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David Ranch
Jerry Dunmire
Read Me
LinPac version 0.28 (stable release)
Copyright (c) 2021 by David Ranch (KI6ZHD) and Martin Cooper (KD6YAM)
Linpac is a modular, Ncurses console-oriented AX.25 packet radio terminal with a
built-in messaging client. Using Linux's native AX.25 network stack, it
can support eight concurrent connected sessions (QSOs) as well as send
UNPROTO packets (UI) to any preconfigured ax25 digi path. Local messaging
support is currently fairly simple yet Linpac is designed to relay all
messages to remote BBSes for full messaging if configured. Linpac "stable"
currently supports an Ncurses-based CLI client but there is also an unstable
Java-based client/server version with a GUI client that's partially
operational but needs work.
If you encounter any problems when compiling or using LinPac please go to
http://linpac.sourceforge.net for support.
Current contributors:
- David Ranch (KI6ZHD)
Packet radio mail: KI6ZHD@N0ARY.#NCA.CA.USA.NOAM
- Martin Cooper (KD6YAM) - Polling load reduction; mail bug fixes; many warning cleanups
- Jerry Dunmire (KA6HLD) - Auto-tools
- Steven Loomis (K6SPI) - Misc patches
Many thanks to the original author of Linpac for creating this flexible
and valuable package for Linux:
Radek Burget OK2JBG ( radkovo@centrum.cz )
QUICK INSTALATION FROM A RELEASE PACKAGE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Release packages can be identified by the presence of the ./configure in
this directory. If the ./configure script is not present, then see the
'Hacking' instructions below.
Optional:
---------
If you plan to use Linpac for recieving and sending your packet mail via a
remote BBS system (not required), you must install the ax25mail-utils
package first BEFORE first running Linpac. This package can be found
at http://ax25mail.sf.net
Before compilation of Linpac, you must have these other packages installed:
NOTE: Though some distributions offer the AX25 libraries natively in
their own repositories, they are usually very old and lack several
important fixes. You can read more about these improvements here:
https://github.com/ve7fet/linuxax25
Required dependencies:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Debian / Ubunutu package names: libax25 ax25-apps libncurses5-dev perl
Optional install: ax25-tools ax25-xtools ax25mail-utils
Centos / Fedora package names: libax25 ax25apps ncurses-libs perl
Optional install: ax25tools ax25mail-utils
I recommend all users install or build the AX.25 stack from
this alternative provider for now:
https://github.com/ve7fet/linuxax25
Once you have installed the above dependencies, please run:
./configure
NOTE: If the "configure" prompt isn't present, you probably got your source
code from Git. If so, run the following:
autoreconf --install
./configure
If autoreconf doesn't run, it probably means you need to install Autotools:
deb-based:
sudo apt-get install automake autoconf
rpm-based
yum install automake autoconf
If "autoreconf --install" fails with:
src/applications/liblinpac/Makefile.am:4: error: Libtool library used but 'LIBTOOL' is undefined
src/applications/liblinpac/Makefile.am:4: The usual way to define 'LIBTOOL' is to add 'LT_INIT'
src/applications/liblinpac/Makefile.am:4: to 'configure.ac' and run 'aclocal' and 'autoconf' again.
src/applications/liblinpac/Makefile.am:4: If 'LT_INIT' is in 'configure.ac', make sure
src/applications/liblinpac/Makefile.am:4: its definition is in aclocal's search path.
Do the following:
deb-based:
sudo apt-get install libtool
libtoolize
autoreconf --install
rpm-based:
sudo yum install libtool
libtoolize
autoreconf --install
The default installation destination directory prefix is /usr/local/*. If you
want to change this, add the following configuure --prefix switch:
./configure --prefix=DIR
where DIR is the new destination directory prefix.
(LinPac installs into PREFIX/bin and PREFIX/share/linpac)
After this just type
make
to compile the package. At that point, you can install the application a few
ways:
For Debian/Ubuntu folks:
--
Consider using the "checkinstall" tool instead of "make install".
This tool must be installed seperately but it will run the
equivelent of "make install" but instead, wrap everything into an
unofficial .deb file with proper packaging
or
For rpm based folks:
--
Consider using the included contrib/packaging/rpm/linpac.spec
file with the rpmbuild tool. This tool must be installed seperately
but takes care of creating a clean RPM package to install
or
# The old classic way
make install
ldconfig
or
make install-strip
ldconfig
One of these options will install Linpac onto your system. The "install-strip"
command will also strip the debugging information from the program (the installation
is then MUCH SMALLER) but harder to report issues to the developer.
ONCE INSTALLED
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Once Linpac is installed, you MUST configure the Linux AX.25 system first.
Linpac is only an application that uses a fully functional AX.25 stack.
Please review the various resources on the Internet on how to do this
such as:
- Official AX25 HOWTO (old, dated but still useful)
http://tldp.org/HOWTO/AX25-HOWTO/
- John Ackermann's pages:
http://www.febo.com/packet/linux-ax25/ax25-config.html
- David Ranch's pages:
http://www.trinityos.com/HAM/CentosDigitalModes/hampacketizing-centos.html#7.ax25initsetup
KNOWN PROBLEMS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- There are reported issues with Ncurses 6.1 (not 6.0) and Linpac where this buggy 6.1 version
is present in Raspbian Buster (10.1), Ubuntu 18.04, etc. Examples include:
* in the monitor window, the first character is sometimes being cut off, but many times
it's not cut off and looks fine.
* in the mail window, weird things are going on with the "background window"
A workaround for now is to run the following command before you run Linpac:
export TERM="simpleterm"
- Signifincant issue with AX.25 and Raspbian Stretch
I have confirmed that with Raspian Stretch, there is some sort of conflict with
it's newly enabled predictable network interface names. What are those? If you
run the command "ifconfig" or "ip addr", you will no longer see Ethernet
interfaces with names like "eth0" but instead, you'll see something like
"enxb827eb5f05". How's that for catchy? For known reasons to the AX.25 kernel
maintainers, in the sa_data kernel data structure, both the stock Raspbian AX.25
.debs and the 3rd party VE7FET ax.25 debs will give errors like the following when
ANY network interface name is longer than 13 characters:
SIOCGIFHWADDR: No such device
Programs like beacon will fail to start. Linpac will also crash upon start with
/usr/bin/linpac: line 181: 9811 Segmentation fault $PKG_BINDIR/linpac $*
Fortunately, if you disable predictable network interface names, things work fine.
To do this, do the following steps:
sudo vi /boot/cmdline.txt
#append the following to the end of the one line in this file
net.ifnames=0 biosdevname=0
Reboot your Raspberry Pi and things will work from there on out. Btw, if Linpac
crashed on you, your terminal might be screwed up and not working properly.
To fix that, run the commands:
stty sane
rm -f rm /var/lock/LinPac.0
- The --enable-LINKSTATIC configuration option does not work.
Please see the linpac-todo.txt file in this source package as well as see
http://linpac.sf.net for other possible problems and their solutions.
NOTES FOR HACKING with the Source code
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It's always recommended to start with the "develop" Git branch as it will
always have the newest code. From there, a clean checkout from the source
repository is not ready to configure and compile. You will need the GNU
autotools (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_build_system) to create the
./configure script and Makfile templates. Once the autotools are
installed the full build procedure is:
autoreconf --install
./configure
make
make install
You can make a release package for distribution using:
make dist
For debugging Linpac, it is useful to run Linpac in the place of compile
without installing it. For this the command 'make noinstall' can be used.
This will create the directory structure in the ./src directory. This is
only available with the staticaly linked applications.
CONFIGURATION OPTIONS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Most of the configuration options are described in the INSTALL file.
[broken at the moment]
There is one custom option for linpac; --enable-LINKSTATIC.
The applicatons are linked using the shared library by default (the library
liblinpac.so is installed in /usr/local/lib). You can link all the
applications staticaly by running
configure --enable-LINKSTATIC