed width font. My goal in creating this CD was to allow the user to have an easier way to get started with a Linux computer and an amateur radio. There is still a lot for the user to do! However, I have complete confidence in your ability to learn what you may not yet know how to do. After all, you're a licensed amateur radio operator! If you are the type of person who can install a tube into your rig with no further direction, or perhaps a circuit board in your computer, then this CD may be for you. However, if you need to be told to get the screwdriver and remove the screws first, with pictures and text, you may be disappointed. This CD is based on Ubuntu 12.04 and is a Remix CD. This means that the selection of software packages is not the same as the standard Ubuntu 12.04. The vast majority of the programs on this CD came directly from the Ubuntu repository. A few programs were installed either directly from source, or installed as a precompiled binary. To the best of my knowledge, there is no proprietary software on this CD. If you find any proprietary software on this CD, please send me email. Assumptions: - computer is old, but not too old (newer computers are OK, too!) - computer has a bootable CD drive - 512MB of memory minimum - 1GHz processor minimum - computer has a working *hard wired* Ethernet connection that is plugged in prior to the installation (or the installation *will* fail). - 4GB hard disk - absolute minimum (more is definitely better) - this CD does the hard work of geting you started, and you can continue on your own Explicit non-goals: - printing software is not included - Flash support in the browser (remember: flash is proprietary) - email (who needs it, you have a radio!) - power management - one CD cannot be used to upgrade the installation from a previous CD Goals: - works as a Live CD - contains installation programs for the hard drive and a USB thumb drive - a reasonable selection of amateur radio software is present, but users are expected to configure each program as is required for their unique situation - to help both the Linux and amateur radio communities by creating this CD In short, the CD was built by starting first with the debootstrap package. The X Window System was installed along with icewm. A variety of amateur radio applications were then installed. The menu was customized for amateur radio use. This link was extremely helpful in the creation of this CD. https://help.ubuntu.com/community/LiveCDCustomizationFromScratch Based on the assumptions above, software was selected for its usefulness to amateur radio, as well as being considerate of the relatively limited memory, reduced CPU horsepower, and possibly reduced disk space of an older computer. Lightweight software need not be primitive in either function or appearance! My old Sony VAIO laptop, with 256MB of memory and a 1GHz processor, is the standard which was used. UPDATE: That 10 year old Sony VAIO laptop has finally had a fatal hardware failure. It served me well for all of those years. I am now using a 7 year old laptop for testing this CD. The included amateur radio software is shown (if this section does not look properly lined up, pick a fixed width font): aa-analyzer.pl - command line program used with RigExpert AA-xxx analyzers chirp - used to program frequencies into HTs (chirpw) cqrlog - a full featured QSO logging program cwwav - command line program to convert text files to CW wav or mp3 earthtrack - used with predict and xplanet to display satellites flamp - NBEMS program for Amateur Multicast Protocol (AMP) fldigi - digital modes such as PSK31 (NBEMS) flmsg - companion to fldigi, a simple forms management editor for standard message formats (NBEMS) fllog - to provide a common log across networked computers flrig - rig control flwkey - modem program for the K1EL Winkeyer series flwrap - companion to fldigi, file encapsulation / compression Fl Moxgen - Moxon Rectangle antenna design program gerbv - view Gerber files glfer - QRSS (slow CW) or DFCW (Dual Frequency CW) modes gpredict - satellite tracking gqrx - software defined radio receiver grig - rig control software gspiceui - GUI interface for spice gwave - analog waveform viewer (e.g. spice output) hamlib - radio control library ibp - HF beacons net - a net control logging program by W1HKJ owx - Open Wouxun, command line programs for Wouxun HTs pcb - interactive printed circuit board editor predict - predict orbits of satellites (used with earthtrack) qrq - CW callsign practice qsstv - SSTV (slow scan TV) qtel - Echolink client soundmodem - user mode driver for packet radio (useful with xastir) splat - command line HF propagation prediction sunclock - track day/night line on Earth svxlink - Echolink server TQSL - used with ARRL Logbook of the World TQSL Cert - used with ARRL Logbook of the World voacapl - VOACAP for Linux - propagation prediction wsjt - weak signal communication wspr - weak signal communication xastir - APRS mapping xcwcp - CW code practice xdx - DX cluster TCP/IP client xlog - simpler QSO logging program xnec2c - antenna modeling software xplanet - used by earthtrack and predict to track satellites xwxapt - display APT images from weather satellites Other included software (not an exhaustive list): epdfview - PDF file reader icewm - lightweight windowing environment imagemagick - image manipulation programs (for use with scrot and display) live-usb-install- program to install software to a USB thumb drive locate - locate and updatedb to create a database of filenames midori - web browser nano - text editor ntp - sync time with time server pavucontrol - sound volume controls pmount - user mount for removable devices scrot - command line screen capture tool smartpm - the Smart package manager for software management ssh - SSH client and server sylpheed - email tool (for use with flarq) ubiquity - program to install software to the hard drive usbmount - automounting of USB devices wicd - GUI tool for configuring network(s) wireless-tools - command line tools for wireless networking xcalc - calculator xclock - a simple clock xfe - graphical file manager xfview - image viewer xfwrite - text editor xosview - system monitor Other tidbits of information: - Ubiquity hard drive installer The Ubiquity installer is a pain in the neck to get working! I FIXED IT! The ubuntu-artwork package is required but not automatically installed. During a hard drive installation, the Ubiquity slideshow entertains you. It is the generic Ubuntu slideshow and talks about things that do not exist on this CD. I toyed with the idea of customizing it, but given the difficulty of getting Ubiquity working (in my experience), I didn't want to take any chances. - icewm menu files are in /etc/X11/icewm. Copy them to your ~/.icewm directory if you wish to modify them. - To change the clock to display 24-hour UTC time, do the following: - mkdir ~/.icewm - cp /usr/share/icewm/preferences ~/.icewm - Edit ~/.icewm/preferences - Look for "Clock Time format" - Uncomment the line - It should read as follows: TimeFormat="%T %Z" - Save the file, exit the editor - Restart icewm: Menu->System->Window Managers->icewm - The clock should now be displaying 24-hour time with "UTC" afterwards - Files installed from source or binary are locate in: - /usr/local/bin - A few development packages are on the CD which were used when compiling these programs from source. - See /usr/local/share/doc/KB1OIQ_Ham_CD/00_SOURCES - Notes about logging program: cqrlog The cqrlog country file is in /usr/local/tarballs/cqrlog-cty*.tar.gz Prior to running cqrlog for the first time, be sure to run the /usr/local/bin/init_cqrlog script, which will populate your cqrlog configuration for the first time. DO NOT run this script afterwards or you will probably corrupt your log files! If in doubt, READ the script to see what it does and decide for yourself if the operation is safe. Once the init_cqrlog script has been run, start cqrlog. You may see an error about "Cannot open source file qslmgr.csv". Click OK. Then, click the X to close the "Importing QSL data" window. Click "Open Log" in the cqrlog window. Read the Changelog, and then click "close". A window should now appear which reads "New QSL managers database is available...". Click "Yes" to install it. After that, you should be all set! The MySQL password is "kb1oiq". - If the user boots the Live CD and creates files in the $HOME directory, they don't seem to be copied to the hard drive when ubiquity does its installation. I think this is a feature about which the user needs to know. - When Xfe first starts, on my computer, it pops up a window which says "Mount point /cow is not responding". There is no such mount point(!). Click OK and ignore it for now. I'll fix it when I figure out the problem. Workaround done for you: mkdir /cow - An example configuration files for xwxapt can be found here: /usr/local/share/xwxapt/xwxaptrc Copy this file to your ~/xwxapt directory. - Wireless configuration: - try WiCD, which by default is shown on the bottom right of the icewm screen (from /etc/X11/icewm/startup) - In the System menu, there is an entry for "Hard Drive Install". This works as expected when booted from the Live CD. However, once the software is installed and booted from the hard drive, this menu option, while still present, does not work, for obvious reasons. In that case, one might wish to edit the /etc/X11/icewm/menu file to remove this menu entry. - Note that the hard wired network MUST be in place prior to attempting to perform a "Hard Drive Install". If not, it will probably fail at the point where it tries to install the bootloader, and you will end up with a hard drive that is not bootable. NOTE: in theory, this should work with wireless running prior to the start of the hard drive installation procedure. I have not personally tried this yet. - In the system menu, there is an entry for "USB Drive Install", intended for creating a bootable USB thumb drive. In the program, be sure to select: - Mode: Distribution - Install from: CD/DVD drive - Distribution: Andy Ham Radio CD - Version: (generally pick the highest numbered version available) - Install to: pick your thumb drive If your "Install to" menu shows no devices, insure that the thumb drive to which you wish to install the software is MOUNTED first. This requirement struck me as strange, but it does work. One might use /media or a subdirectory as the mount point. Note that this procedure works fine if the source medium is a CD/DVD, and the destination medium is a mounted partition on a USB thumb drive. However, if the user has booted a USB thumb drive on a computer which has no CD/DVD drive, the thumb drive cannot be cloned. :-( There may be a way to boot from a USB thumb drive and install to another USB thumb drive. Instead of selecting "Install From CD/DVD", choose "Internet". Note that this will cause the program to download a large (600-700MB) file from Sourceforge and store it somewhere in /tmp. On some computers, /tmp may not have enough space to store such a large file (df -h | grep tmp), in which case this procedure will fail. Yes, it is possible to resize tmpfs but that procedure is beyond the scope of these RELEASE_NOTES. For more information about live-usb-install, please consult this website: http://live.learnfree.eu - Satellites can be seen over the planet Earth on your root window! - In the Amateur_Radio->Satellite menu, start the Predict server - There probably won't be any visible output. That's OK. - In the Amateur_Radio->Satellite menu, start Earthtrack - One should see a picture of the Earth on the root window, with satellites drawn on it, centered at the location of W1AW. - Customize the home QTH by editing ~/.predict/predict.qth. - Clean it up by the Earthtrack (cleanup) menu. - Restore your background by Menu->Settings->Themes->Default. - If this fails (and it fails the very first time), select the Earthtrack (cleanup) menu, which kills all of the predict and earthtrack processes, and start again. - Look at the HACKS file for specific hacks and customizations. - Sound: what a painful experience! As of the version 11 CD, pulseaudio and ALSA have been installed. For older programs one might need to edit the /etc/X11/icewm/* files appropriately to adjust the menu entries for these programs to preface the executable name with "padsp". This also works on the command line: e.g. padsp xcwcp. Many (most, all?) have already been done. - One might try: audacious /usr/share/sounds/alsa/Rear_Center.wav & - Be sure to unmute the sound in Menu->Utilities->Sound->PAvucontrol - Virtual Box OSE: - Sound - I have it working with PulseAudio on the host and ICH AC97 as the sound device. - When one logs into the Live CD for the first time, sound may not work (it doesn't for me). Test: "aplay -l". - If no soundcards are found, try this: - sudo /root/bin/fix_sound_live_cd (adds user ubuntu to group audio) - log out - log back in - "aplay -l" should now show the soundcard - This will need to be done each time the Live CD is booted. - Screen Resolution - One might notice that the screen resolution is limited to 800x600 - To increase the resolution: - In the Guest OS, type these commands: sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install virtualbox-ose-guest-x11 - Restart the X server (try: sudo /etc/init.d/xdm restart) - Menu->Logout - log back in - First boot after hard drive installation - add your user to the group netdev - add your user to the group audio - reboot - Sound now has a fighting chance of working: aplay -l - the error message from wicd should have gone away - Have fun!!! - gqrx - on the 64-bit version, the icons are missing, but all functions are accessible from the menus. - Wireless - Be sure to go into the WiCD->Preferences menu and set the Wireless Interface - WiCD is accessed via the icon on the taskbar near the clock - One must remove the network-manager package or wireless will fail with "Bad Password" - Try it first to see if this is necessary - VOACAP for Linux - built from source - the sources were huge and had to be removed from the CD - look at 00_SOURCES for the URLs for VOACAP and its dependencies - don't forget to run makeitshfbc before running VOACAP for the first time - it's OK if you forget...it will remind you. :-) - qsstv - The help file is not where the program expects it to be. - To fix it, bring up qsstv in the Amateur_Radio->Digital_Modes menu. - Goto the menu: Options->Configuration - Change the "documentation" line to read: /usr/share/doc/qsstv/html/ - Click OK - Now, it should work: Help->Users Guide - The browser should appear, with the help page displayed. - midori - web browser - if you can't see the box to type in the URL, make the window bigger until you see it - I cannot possibly support all of the programs on this CD. If you require assistance, please search the internet, and I'm sure you'll find the answer. I hope you have a lot of fun with this CD! 73 de Andy KB1OIQ March 2013