• Steve posted a message at the Resonant Frequency forums and asked about the early episodes not being available on iTunes. That was a “feature”, but Richard “fixed” it. Going forward, once we hit 50 episodes, older ones will drop off the feed to iTunes, so you’ll need to go to the web site to get them.
• Chris, ZL2CCO, posted a link to the LHS site on his blog. Thanks, Chris!
• Via snail mail we received a donation and feedback from Tom, NC0O. He’s been enjoying the podcast and sent a donation to support the Dayton expedition. Thanks, Tom!
• Walter, KV6M, writes to clear up a mistake from Episode 31. We incorrectly attributed the penultimate donation to the Dayton fund to Walter, WN3LIF, but it was, in fact, from Walter, KV6M. Sorry, Walter, we’ve corrected the show notes, and thank you for the donation, and correction. We’re sorry for the confusion.
• Doug, N6LMX, sends his greetings and wonders what happened to a message he sent some time ago and was never mentioned, so he sent it again. (Richard had been holding it for the other show.) Doug wonders which Linux distribution Richard chose for his old Dell Latitude laptop. Richard chose Crunchbang Linux Lite. Also mentioned, the Midori browser.
• Larry, W0AY, writes to express his appreciation for Episode 31. He would like to see Richard get a mute switch for his microphone. Thanks, Larry, and we’re currently soliciting donations for a noise gate for Richard.
• LHS got a mention in an anonymous comment in the Linux Journal forums.
• Chris, K3DC, mentions LHS in a presentation he prepared, perhaps for a club meeting.
• Another LHS mention in an IRC log posted to pastebin.
• Jim, N2ENN, writes to offer some information about microphones in response to Bill’s microphone rant in Episode 31, and discusses Linux drivers. Thanks for the information, Jim. We’ll talk more about this in a later episode.
• Glynne, KD5VQD, offers his wallet-sized reference card for the phonetic alphabet. Thanks, Glynne. Russ will post it in the Articles section of the Linux in the Ham Shack web site.
• Klaatu mentions in his blog that he enjoyed the song “Flash in a Bottle” by Dead Heart Bloom in Episode 30.
• Others have commented that they enjoyed the song “Don’t Go” by Tenpenny Joke that was featured in Episode 31.

Announcements:

• Southeast Linuxfest v2.0 is set for June 12-13 at the Marriott at Renaissance Park hotel in Spartanburg, SC! Russ is planning on being there, as is Klaatu.
• Texas Linux Fest will be Saturday, April 10, 2010 at the Monarch Events Center, Austin, Texas
• Logo Contest: The Linux in the Ham Shack logo needs an update, and we’d like a new logo before the 2010 Dayton Hamvention. Please submit your original logo, preferably in .tiff or .svg format, or in a very large .jpg, to Russ and/or Richard. Deadline is March 31, 2010. If selected, you will win $100!
• Program Intro Contest: Record your Linux in the Ham Shack introduction and send it along. Record it on your computer and send the sound file, or call 888-455-0305, or 417-429-4069, and record your intro via the phone. All entries will eventually be used, but one winner will be chosen at random and will receive $25. Recordings made via the phone numbers will have two chances to win.
• Send your submissions for either contest to Russ k5tux@blacksparrowmedia.com or Richard kb5jbv@blacksparrowmedia.com.
• We’ve been having problems with our hosting service. It’s likely that the Black Sparrow Media sites will be moving sometime in the next few months. Check the web site for details as they develop.
• Look for Linux in the Ham Shack at the 2010 Dayton Hamvention. We’ll be in the North Hall, booth #265 (NH0265).
• Our new donation goal is to raise sufficient money to purchase a noise gate for Richard. Every little bit helps, so please click on the Donate link and send along a dollar or two.

Links and Notes:

• Callsign lookups: the FCC Universal Licensing System (ULS), and QRZ.com.
• Our hosts talk to Klaatu, well-known podcaster and IRC denizen (as notKlaatu). (see The Day the Earth Stood Still). Klaatu is involved with several podcasts, including The Bad Apples, available through Hacker Public Radio, Fedora Reloaded, Linux Cranks, Today in Tech Radio, and others. He can often be found on irc.freenode.net in about any channel with Linux in the title.
• Russ and Klaatu talk about using xmodmap to remap keyboard key assignments. Klaatu discussed that in episode 5×04 of The Bad Apples podcast. More info is available in the show notes for that episode. He also has an article describing how you can also remap the Control key to the Caps Lock key.
• Soylent Green
• THX 1138
• Klaatu uses talk.fedoraproject.org to record some of his podcasts.
• Sansa Clips
• Setting MTP (Media Transfer Protocol) or MSC (Mass Storage Class) on the Sansa Clip (Follow the link in that article for instructions.)
• ROCKbox open source firmware for mp3 players.
• The Linux Outlaws podcast. (We love Fab! And Dan, too.)
• Check out the cool pictures of Unix desktops.

Music:

• “Bessie’s Secret” by Heifervescent from the album “Murder in the Garden.”
• “Breathing on Another Planet” by No, Really from the album “Rust.”

This episode of Linux in the Ham Shack is jam-packed with content. We have a special guest from around the Interwebs that you will likely know if you listen to other podcasts about Linux. The show did run a bit longer than usual, but there is just so much in it I couldn’t begin to tell you everything you’re going to hear. I do hope that you’ll stick around for the entire episode because there are some goodies near the end that you will not want to miss out on, including how you can win significant cold, hard cash.

Thanks to our special guest, our live participants and to everyone who listens to the show. PLEASE, tell everyone you know about us, and that we’re not just for amateur radio enthusiasts. Technofiles, geeks, Linux and FOSS addicts and just about everyone will gain something from the podcast. Oh, and due to a couple of technical problems, the audio quality in this episode is poor in a few places. I did the best I could. Next time it’ll be better. Have a great week!

73 de Russ and Richard

Contributors:

• Linux in the Ham Shack showed up on Podcast Sniper.
• Chris, ZL2CCO, mentions LHS on his blog. Thanks, Chris!
• Doug, N6LMX, is listening to Episode 31 and recommends the Griffin SmartTalk Headphone Adapter for the iPod Touch. It adds a microphone to your headphones. He bought his at Fry’s. (You can also find it at Amazon for a little less money. Click through our Amazon store and support the Black Sparrow Media podcast empire! -Ed.)

Announcements:

• Texas Linux Fest is Saturday, April 10, 2010 at the Monarch Events Center, Austin, Texas.
• Southeast Linux Fest is June 12-13, 2010 at the Marriott at Renaissance Park hotel in Spartanburg, South Carolina.
• We met our fund-raising goal for attending Dayton Hamvention 2010! The next goal is to raise enough money for a noise gate for Richard.
• Richard expresses his appreciation for everyone’s patience and support during the past few weeks.

Links and Notes:

• Amateur radio satellite operation.
• Doppler shift
• Footprint
• Linear transponder: a broadbanded repeater that operates over a range of frequencies.
• Satellite tracking: there are programs that will help you find when and where a satellite will appear over your location. This page lists several, including some that run on Linux.
• You will very likely need an antenna with gain, and probably a means of moving the antenna to match the trajectory of the satellite as it passes by.
• SAREX (Shuttle Amateur Radio Experiment) has been superceded by ARISS (Amateur Radio on the International Space Station).
• Equipment considerations. A VHF/UHF radio with sideband capability is often required, as is a cross-polarized antenna with gain.
• More info can be found at the AMSAT site including Keplerian Elements and other tracking tools.
• The ARRL publishes several books on satellite operation.

Music:

• “Long Way Home” by Kasey Anderson from the album “The Reckoning”
• “Amnesia” by Roots of Rebellion from the album “The Looking Glass”

This episode is a little heavy on the radio side of things. However, don’t be deterred. Richard gives us a lot of great information about satellite technology, concepts such as Doppler shift, transponders, antenna polarization, the science of orbits and much more which will appeal to your inner geek whether you’re into ham radio, computers or just science and technology in general. Have a great week, and we look forward to seeing everyone in the chat for the next live recording on Tuesday, March 2nd.

In the month of January I came down with the flu. I was only actually sick for about a week but I lost my voice for nearly a month. I was able to record LHS thanks to the editing skills of Russ.

Since the start of this month we have had an emergency surgery concerning my sons girlfriend and a yet to be named grandchild. I lost my mother right after that. Then I had to move my son out of his apartment in a hurry and my other son injured himself due to an altercation with an inmate at work. Add to that the largest snow storm I ever remember in this part of Texas and a power outage of more than 48 hours here. I have been a little busy.

My Fans are important to me. you folks have been with me for a long time and I will get a fresh Episode of RF out ASAP. We will be recording LHS tomorrow night and I will be there.

Thank you for your patience my loyal friends and listeners.

Richard KB5JBV

Contributors:

• Ted WA0EIR, in snowy Iowa, Andy aka Integgroll on IRC, and Bill KA9WKA join us for a round table discussion.
• Jay writes in about the Linux Journal episode (#029) and the analysis of the Amazon Kindle and DRM issues. Our panel talks about the Kindle , e-readers in general, and DRM issues. Russ mentions how Amazon retracted a couple of George Orwell titles.
• Google alert tells us that Linux in the Ham Shack and other amateur radio podcasts are being played over a local repeater by Tony VK7AX for the enjoyment of listeners in SE Australia and Tasmania. Good on ya’, mate!
• LHS was mentioned on Joe’s (WN2SYZ) blog. Thanks, Joe!
• Dave, KG4GIY, posted another mention of LHS at Linux Journal when we talked about software-defined radios (SDR) in Episode 26. Thanks, Dave! Check out the Linux Journal amateur radio content.
• Chris, Twitter ID WOKNSS, tweeted about catching up on back episodes of LHS. Thanks, Chris!
• LHS was mentioned at the Low SWR podcast website. Low SWR is an amateur radio podcast produced by Rich KD0BJT and Brady KD0BJS. They’re up to eight episodes already! Good job, guys!
• The Axis wrote to us, Mint Cast, and The Linux Link Tech Show to thank us all for content about the Linux program screen. We’re glad you enjoyed it. A possible application might be operating digital modes remotely. (Bonus Show Notes Content: The February 2010 issue of QST has a Short Takes article about the Glentek Radio-to-Ethernet Controller. Glentek has a variety of products to facilitate remote operation of an amateur radio station. -Ed.)

Announcements:

• Texas Linux Fest is April 10, 2010 at the Monarch Events Center in Austin, TX. You might find Richard or Russ there, so say Hi!
• Donations: We’ve achieved our goal! Walter, KV6M, made a second donation (thanks, Walter!), and the remainder was supplied by Beth Lynn Eicher of the Ohio Linux Fest. Thank-you, Beth Lynn! Look for the Linux in the Ham Shack booth at Dayton Hamvention 2010. (Note: the podcast incorrectly identifies Walter as WN3LIF, another Walter that also contributed.  We apologize for the confusion. -Ed.)

Links and Notes:

• From the chat room, Ronnie K4RJJ, asks what PDAs would work with sound card digital modes. There’s i-PSK31 that will allow you to use PSK31 with your iPhone and radio. It’s also available via the iTunes store. (Note: I mistakenly said the price was $1.99. The actual price is $5.99. Sorry. -Ed.) There is also some documentation on how to wire the headphone plug for the iPhone for connection to your radio.
• Ted rants about the use of macros in digital conversations, and the panel discusses.
• The panel discusses the appropriate power levels for digital modes. Lower power, say less than 35W, is usually enough. There are devices, such as the PSKMeter, that attaches to your transmitter output and, along with software, will display your signal so you can avoid splatter. PSKScope is another program for the PSKMeter that provides additional functionality, such as automatic audio drive level control, but only in the Windows version. A Linux version of PSKScope is available, but does not have the automatic drive level control. The other device discussed is the IMD Meter, which is a standalone device that displays your IMD while you are transmitting. No computer or software is necessary.
• Next, the panel talks about operating via VHF/UHF satellites. (There’s a good introductory article on the AMSAT web site. Randy, K7AGE, has produced several YouTube videos of various amateur radio activities, including this one where he operates AO-51. Another video from the 2007 Dayton Hamvention shows a similar system.
• Bill introduces the microHAM USB Interface III. (That’s the Americas website. There is also a site for Europe. The panel discusses the merits of the device.
• We then move to a discussion of Linux Mint 8 “Helena”.
• Bill rants about Yaesu microphones on their VHF/UHF radios.
• Russ talks about some cloud computing applications: Ubuntu One and Dropbox. The panel discusses the relative risks and advantages of using such services.

Music:

• “Don’t Go” by TenPenny Joke from the album “Ambush on All Sides”.
• “Mirror of Humans” by Amity in Fame from the album “Dinner for One”.

I would very much like to thank Bill, KA9WKA, Ted, WA0EIR and Andy (Integgroll on IRC) for filling in as co-hosts for Richard on this episode. Sadly I must report that Richard lost his mother to a battle with cancer yesterday morning. I know the thoughts, prayers and deepest sympathies of myself and our listeners are with Richard and his family during this time. Unfortunately, I do not have any further details on events in Balch Springs at this time. If you would like to send your condolences, please address them to kb5jbv@blacksparrowmedia.com. Richard may feel like joining me to record again in a week’s time, but if his circumstances do not permit, we will certainly carry on and offer him all of the time and space he may need to recover.

In this episode, our esteemed round table guests touch on a variety of topics. In usual fashion, I address feedback at the start. Beyond that, topics range from MicroHam digital rig interfaces, a rant about Yaesu, Linux Mint 8, cloud storage, e-readers and much, much more. Thank you for your faithful listenership.

73 de Russ

73 de Russ, K5TUX

Contributors:

• Shawn Powers of Linux Journal, and a recent guest on LHS, had a house fire. If you can, please help him out.
• Google alert says LHS was mentioned in the Niagara Peninsula Amateur Radio Club (NPARC) forums, but it seems to have disappeared.
• There’s been a problem with Russ’ email, k5tux@blacksparrowmedia.com, so please also copy Richard, kb5jbv@blacksparrowmedia.com, on any email until the problem is resolved.
• Michael, DL4MGM, advises WSPR users to make sure their transmitters are on frequency, so as to avoid encroaching on the visual QRSS, particularly on 30m. He also suggests using “sudo su” to get a root shell session.
• Ted, WA0EIR, writes to express his appreciation for Episode 029, and the plug for his website.
• Google Alert tells us that a French website, al-aide.com, reprinted the post about Episode 029.

Announcements:

• Texas Linux Fest will be held in Austin, TX on April 10, 2010, at the Monarch Event Center. You might even find a Linux in the Ham Shack host there! Tracy, one of the organizers of the event, is also starting another Linux-related podcast. Keep an eye on his website for the first episode.
• We’re nearing our goal of raising $750 for the LHS expedition to the Dayton Hamvention in 2010. Please click on the Donate button and make a donation, as every little bit helps. Thank you!

Links and Notes:

• There has been a lot of ham radio involvement in the relief efforts in Haiti, through such groups as the Texas Baptist Men and SATERN. Russ points us to this YouTube video containing a contact with HH2JR, demonstrating the effectiveness of ham radio in emergency communications.
• Richard talks about using Linux scripts to automate D-RATS transmissions (auto-QSTs). This script downloads weather information and formats it for sending through D-RATS.

  	#!/bin/bash
  	#
  	# Change directory
  	cd /home/richard/drats/current_conditions
  	#
  	# Remove the old downloaded weather file
  	#
  	rm KHQZ.TXT
  	#
  	# Download the current weather file from NOAA
  	#
  	wget -q ftp://tgftp.nws.noaa.gov/data/observations/metar/decoded/KHQZ.TXT
  	#
  	# Remove the old formatted file
  	#
  	rm current.txt
  	#
  	# Strip last line of text of the NOAA file, using sed
  	# This sed command strips out everything between "Mesquite" and "Pressure"
  	#
  	sed '/Mesquite,/,/Pressure / !d' KHQZ.TXT > khqz1.txt
  	#
  	# Add a blank line to the new file
  	#
  	echo -e " " >> current.txt
  	#
  	# Copy Mesquite Weather conditions to new file
  	#
  	cat khqz1.txt >> current.txt
  	#
  	# Done!
  	# A cron job then periodically sends out the contents of current.txt
  	#
  

• For more information on using the BASH shell and scripting, see:
  • Learning the BASH Shell from O’Reilly Media. (Shameless plug: You can buy the O’Reilly book through the blacksparrowmedia Amazon store)
  • Advanced BASH Scripting Guide
• Russ discusses the Linux “screen” command.
  • bash (Bourne Again Shell) is one command shell program. There’s also csh, tcsh, korn, and others.
  • psk31lx is a PSK31 program for a terminal session.
  • If you have a Linux distribution with the Amateur Radio repository, such as Debian, Ubuntu, or Linux Mint, psk31lx should be available there. You can then install it with the Synaptic package manager, or with the command

    	apt-get install psk31lx

  • More about screen:
    • A Guide to GNU Screen
    • How do I Use Multiple Screens on One Terminal over ssh session?
    • Linux Screen Tutorial and How To
    • Power Sessions with Screen
    • GNU Screen
    • screen switches and command keys
• Visit us on the IRC channel #lhspodcast at irc.freenode.net or call the voice message line at 888-455-0305, or +1 417 429 4069.

Music:

• “Flash in a Bottle” by Dead Heart Bloom from the album “In Chains.”
• “Things Happen Fast” by Fuzzy Logic.

As of Episode #029, we have achieved more than 50,000 downloads. Episode #029 also turned out to be one of our most popular. When Richard and I started this endeavor back in October 2008 we didn’t really know what to expect out of the podcast, but I think it’s safe to say that whatever expectations we may have had, we’re certainly reaching or exceeding them. I only hope that we only have more room to go up from here. Thank you to everyone who listens to, participates in, or otherwise helps out with the podcast–especially Bill, KA9WKA, our beloved Show Notes compiler, and everyone who has made a donation to the program. We are only about $100 in donations away from our booth at the 2010 Dayton Hamvention and we hope that we’ll be able to set up there and say hello to all of our fans, old, new and undiscovered, when it finally rolls around.

But for now, we wish you a speedy download and an enjoyable listen.

73 de Russ and Richard

• Last episode we talked about WSPR. Eddie Bennett, G3ZJO, wrote an article about running WSPR under Linux, and that article is available on the LHS website. He has several other blog pages, too.
• Don, WS4E, wrote that he recently acquired an iPhone and was interested to see that there is a Ustream app for it, but the app only plays pre-approved streams. He wonders if the LHS and RF podcasts will be available on Ustream. Russ did contact them, and LHS is now available on the Ustream iPhone application.
• We received a pingback from Ben, VK5JFK, to the article on the LHS website, Linux Mint 7 – Refreshing
• Paul, KC9QYB, of teenradiojourney.com, writes about a problem he was having with a file server. They recently upgraded it to the latest version of Ubuntu server, on a separate partition. He wonders how he can recover the data from the other drives and partitions. Russ answers. Essentially:
  1. Identify the “old” drive device name. You can search through the results of the dmesg command to see which devices are detected at boot. Let’s assume your old data is on drive /dev/hda1.
  2. Create a directory in the /mnt directory on your new drive (or partition) to serve as the mount point. We’ll call it root:

     mkdir /mnt/root

  3. Mount the old drive:

     mount /dev/hda1 /mnt/root

  4. Now you can copy or move files from the old drive at /mnt/root to the new drive.
  5. Similarly, you can create other directories in /mnt for other partitions, such as /var, /usr, /home, or whatever you might need.
• A Twitter mention from timls about listening to the podcast.

Announcements:

• We received a donation from Bill, NF9D, to help send Linux in the Ham Shack to the Dayton Hamvention in 2010. Thanks, Bill!

Links and Notes:

• Interview with David Lane, KG4GIY, and Shawn Powers of Linux Journal. Shawn is the Associate Editor and David is a contributing author, blogger, member of the Reader Advisory Board, and amateur radio operator. The January, 2010 issue of Linux Journal is devoted to amateur radio topics.
• The very first issue of Linux Journal is available online, and also contained an article about ham radio.
• David’s blog post about ereaders.
• David is also the Emergency Coordinator and RACES officer for Prince William Cty, VA. David discusses the use of Linux in emergency communications.
• Mentioned in the chat room: David Freese, W1HKJ, the author of fldigi, also has NBEMS, Narrow Band Emergency Messaging System, for Linux.
• The group discusses how packet radio networks operate.
• This leads to a discussion of what, if any, types of encryption are allowed in amateur radio transmissions.
• Linux Journal has their “virtual ham shack” at http://www.linuxjournal.com/ham/, which includes a forum. David has recently started a thread there about software-defined radios.
• The panel discusses what appears to be an increase in ham radio software for the Linux community.
• Russ asks the panel their opinion about the new evil empire, Google, and specifically Google Wave and Google Voice.
• What about Google DNS? http://code.google.com/speed/public-dns/ (The panel mentions “Cricket’s book”, which is DNS and BIND, by Paul Albitz and Cricket Liu, published by O’Reilly.)
• With Oracle’s purchase of Sun, what will happen to MySQL?
• Look for David at the Linux Journal chatroom on freenode IRC, in the #linuxjournal channel.
• Check out the Linux Journal store, too.

Music:

• “Let’s Get It Started” by Oh No Not Stereo from the album “003″
• “Miss America” by Beyond 7 from the album “Revelations Per Minute”

In this episode, we had the honor of interviewing two prominent figures from Linux Journal magazine. David Lane, KG4GIY, is the magazine’s eminent blogger and ham radio advocate. He is a large part of the reason the January 2010 issue of LJ is all about amateur radio. Shawn Powers is the magazine’s associate editor, which gives him the dubious honor of being a guest on our show. He’s the go-to guy when the editor, publisher and just about everyone else needs something done. We have to say we were greatly honored to have the LJ folks join us, and we sure hope we haven’t scared them off so they’ll come back and talk with us in the future.

Hope everyone is having a fantastic 2010 so far, and thanks for downloading LHS in the new year. And if you have a couple of dollars leftover from holiday binging, please drop us a donation as the deadline for acquiring a booth in Dayton is coming up fast. And remember, we appreciate our listeners, each and every one. Thank you!

73 de Russ and Richard

• Walter, WN3LIF, writes to express his appreciation for the podcast. He has successfully interfaced his FT-450 to his Linux Mint system.
• Terry, KV6M, alerted Richard to a link spam entry in the forums at blacksparrowmedia.com.
• Bob, VE3SRE, recently found the podcast, and has been a user of GNU/Linux for many years. He’s found a good contest logging program, but neglected to mention which one. Let us know, Bob!
• Paul, KC9QYB, of teenradiojourney.com, Kent, VE4KEH, and Bill, KA9WKA, join the roundtable discussion this episode.

Announcements:

• Check out Russ on Hacker Public Radio! In episode 0494, Klaatu interviews Russ at Ohio Linux Fest.
• Another generous donation came from Jim, W9GNG. Thanks very much, Jim! LHS is well on the way to their goal for sending Richard and Russ to the Dayton Hamvention 2010! If you’d like to donate, click on the Donate button at the Linux in the Ham Shack website.

Links and Notes:

• The ARRL has an article about Senate Bill 1755 being passed in the Senate and now moves to the House of Representatives for consideration. A roundtable discussion ensues.
• Kent, VE4KEH, joins the roundtable to discuss WSPR (Weak Signal Propagation Reporter), written by Joe Taylor, K1JT. See also the WSPRnet page for recent observations.
  • When you install the .deb package, it may not create a desktop icon. The program installs, by default, into the /WSPR directory. So, you may need to run it by doing the following in a terminal window:

    		$ cd /WSPR
    		$ ./wspr
    

  • Of course, you’ll also need a soundcard interface to your radio. Once running, you should go to the Setup -> Station parameters menu option and enter your callsign, grid square, transmit power, and set your audio device and rig control preferences.
  • It can even be used on the experimental 600m band, if you have a license to operate there. On July 28, 2009, the FCC granted the ARRL a modified license for WD2XSH. This modified license allows the experiment to operate with 45 stations across the continental USA, Alaska, and Hawaii. So, unless you’re one of the stations specifically authorized to operate on 600m, you should only provide reception reports, and not transmit on that band.
  • One final note about WSPR: you must have your computer clock set very accurately. The easiest way is to set up an NTP client on your computer to synchronize your computer clock to one of the network time protocol servers. Here is an article on setting up a Ubuntu client, which should also work for Linux Mint. Or…
  • If you RIGHT CLICK on your desktop clock and select “set date / time”, there may be an option to automatically set the time. You can select the ntp.ubuntu.com server so you don’t overload the public servers.
• Paul recently built a Pixie II QRP CW transceiver kit.
• Bill Meara, M0HBr/CU2JL/N2CQR, of the SolderSmoke podcast is also a fan and practitioner of WSPR.
• Bill, KB3CVA, has a telnet BBS online at http://phantombbs.net.
• Russ discusses a gizmodo article about Microsoft patenting the sudo command. It’s not likely that the patent is enforceable. Don’t Panic. Articles on ars technica and Information Week have a more realistic slant on the issue.
• Tip: to eliminate having to enter your password each time you use the sudo command:
  • First, edit the /etc/sudoers file using the visudo utility. It is considered insecure to tweak the /etc/sudoers file manually.

  		$ sudo visudo /etc/sudoers
  

  • Uncomment this line by removing the # character:

    		# %sudo ALL=NOPASSWD: ALL
    

  • So it now looks like this:

    		%sudo ALL=NOPASSWD: ALL
    

    and save the file.

  • Finally, add your user name to the sudo group. For example, to add user russ to the sudo group:

    		sudo usermod -a -G sudo russ
    

  • Log out and in, and enjoy sudo without the password prompts.
  • Of course, if you just want to avoid repeatedly typing your password for a session, you can issue the command:

    		sudo bash -
    

    which will give you a bash terminal session as root, and you can then issue several commands as root without the need for typing sudo at all.

• Debate in the chat room about cell phones and emergency communications. Richard talks about the cell phone problems during hurricane Katrina. Most cell phone systems are designed to support about 20% of their subscribers at any given time. When an emergency occurs, the cell phone networks are quickly overloaded.

Music:

• “Inside Joke” by Little Thom from the album “Bottomfeeders”
• “A Little Bit of Riddim” by Michael Franti and Spearhead from the album “All Rebel Rockers”

Hopefully everyone has enjoyed their holidays, spent time with families, given and received all of the gifts you’ve hope to give or receive. Warmest wishes from our homes to yours during this time of friendship and togetherness, and please accept our gift of a new podcast to take you through the rest of this special time and into the upcoming new year. May it be more prosperous and fulfilling than the ones that have come before.

73 and Happy Holidays,

Russ (K5TUX) and Richard (KB5JBV)

Well from the talk on the WWWeb I was hoping for better things I must admit. I have been away from Linux for a time. There are things in Ham Radio still that you just can only do with Windows. I did install Ubuntu 9.04 and ran WSJT that is in the repository it worked fine all be it an old version..

I have done plenty to promote the use of Linux in the Ham shack and with Fldidgi you have a wonderful piece of stable software that does everything just as well on Ubuntu etc. as it does on Windows.

I have compiled and modified WSPR to run on Linux very well so when the WSRP2 version for Linux was released I was so pleased to hear that Mr Average Ham in his shack with Linux on his machine could now fetch and run WSPR easily.

Last night I tried WSPR2.00 rev1714 on my Ubuntu 9.04. All went well, this is just what we have been looking for I thought. Then the annoying flickering of the green RECEIVING box caught my eye, obviously as processing is going on in the machine that display gets starved or something. I have seen this before it makes the software look unstable, shame that.

Decodes went ahead fine, however, those Labels are still miss aligned UTC dB DT Freq Drift, I was decoding my own beacon on 500Khz this software plainly indicated Drift – G3ZJO, no that is my Call Sign, not a drift value, if I were to run this version on Linux I would have to go in and modify the labels as before, such things just annoy me to death. But hey it works doesn’t it, ‘though you don’t have to accept these things with Fldigi.

Then Ubuntu 9.04 informed me of the software update to 9.10, they say that WSPR runs fine on 9.10 so I went ahead with the install. Time to take a look at WSPR2 on Ubuntu 9.10, ERROR access denied. Oh yes, well it worked before, lets try WSJT, no go, try Fldigi all is fine, works great.

I know what has happened Ubuntu update has thrown out some of the libraries needed by WSPR, we are back to ‘old days’, I have done it all a hundred times, do I want to bother now, will Mr Average Ham in his shack want to bother? Still, Linux and WSPR has further to go before it is as easy and as acceptable as Windows, shame.

Contributors:

• Matt, KC8BEW, tells us about a new Linux forum at Linux Journal for amateur radio topics.  The January, 2010 issue of Linux Journal has several amateur radio related articles.  Add  http://www.linuxjournal.com/ham to your bookmarks.  Look for an interview with a couple folks from Linux Journal on the episode to be recorded on January 5, 2010.  And thanks to Kent, VE4KEH, for the plug in the forum over there.
• Kent, VE4KEH, sent in an audio segment, to be included later in this episode.  If you’d like to submit an audio segment, please send it in .ogg or .mp3 format, if possible.
• Another message from Kent suggests a topic for a future show about installing distros from live .iso files to a flash drive with persistence.  (Check out the Pen Drive Linux site.)
• Rich, KD0BJT, and his son Brady, KD0BJS, have started their own podcast, called Low SWR.
• A WordPress blog by Gary, KE2YK, references an article by Martin, AA6E, about Linux and amateur radio.
• The Fresh Ubuntu podcast website has linked to the LHS website.  They’re also on Freenode IRC at #freshubuntu.
• The Bluff County DX Association of LaCrosse, WI linked to the LHS website.  Thanks!
• Ben, VK5JFK, left a comment on Bill’s review of Linux Mint 7 asking if Xastir runs under Linux Mint.  Yes, it does, and I’ve posted an article on the website about it.
• Ed, KC5NT, writes to say he enjoys the podcast and is 100% Linux in the ham shack.  He describes his radio activities and made a donation to the fund to send LHS to Dayton in 2010.  Thanks, Ed!
• Jason, NT7S, has a link to LHS in his blog, Ripples in the Ether.
• Richard sent some feedback to the Going Linux podcast and got mentioned in episode 86.
• The technet.147120.com blog also linked to LHS. They hold an on-air technical net in the Orlando, FL area on Wednesday nights on the 147.120 repeater (103.5 Hz PL).

Announcements:

• Donations: We received donations from: Ed KC5NT, Bill KA9WKA, Doug N6LMX, John EI7IG, and Walter WN3LIF.  Thank you all for your very generous donations.  It looks like we’re well on the way to sending Russ and Richard to Dayton in 2010.
• Thanks, again, to Dave and John of Gamma Leonis for the theme music for the show.  www.gammaleonis.com

Links and Notes:

• Kent, VE4KEH, supplied an audio report about the Ontario GNU/Linux Fest.
• Russ reviews Ubuntu 9.10 netbook remix.
• Russ rants about the Evil Empire — no, the other one.  Google.  Specifically, Google DNS.
• For more information about configuring BIND, see the International Systems Consortium.
• Richard reports on his D-RATS project running on a Dell Latitude CPt.  It was running Xubuntu Linux, but he moved to  CrunchBang Linux, and it’s working much better.
• KB3CVA has a telnet BBS online at www.phantombbs.net.  Check it out.

Music:

• “Fade Your Heat” by Val Davis from the album “Immortal”
• “Didn’t I?” by Shane Jackman from the album “Equilibrium”

Thank you to everyone who has so generously donated to the podcast so that we might have a presence at the upcoming Dayton Hamvention in May, 2010. It was an idea spawned at Ohio Linux Fest in September, 2009 and we’ve come a long way since then. Every contribution helps and we hope you’ll continue to support Linux in the HAM Shack in the future. We also hope to provide timely and essential information to amateur radio enthusiasts and computer users for a long time to come.

From our world to yours, have a Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Joyous Saturnalia, or just a good ol’ time–whatever your “thing” might be. We hope you enjoy our latest installment of the podcast, and please: Keep spreading the word. Every month our audience grows, and we predict world takeover by 2014. Well, maybe not, but we are talking about evil empires after all…

73 de Russ, K5TUX

Ben, VK5JFK, left a comment on my review of Linux Mint at the Linux in the Ham Shack web site, asking if I had installed Xastir under Mint.  I had not, but since Richard talked about Xastir in Episode 23, and Linux Mint is the “official” distribution for Linux in the Ham Shack, I thought a brief how-to article might be useful to our listeners.

In fact, installing Xastir in Linux Mint is fairly easy.  Here’s a step by step procedure:

• Launch the Synaptic Package Manager
• Select the Amateur Radio (Universe) repository
• Click on Xastir in the list – version 1.9.4-3 was available as I did this
• Click on Apply – a bunch of dependencies were selected, and after approving that list, off it went.

A few minutes later (over a DSL connection) the installation was complete.

The first (and only) problem I encountered was that the installer did not create an entry in the Mint menu.  To remedy this, I clicked Menu, Preferences, Main Menu.  This utility allowed me to add a new menu category I called Amateur Radio, and a new item in that category that I creatively called Xastir.  The associated command is “/usr/bin/xastir“.  After logging out and in, the new menu item appeared.

Before running Xastir for the first time, I opened a terminal and entered the command:

$ callpass ka9wka

and the computer responded:

Passcode for ka9wka is 19125
$

Of course, you will use your callsign and you’ll receive a different passcode.  You’ll need that number when configuring the interface.  No, the callsign is not case-sensitive.

After running Xastir, you must perform some configuration, as Richard discussed.  For this test, it was simply a matter of defining my location and adding the Internet interface.  When you launch Xastir the first time, it will automatically open the “Configure Station” dialog, but you can return to that by clicking File, Configure, Station.  Here I entered my callsign and location.  I left the rest of the options at the defaults.

Next, I clicked the Interface menu option, then Interface Control.  This brings up an empty list of configured interfaces.  I clicked Add, chose “Internet Server”, and clicked the Add button. The “Configure Internet” dialog box appeared.  I entered 19125 into the Passcode field (see above), and “r/42/-87/500″ (without the quotes) into the Filter Parameters field.  This filter says, I believe, show all stations within a radius of 500km of 42 degrees N and 87 degrees W.  Modify to suit your location and preference, and click OK.  Finally, still in the Interface Control dialog box, I clicked Start All.  The status changed from DOWN to UP, and I closed the dialog box.  In a few moments, stations began to appear on the map.

There are a lot more options in Xastir that I haven’t explored here.  For example, if you’re planning on installing this on a laptop with a TNC and GPS device attached, you’ll need to add interfaces for those as well, and you’ll probably want to add a more detailed map for your area.  For now, this should get Xastir running under Linux Mint with a minimum of time and bother.

73,

-Bill, KA9WKA

• Russ recommends the movie Carnival of Souls.
• Wish Russ a Happy Birthday on December 5th!
• Jos invites everyone to attend Camp KDE 2010 in San Diego, CA on January 15-22, 2010.

Announcements:

• Donations from Paul KC9QYB, Joel, and Walter. Thank you! (And congratulations to Paul on getting his Technicians license!)
• A Google alert says the LHS website showed up in linuxzine.com, probably because of our sponsorship of Linux Mint.
• You can leave feedback via our toll-free telephone line at 888-455-0305.

Links and Notes:

• Richard talks about using an old Dell Latitude laptop for mobile operations. After many trials and tribulations and resetting the BIOS, he managed to install Xubuntu, and has D-RATS installed.
• Russ installed Ubuntu 9.10 on a machine. He tried 64-bit Linux Mint 7, but it failed.
• Richard wanted to run DSL or Puppy on the Latitude. DSL booted, but he couldn’t get the network card to work.
• From the chatroom, N3JIM asks what virtualization software Russ is using. Currently, VMWare Server 2.02, but it doesn’t play nice with newer kernels. So, Russ is planning on moving to Sun’s VirtualBox.
• Matt points out that Ubuntu will remove Gimp from the default installation beginning with Ubuntu 10.04.
• Short Wave Listening, a topic suggested to Russ at Ohio Linux Fest.
• Receivers: Ten-Tec RX-320D, a PC-controlled, shortwave receiver. Ten-Tec supplies Windows software, but there is a Linux program, too.
• An article describing the receiver and it’s application.
• Other radios are available from Yaesu, Icom, Kenwood, and C. Crane.
• Russ talks about the Radio Shack DX-440 shortwave receiver he used (aka Sangean 803A).
• Digital Radio Mondiale
• Time Synchronization Stations – you can syncrhonize your PC clock to a national standard: WWV, CHU.
• Software: MultiMode 5.9.2 (for Mac OSX), fldigi, Radio Explorer.
• Things to hear: Numbers stations, Letter stations.
• Antennas: very similar to what you would need for a transceiver. Random wires and tuned dipoles, will work, too. Look for a receiver that has an external antenna jack.
• Where to listen: Amateur radio bands, international broadcast bands.
• QSO Radio Show can be heard Tuesdays from 05:00PM to 07:00PM ET, 2100 to 2300 UTC at 7415KHz (WBCQ radio).
• Coast to Coast AM
• Check Amazon for antennas, receivers, and SWL-related books. (Remember to use our Amazon link for your purchases.)
• Passport to World Band Radio (Also available at Amazon).
• KO4RB asks if we’ve had any specific experience with an active antenna for shortwave listening.

Music:

• “Say Hey (I Love You)” by Michael Franti & Spearhead from the album “All Rebel Rockers”
• “The Only Life” by Justin Roth from the album “Shine”

• Russ visited a Ham Radio Outlet in Virginia and bought a new Yaesu FT-7900R for his truck.
• Richard bought a Kenwood TS-50, some wire and antennas at the Belton hamfest, but hasn’t installed them yet.
• John, EI7IG, says you don’t need AX.25 support in the kernel to run XASTIR, since you’re running the TNC in KISS mode. He also says that APRS is useful for emcomm events, disseminating local weather information, and passing short text messages.
• Tim, KI6BGE, recommends Resonant Frequency, Linux in the Ham Shack, and SolderSmoke in his October 29 blog entry.

Announcements:

• We received a donation from Paul during the last episode, and now Alex made a sizable donation. Thanks, Alex!

Links and Notes:

• Roundtable discussion with Kent VE4KEH, Paul from TeenRadioJourney, Matt KC8BEW, and Jim N3JIM.
• Jim runs Mac OS X and FreeBSD.
• Matt runs OpenSUSE, Ubuntu, Windows XP, and Linux Mint.
• Paul runs Windows XP and Ubuntu.
• Kent was running Debian, but now runs CrunchBang and Linux Mint.
• Topics include running packet, buying TNCs at hamfests, digital modes, fldigi, remote control operation of radios, EchoLink, IRLP, CW, 6 meters, repeaters, the HAARP project, 2m Slim Jim antenna, J-Poles, handy talks, and Richard loses his mind.

Music:

• “Company of Fools” by Great Big Sea from the album “Fortune’s Favour”

• Kent, VE4KEH, writes in the forums that the Debian Testing updates have caused him some problems. Richard suggests not using the Testing distribution, while Russ disagrees.
• Do any of the ham radio digital protocols support full TCP/IP? Can we load a web site via packet radio?
• Comments about Episode #023:
  • Alex, OZ9AEC, says that he’d rather attend an Ubuntu launch party every six months, rather than a Windows party every six years. He provided a link to an Ubuntu 9.10 Release Party Map.
  • Jim, N3JIM, defends APRS (Automatic PACKET reporting System), saying it’s more than just vehicle tracking.
    www.aprs.org says it’s “automatic packet reporting system”
    www.aprs.net says it’s “automatic position reporting system”
    Our hosts discuss the apparent usefulness, or lack thereof, of APRS.
• Richard rants about receiving spam, this time from Twitter.

Announcements:

• Please donate to the fund to send Linux in the Ham Shack to the Dayton Hamvention in 2010!

Links and Notes:

• Joe, NE3R, provides this audio segment about minicom, a Linux terminal application for connection to serial port devices. Check out Joe’s blog.
• Audio from Russ at Ohio Linux Fest:
  • Talking to Jim, KB3ORA.
  • Handing out DVDs of the first 22 episodes.
  • Matt, KC8BEW, provided some ham radio gear to use at the booth. Thanks, Matt.
  • Russ visits with Beth Lynn Eicher and Rob Ball, both of OLF, and Doug Vann of Duo Consulting talks to Russ about Drupal.
• Richard talks about his visit to the Belton HamEXPO in Belton, TX.
  • FlexRadio was there.
  • Sidewinders on Two radio club.
  • Henry Allen, K5BUG, was offering his Texas Bugcatcher Antennas.
  • Richard met Dr. David Woolweaver, K5RAV, the ARRL West Gulf Division Director.
• Donate to the fund to bring Richard and Russ to Dayton Hamvention 2010.
• Look for new topics in future shows, such as reviews of other Linux distributions such as ARCH Linux, Slackware 13, and OpenSUSE 11.1.
• Russ talks about getting his amateur radio station back on the air. He put up a new antenna, an AlphaDelta DX-CC trap dipole for 80-10m. He also acquired a Rascal GLX sound card interface, installed fldigi, and made his first digital mode contact with PSK31 on 20m! Yay, Russ!
• Russ has also discovered IRLP.
• Paul, from TeenRadioJourney.com, made a donation to the Dayton fund. Thanks, Paul.
• We’re looking for a new logo for Linux in the Ham Shack. Any and all submissions will be considered.

Music:

• “So Hard” by A. Rex, from the album “Moving Backwards”
• “Drive” by Barb Carbon

Several thank yous go out to those who donated to the Dayton Hamvention 2010 fund. With my upcoming matching contributions we’ll be about halfway to our goal. Please keep those donations coming, even after we’ve met our goal, so we can continue to improve our equipment, our hosting and our program. As always, thank you for downloading Linux in the HAM Shack. Please send us your feedback and questions, and please tell everyone you know about us–through word of mouth, blogging, social networking, whatever it takes. Our listenership continues to grow, and we hope that trend continues for years to come.

73 de Russ, K5TUX

• Paul, from TeenRadioJourney.com, mentions LHS on his blog.
• Russ Wenner from The Techie Geek podcast joins us in the chat room.
• Kent, VE4KEH, in a post in the forums, says he heard Russ on an episode of Hacker Public Radio, and wonders if an appearance on Linux Outlaws is next. He also asks about a Windows 7 launch party. Our hosts respond.
• Kent also posts a comment in a thread about Acer dropping support if you install Linux on one of their computers. Kent asks which manufacturers are Linux friendly? He also wonders why Acer creates two partitions on their laptops.
• threethirty from Linux Cranks sent congratulations about LHS getting a mention in an LXer.com article Ohio LinuxFest Report
• Matt, KC8BEW, in a comment about Episode 22 asks if Chirp will support radios other than Icom D-Star.

Announcements:

• Ken S. made a generous donation to the fund to send Linux in the Ham Shack to Dayton HamVention, 2010.
• Look for Richard at the Belton HamEXPO on October 3rd. in Belton, TX. Jerry Taylor, KD0BIK, of The Practical Amateur Radio Podcast will be there, too.

Links and Notes:

• Russ talks a bit about being at Ohio Linux Fest. He was in “podcasters row” in the exhibit hall, along with the Northeast Ohio Open Source Society, The Linux Link Tech Show, and the Security Justice podcast. Russ shares some interviews and audio he recorded:
  • Interview with Matt, KC8BEW.
  • Russ plans on taking Linux in the Ham Shack to Dayton Hamvention, 2010.
  • Jim, KB3ORA, stops by the booth.
• Questions in the chat room:
  • Russ Wenner from the Techie Geek Podcast, asks: is ham radio an expensive hobby? Richard opines.
  • HamTests.net is a good resource. The European site is HamTests.co.uk.
  • Do you need to learn Morse code? Nope, but it’s even more popular now.
  • Do you need a high antenna? Not necessarily. Russ discusses. The ARRL has several good books on antennas.
  • Paul Shirey asks if shared folders on different machines can be combined. Possible, but difficult.
• Richard talks about APRS and XASTIR.
  • One of the requirements for using APRS under Linux is that you must have the AX.25 packet radio protocol support in the kernel.
  • To determine if your kernal has AX.25 support, enter this command in a terminal:

    grep ax25 /proc/kallsyms

    If you get a result something like this:

    c0510ddc r trans_net_ax25_table
    c05127a0 r trans_net_ax25_param_table

    then AX.25 support is built into the kernel. If you receive nothing, then you’ll need to recompile the kernel with AX.25 support. (Most of the current versions of Ubuntu and Linux Mint have AX.25 support.)
    For more information, see the HowTo:AX.25 article on the XASTIR wiki.

  • Richard describes configuring XASTIR.
  • Bottom line: it’s not all that hard to set up. Read the wiki. There are how-to articles for many different operating systems.
• From the chatroom, someone asks about the throughput of the various data modes in amateur radio.

Music:

• “Like This” by STEEP from the album “STEEP”
• “Lost” by Trainlight from the album “Now You’re Alone with Ghosts”

Contributors:

• Doug, N6LMX, recently acquired an old Dell Inspiron 3500 notebook and decided to try Linux Mint on it. For some reason, probably processor and memory, it stalled before it got started. Same with Ubuntu 9.04. However, Xubuntu 9.04 works like a charm.
• Joe, NE3R, sent an audio message about minicom. Thanks, Joe. Look for it in a future show.
• Google alert about a LHS mention in John’s Blog.
• Paul in the chatroom asks about connecting a Linux machine to a shared Windows printer. Russ suggests browsing to http://localhost:631 to bring up the CUPS administration page and configuring the printer there.

Announcements:

• New streaming audio on the web site. New URL: http://stream.lhsinfo.org:8008, or go to http://lhsinfo.org and look for the links on the right side of the page.
• Look for Richard at the Belton HamEXPO on October 3rd. in Belton, TX. Russ will be at Ohio Linux Fest on September 25-27 in Columbus, OH.
• Welcome Bill, KA9WKA, as the newest member of the Black Sparrow Media production team. Bill will be compiling the show notes for Resonant Frequency. (And, now, LHS too. Email comments, corrections, suggestions to ka9wka at blacksparrowmedia dot com. -Ed.)

Interview:

• This is the remaining portion of the interview with Bill, KA9WKA, where we discuss various amateur radio topics.
  • NUE-PSK modem
  • American Morse code
  • G5RV antennas
  • 135′ Doublet antenna (similar to Figure 3 here)
  • Moxon antenna
  • CW vs. texting
  • B&W folded dipole
  • fldigi
  • D-Star
  • D-Star DV Dongle
  • Replackaged Icom equipment at the DX Store

Topic:

• Richard discusses programming radios using Linux
  • Richard tries programming his Vertex VX-150 using Wine under Linux. The programming software installed fine, but when he tried downloading the data from the radio to the computer, he received errors, probably due to a mismatch in the serial port speed. Next, he tried programming his Icom IC-91AD. The software installed and recognized his serial port, COM1, and he was able to program the radio.
  • Tim, KI6BGE, in the chatroom, says the IC2200H D-Star program works the same way.
  • KB3GTN in the chatroom says he’s had good luck programming his Kenwood TS480 within Linux, using his own program.
  • Tim, KI6BGE, says the Icom ID800 and IC2200H use the same programming cable, but different software.

• A Ustreamer asks which Linux distributions we’re using. The summary is Linux Mint, Ubuntu, Xubuntu, Kubuntu, SpearMint, CentOS, OpenSUSE, and Debian.

Music:

• “Terra Firma” by Garrett Wall from the album “Sky Pointing”
• “All of the Above” by Garrett Wall from the album “Sky Pointing”

• Jeff has switched to Linux Mint. He asks about iPod syncing programs. He has tried Banshee and Amarok, and is not impressed. He’d like to use iTunes, perhaps under Wine. Russ suggests trying Songbird, if it supports your device. Check their wiki page to see if your device is supported.
• Tweet from M0GLG regarding Echolink under Wine. He says it works with no real issues other than configuring the sound devices. He hasn’t managed to get it to work with USB devices, yet.
• Comment on the website about episode 20 from Matt, KC8BEW. He is looking forward to seeing Russ at Ohio Linux Fest.
• Look for Richard at the upcoming Belton, TX hamfest.
• LHS was mentioned on Jonathan Hardy’s blog KIX-online in the August 30 post.
• John, EI7IG, posted a message in the forums providing a link to information on compiling XASTIR from source, and mentions the Linux RMS Gateway software for accessing Winlink 2000 networks. He also says the Windows Winlink 2000 client, Airmail, works fine under Wine.
• Clay, K6AEP, writes that he has an Eee PC 1000he and 702, and says you can use applications on the smaller screens. In eeebuntu 3.0, hold down the Alt key and you can move the screen around to see the rest of it. Crossover 8 has allowed him to avoid using Windows except for a couple of programs, such as Echolink. It seems to install fine, but mic audio doesn’t work. He’s tried SUSE 10 and 11, CentOS 4 and 5, Slackware 12.2, Ubuntu, Mint, Extreme Ubuntu, and Debian, and a variety of computers. He likes Ultimate Edition Linux 2.3, based on Ubuntu 9.04, even better than Mint 7.
• Gary, M0TXD, comments that he has just installed Ubuntu on his hamshack computer with four serial ports, but can’t get them to open. Russ suggests that it’s a permissions problem on the devices.

Announcements:

• Russ was invited by Klaatu of Linux Cranks to join their fourth roundtable discussion. The topic is the most common Linux applications on the desktop. Look for it on Hacker Public Radio (.mp3 file).
• Linux in the Ham Shack has become an official sponsor of Linux Mint.
• lhsinfo.org now has streaming audio links.
• Check out Ohio Linux Fest. Russ will be there. Will you?
• Question from the chatroom: How do I change from Ubuntu to Linux Mint? 1) Download the .iso and install it, but that will likely overwrite everything on your machine. 2) Get the sources.list file from a Mint installation (if you are on Ubuntu 9.04 already and want Mint 7) and update the repositories, then do an apt-get dist-upgrade. Russ tried that, and it worked pretty well, but there were a couple of package conflicts that had to be handled manually. The safest and easiest is to just install from the .iso, especially if you already have your /home directories in a separate partition. No matter how you do it, you should backup your system first.

Interview:

• Interview with Paul Shirey, of the Teen Radio Journey podcast.
• Topics discussed:
  • Gordon West study materials
  • The Ham Radio Podclass
  • Jerry Taylor’s Practical Amateur Radio Podcast
  • Chris Matthieu’s HamBrief.tv video podcast
  • 10-10 international
  • Worked all states nets, like the 3905 Century Club
  • Salvation Army Team Emergency Radio Network, SATERN
  • Texas Baptist Men
  • Alinco DJ-175T/E dual band handheld radio
  • J-pole antennas
  • Flag pole antennas
  • Shackbox Linux
  • Linux Mint

Music:

• “Give In Give Out” by Plunkett from the album “Plunkett”
• “Dale” by Mutandina from the album “Mutandina”

• Email exchange with Herve, of Shackbox Linux.  If you found it useful, please consider donating something to the project.
• Voice comment from Rodney (aka R0dzilla) KJ4OHH: he asks for more information on Echolink and Echolinux. Our hosts respond with CQiNet and QTel.
• Rod, KJ4OHH, posts in the forum:  If you install a 32-bit program under 64-bit Linux Mint 7, then install a 32-bit application, getlibs may not find the 32-bit libraries, so you have to get them from the Ubuntu repository:

  $sudo getlibs --distro Ubuntu --release jaunty nameof32bitprogram

  And congratulations to Rodney on getting his license!

• VK5HZ in IRC says Echolink does work in Wine, at least for him.
• Joe, NE3R, runs packet and uses an old TNC with firmware from the 1980s.  He runs XASTIR with an MFJ TNC and minicom.
• Ken, WA3FKG, posts in the forum:  Acer says if you replace windows with Linux on one of their machines, you’ve voided the warranty.
• Tony Malloy re-Tweeted on identi.ca when Episode 019a came out.  Thanks, Tony.
• Damon, NN7B, asks “Which packet program do you use for Linux?”  It’s probably easier to use a TNC in KISS mode, rather than trying to do software packet.
• David, KF5BCM, wants a noise gate on Richard. He says hears Richard breathing loudly on Episode 15.  (Make a donation and maybe that will help fund the equipment.)
• turtles7, in the forums, suggested a topic for a future show: mobile installation hints. He recently installed a mobile in a minivan, and still has high SWR.

Interview:

• Interview with Beth Lynn Eicher of the Ohio Linux Fest.
• Beth Lynn talks about the training opportunities at OLF, exhibitors, and the history of OLF.

From the chat room:

• Why don’t we do shows on Linux basics? We did. Check out the older episodes. If there’s something we haven’t covered, let us know.
• What is a “Crank”? See Linux Cranks.  (ogg format, explicit)
• How to play .ogg files in iTunes.
• KJ4OHH just bought a 8GB Sansa Fuze for $39. Refurbished Sansa Clips are often available at buy.com and newegg.com for good prices, too. They play OGG files natively.
• Check out Shackbox Linux, too.

Music:

• “Out of It” by Brad Sucks from the album “Out of It”.
• “Fallen from Grace” by Shawn Harris from the album “Temptation”.

Wednesday:

• “Btrfs: A new Linux file system”, presented by Valerie Aurora of Red Hat.
  • Btrfs (B-Tree file system) is a possible replacement for Linux ext3 and ext4 filesystems.
  • Features:
    • seamless integration with multiple underlying devices, similar to LVM
    • built-in checksumming
    • on-the-fly snapshots
  • (An interesting interview with Valerie is at Linux Magazine. -Ed.)
• “The Linux Defenders: Stop the Trolls, Protect Linux, Further Innovation” presented by Keith Bergelt of Open Invention Network.
  • A discussion of freedom, intellectual property, prior art, and software development. The Open Invention Network buys software patents to protect them and not exploit them as a revenue stream.
• “Building a Private Cloud with Ubuntu Server” presented by Rick Clark and Søren Hansen of Canonical.
  • Virtualization using Eucalyptus.

Thursday:

• “Why It Is Hard To Be Fast” presented by representatives from Intel.
  • A discussion of the reasons why the pace of improving computer speed has slowed over the past few years.
• “The Role of Users in Open Source Projects” presented by Stormy Peters of the GNOME Foundation.
  • A discussion of why users are important to an open source project and how they can be more involved.

Friday:

• “The Art of Klingon Programming” presented by Paul Fenwick (Perl Training Australia)
  • A hysterical talk about programming Perl in the Klingon language. (Unfortunately, we cannot find a link to the slides. -Ed.)
• Walking tour of The Tech Museum of Innovation.
  • A behind the scenes look at the development of the museum exhibits. All of the technology used for the exhibits was developed with open source tools.

• Adrian, M0GLJ/VK2BAC reinstalled Ubuntu on his Asus Eee PC 701SD, and wondered if there was a logging program that worked well on the small screen.
• Paul, no callsign given, asks for a link to Shackbox Linux.
• Bill, KA9WKA, offered a review of Linux Mint 7.
• Paul Shirey writes to ask about the upcoming Windows 7.
• Ray, KO4RB, submits his comments praising Linux Mint and the podcast.

Announcements:

• Resonant Frequency now has a page at Facebook. Look for Resonant Frequency Podcast
• More about spam.

Discussion:

• Linux Mint 7 with guest Bill, KA9WKA.   We talk about Linux Mint 7, CentOS, various other distributions, why we like, or dislike, Linux Mint, and a few of the problems encountered.
• Russ talks about trying Linux Mint on his 10″ Eee PC.  He installed it via Pendrivelinux.  He had a problem with the wireless driver, but a kernel upgrade and a minor configuration change fixed that. The wired Ethernet interface did not work.  Compiz works, but you probably wouldn’t want to run it all the time on a netbook.  Some of the power-saving features don’t work.
• Richard describes his experience with a wireless network intrusion.  Once recovered, he tried to install Mint on one of his machines, but although the live CD ran fine, and the install went well, the machine would hang while loading the desktop.  He suspects it’s a problem with the hardware.  Otherwise, he likes Linux Mint.  Our recommendation for first-time Linux users: try Linux Mint.
• Overall, Russ likes it too, but has issues with his web camera, primarily due to changes to the kernel and Video for Linux, v.2.  To fix it, he had to install Linux Mint 5, instead of 7.    For some cameras, you can pipe a V4L2 camera through V4L virtual video device.  Your camera has to provide pixel format YUV420P.  If that’s the case, the Flashcam project might help. YMMV
• Mojito

Music:

• “Chalkboard” by Convey on “Convey (EP)”
• “How Fast” by Promise of Redemption on “When the Flowers Bloom…”

In this episode, we address listener feedback and comments, and then in a burst of inspiration invite listeners from the chat room to come onto the program for a lively and very fun roundtable discussion. Topics were varied, from portable antenna design, to life without Red Bull; from the HAARP VLF array in Alaska to D-STAR, PACTOR and other digital ham radio communication modes. And since I was on meds and Richard was off his, things got a little crazy towards the end.

We hope you enjoy this episode of Linux in the HAM Shack. Please leave us comments or questions on the web site or via voice mail at 888-455-0305. And send your best wishes to Bill, KA9WKA, who has taken on the responsibility of getting LHS’s show notes out in a timely fashion. Thanks, Bill. You’re a lifesaver!

73 de Russ, K5TUX

• George, N0JRJ, really likes the podcasts and would like to participate in the live show.  (Just show up! -Ed.)  He also agrees with Richard that it can take a long time to amass the equipment for a radio station, and that we need to foster new Elmers.
• Walter, KV6M, made a donation to the podcast.  Thank-you!
• Rodzilla, no call yet, is looking forward to getting his license and a Yaesu FT-8800.  He would like remote control software for the FT-8800, and wants to know if the programming software runs under Wine in Linux.
• K6*** provided instructions for compiling fldigi under Ubuntu Linux 9.10 X64.
• The Princeton Ham Radio Club mentioned the LHS podcast on their website.  That’s Princeton, KY.

Announcements:

• The LHS podcast is now available on social.Zune.net.

Links and Notes:

• Richard talks about his experience with the Linux Cranks (Stay clear of the monorail!)  (ogg format, explicit)
• Hacker Public Radio has asked Richard and Russ to do a couple segments.
• Richard rants about receiving spam via Twitter.
• We discuss “Windows 7 is the same as Ubuntu” .
• Firefox addons useful for ham radio operators.
• AE7Q has tools to add callsign and grid square lookups to your Firefox search engine tool bar (Scroll down to the pink boxes on the lower right corner of the page. -Ed.)
• Mozilla has a QRZ.com addon.
• There is also a plugin to search the ARRL Callsign database.
• N0HR has Propfire, a Firefox plugin for propagation information.
• N0HR also offers PropStats, which provides propagation statistics for your website. http://www.n0hr.com/propstats.htm
• haminfobar from John, G0DPC.
• hamlinks toolbar from N0HR.
• Take a look at VA3STL’s weblog (October 5, 2008 entry).
• Not actually ham radio related, but a couple of cool 3D plugins:  FoxTab lets you browse your Firefox tabs in a 3D fashion, and Cooliris allows you to browse your image files in a similar way.
• Synergy allows you to share a single mouse and keyboard between multiple computers, with just software and your existing network.    There are several configuration tools, such as QuickSynergy for Linux or OS-X, another Mac OS X Synergy GUI, and SynergyKM.
• Xirc is a good IRC client program.  There are versions for Linux, OS X, and Windows.

Conclusion:

Contact Richard via:

Email: kb5jbv@blacksparrowmedia.com
Twitter: twitter.com/kb5jbv
Web: lhsinfo.org
Forums at blacksparrowmedia.com

Contact Russ via:

Email: k5tux@blacksparrowmedia.com
Twitter.com/jrwoodman

Music:

• “San Jose” by Suns of March from their album “Bulletproof Heart”.
• “Another Me” by P. J. Pacifico from their album “Well I’ll Be”.

In Episode #024, we bring you some final wrap-up from Ohio Linux Fest, including interviews with ham radio operators, Linux users, Beth Lynn Eicher from OLF, members of the Drupal project and more. We answer listener comments and questions, of which there are many, and I talk about my getting back on the air and include my new experiences with digital communication via ham radio, from PSK to IRLP. Grab a drink, sit back and enjoy this episode of Linux in the HAM Shack. And if you have a spare couple of dollars, drop them in the can so we can bring our show to the national ham radio convention in 2010: The Dayton Hamvention.

73 de Russ, K5TUX

So without further delay, here are the winners in no particular order:

• E. Wahl
• P. Farris
• J. Wolfe
• T.Picray
• J. Garrett

I will be sending out e-mails shortly to get the mailing addresses for those winners who haven’t already provided them. After that, you should be receiving your prizes in the mail.

Thanks to the Ohio Linux Fest staff for a great experience, and thanks again to all the conference goers for making it a fantastic time. We hope to see everyone next year.

Not ones to leave out actual content and learning, we address questions from listener feedback, and Richard talks about using rig control software under WINE for Icom, Yaesu and Kenwood radios. And of course there are other topics thrown into the mix as well. Thank you to all of our listeners, old and new, for downloading this latest episode. Please tell all your friends about us and send us feedback, whether by e-mail, forum or voice mail. Hope to see everyone in Belton, TX on October 3rd or in Columbus, OH from September 25-27.

And may the force be with you.

73 de Russ (K5TUX)

For the main segment of our program we talk with Paul Shirey of Teen Radio Journey, a podcast chronicling the pursuits of a young man from Illinois on a quest to get his ham radio license. It was a lot of fun to talk with Paul and we’re glad to have him on the show. As always, send us feedback on the program and leave us voice comments at (888) 455-0305. And if you have a few extra dollars kicking around and you find the podcast useful, why not make a charitable donation to the program? All funds go directly toward improving our show. Thanks for listening!

73 de Russ, K5TUX

Don’t forget to leave us voice feedback or questions. We’d love to put you on the air. And we know how ham radio operators often have the gift for gab. So let it out. Don’t be shy. Linux in the HAM shack wants YOU.

73 de Russ, K5TUX

When Gnome first came out, it was noticeably slower on my machine (at that time) than KDE, so I stayed with KDE. I also tried some of the other, lighter, window managers, but being lazy, I stuck mostly with KDE and Red Hat for years, even through a few early versions of Fedora. I became disenchanted with Fedora primarily because of it’s rapid release cycle. I don’t have time to install a new version every six months, or whatever. I like to find a stable version of a distribution and run it for a few years, hopefully with updates. That’s why I ended up using CentOS on my home server, and on a couple of desktops. It’s stable and gets updates for a good long time. Having said all that…

I started listening to “Linux in the Ham Shack”, “Resonant Frequency”, and “Linux Outlaws”, and decided it was time to look at something else. My CentOS 4.7 desktop machine that I used at work, an old Dell Dimension 4100 with a 900 MHz processor and 256 MB of memory, ran fine. But I wanted to try the newer version of Firefox, which would require updating a bunch of libraries and these were not forthcoming. Security patches had dwindled, too, so it was time for a change. Maybe I should give one of the Debian-based distros another chance.

I’d heard good things about Linux Mint, and downloaded the live CD (http://ftp.heanet.ie/pub/linuxmint.com/stable/7/LinuxMint-7.iso). I dug up a Dell OptiPlex GX240 that was mouldering in a back room. It has a 1.5GHz processor, so that would be a nice update in speed, but only had 256 MB of memory. Well, that was good enough for my current CentOS box, so maybe it would be enough here, too. I plugged in a spare monitor, keyboard and mouse, and booted the live CD. All the hardware was recognized, the network configured itself, and I was off and running. Naturally, running off the CD was a bit slow, but that’s to be expected. Since everything seemed to work, I then installed Mint on the hard disk. For those of you that still think Linux is hard to install, give any of the popular distributions a try. Basic installation on reasonably recent hardware (within the last 5 or 6 years) is a breeze. Much easier than Windows, and usually only one reboot at the end. I did have to change from the ALSA sound drivers to the OSS drivers in the Control Center to get sound working. This is no doubt due to the age of this machine.

With the install completed, it was time to move my files, bookmarks and email from the old box to the newer one. Again, not a big deal. I just exported the Firefox bookmarks to a file, and copied the file to a flash drive, along with my Thunderbird default profile directory and various other files I wanted to keep. Then I inserted the flash drive in the Mint box and copied the files to their equivalent places on the new box. I was ready to use it as my main Internet computer at work.

It is pretty! I like the green Mint them, and Gnome has improved a lot since I last played with it. Next, I replaced the old PS/2 mechanical mouse I was using for testing with my preferred Logitech Trackman Wheel. Uh-oh. From the moment X started, if I spun the ball, the cursor would jump around wildly, randomly issuing click events. Not good.

I tried a USB version of the TrackMan Wheel, and it worked perfectly. Evidently, there’s something about the PS/2 mouse driver that just isn’t right for the PS/2 version of the TrackMan. I found a few suggestions online, but none worked. So, I ended up replacing the PS/2 trackball with a USB version. Sometimes, it’s just easier to replace a bit of hardware than spend hours trying to fix software.

I then found that, by default, clicking a link within a message in Thunderbird would not launch Firefox. A bit more Googling revealed that you must create a users.js file within your .mozilla-thunderbird/.default directory containing these lines:

user_pref(“network.protocol-handler.app.http”, “/usr/bin/firefox”);
user_pref(“network.protocol-handler.app.https”, “/usr/bin/firefox”);
user_pref(“network.protocol-handler.app.ftp”, “/usr/bin/firefox”);

After creating that file, and changing the permissions to 700, that issue was fixed.

I was pleasantly surprised to see Firefox 3.5 available as a package from the repositories within days of the Mozilla release. So far, it has been very stable, and perhaps a bit faster than Firefox 3.0.11. However, for whatever reason, it’s still considered “beta” by the repository, so it doesn’t install as the default browser, or replace Firefox 3.0.11.

Over the next week or so, it seemed that this machine, though ostensibly 80% faster, didn’t feel as fast as the old one. And it seemed to be beating up the hard drive quite a bit. I’m guessing there are several possible causes:

1. Gnome may be more resource hungry than KDE. Just an opinion, not necessarily fact.
2. 256MB, while adequate for CentOS 4.7 and KDE3, isn’t enough here.
3. The default setting in MintUpdate to check for updates every 5 minutes (!) is ridiculous.

I changed the MintUpdate setting to check for updates every 4 hours, and maxed out the memory in the machine at 1GB. That did help the performance issues quite a bit. The hard disk has calmed down, and the system feels about as responsive as my older CentOS box.

Then a strange thing happened. I had the screensaver configured to “random”, and the Molecule screensaver activated. The screen was blanked, except for the words Constructing Molecules, and the system froze! Nothing would wake it up, and I could not switch to another virtual console to shut it down. I either had to kill the power, or issue the incantation:

Alt-PrintScreen-S
Alt-PrintScreen-U
Alt-PrintScreen-B

to sync the disk, unmount the disk, and boot, respectively.

After some more research, it turns out this bug is old and tenacious. It’s been around in the Ubuntu (maybe Debian?) world for at least two years, and is still not fixed. From the bug reports I’ve read, it seems to be related to the driver for the ATI 128 Rage Pro Ultra video that’s installed on this machine, and MANY other Dell products. I did find instructions for de-activating the Molecule screensaver:

================
Open a Terminal from the menu Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal and type:

gconf-editor

The Gnome configuration editor opens. From the hierarchy tree on the left side expand “apps” and then choose “gnome-screensaver”. On the right side, you should see the configuration of the screensaver. Look for a property called “themes” and double click it. A window for configuring the themes opens. From the list of values, mark all entries (there should be only one) and click on remove. Then, leave the window by clicking “OK”.

Now, open the screensaver configuration by clicking System -> Preferences -> Screensaver. Choose “Blank Screen” and leave the window.
================

That will revert to just a blank screen screensaver, but at least it won’t hang the machine.

Installing applications from the repositories is easy, and I appreciate having access to the amateur radio packages. Other than the few speed bumps described above, I haven’t had any other problems. I plan on keeping it.

-Bill Grzanich, KA9WKA

Thanks to all of our listeners for downloading the podcast and sending us your comments and other feedback. We hope it’s as much fun for you as it is for us. And remember, leave us an audio comment at +1-888-455-0305 and we’ll get you on the podcast. And if you want to participate as KA9WKA did, let us know and we’ll set you up.

73 de Russ and Richard

73 de Russ, K5TUX

As far as Episode #018 is concerned, Richard and I tackled a few questions from listeners. We spent a few minutes trying to keep our thoughts to ourselves about spam e-mail, managing to fail miserably. After that, we talk about some useful ham radio and other miscellaneous add-ons for Firefox that we hope our listeners will find useful. And when no other topics present themselves, our well-oiled machine moves onto an in-depth look at the virtual keyboard and mouse controller called Synergy.

We hope everyone enjoys this edition of the podcast and feels compelled to send in their comments, questions and suggestions for future episodes. Also, don’t forget to follow us individually and as a podcast on Twitter, and make sure to leave your audio comments at +1-888-455-0305 so we can include them in upcoming shows.

73 de Russ and Richard

Contributors:

• Don WS4E sent us a pointed email. He uses SuperOS and was even able to get his programming software for his talkies. Likes SatScape for satellites in Linux.
• Bob K4BB says that you can use MONO for running HRD on Linux. behind on the podcast. And Likes Unetbootin Really likes the quality of the show. Feels the websites need help. Bob had four or five pieces of feedback this time. Thinks the music is a waste.
• BTW Colin and Martin at ICQ Podcast are our friends
• Captain Spauldings Blog, He uses Ubuntu and likes the podcast. (Hooray for Captain Spaulding the African explorer)
• Donation Mark K. Thanks Mark
• Richard says “Join the fun and be a guest co-host”
• The Techie Geek gave us a mention. Thanks for the tip on the Sansa Clip Russ
• We have appeared again in a comment over at Solder Smoke. Keep spreading the word.
• Thanks to the guys at TiTradio podcast for the mention
• Hello to Azimuth, Wayne KB7CFD, Don’t fear the badger.
• Kent VE4KEH sent us a message about forwarding X11 over SSH using xming

Announcements:

• We now have voice mail. Leave us a message and we will get it on the show +1-888-455-0305

Links and Notes:

• xming for windows
• putty for windows

• Russ talks about Java for a while:
• Its cross platform
• A little clunkie
• Side track to Adobe Air
• Cool stuff available
• BTW there is a version of Adobe Air for Linux
• Now that we have our Java, We need a doughnut

• Drats extravaganza:
• Terminal for D-Star low speed data on Talkies and Mobile Rigs
• Dan KK7DS
• Drats.com
• It is cross Platform
• Written in Python and GTK
• Not only the terminal but a repeater too
• Windows installer
• on Linux you also need a few libraries
• Easy to use if you have ever used terminal software
• If you haven’t used terminal software before, Still easy to set up to run
• Auto QST’s, Preformatted forms, Weather info, APRS, even internet email.
• Heard List, APRS data
• Session activity log
• Ratflector access for testing

• The Drats Repeater Proxy:
• Very simple
• Setup you own repeater at your house
• Can be setup for over the air or network operation
• Don’t have to setup the ports for your local network while testing
• Auto id of repeater
• Monitor screen shows connected computers and radios
• Sometimes Simplicity is best
• Web page has How-to’s, Wiki, Info and mailing list for information about Drats
• Ratflector on ports 9000 and 9001 for testing over at the Drats website
• Russ says it works on MAC
• Check out the website at
• Richard Hopes that Drats becomes the standard for D-Star low speed digital

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Part I & II)
• Jonathan Coulton – Always the Moon
• Dropout Year – This Notebook

]]> http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/2009/07/linux-in-the-ham-shack-17/feed/ 0 http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/2009/07/linux-in-the-ham-shack-017-2/ http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/2009/07/linux-in-the-ham-shack-017-2/#comments Tue, 14 Jul 2009 06:52:34 +0000 Russ K5TUX http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/?p=355 http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/2009/07/linux-in-the-ham-shack-017-2/feed/ 0 00:01:01 Linux in the HAM Shack #017 Exploring Linux and Open Source software and how amateur radio enthusiasts can use them to be more productive and get greater enjoyment out of their hobby. Podcast,(OGG) Richard (KB5JBV) and Russ (K5TUX) clean No http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/2009/07/linux-in-the-ham-shack-017/ http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/2009/07/linux-in-the-ham-shack-017/#comments Tue, 14 Jul 2009 06:43:19 +0000 Russ K5TUX http://blacksparrowmedia.com/lhs/?p=350 Thanks to our wonderful listeners, we have some great feedback to go through in Episode #017 of Linux in the HAM Shack. After we attempt to address everyone’s comments and questions while trying to seem moderately intelligent doing it, I give a short informative segment on Java, Adobe Air and other virtual runtime environments. Then Richard gets down to it, giving a nice description of d-rats, a cross-platform D*STAR application written in Python by KK7DS.

Many thanks as always for subscribing to and downloading the podcast. Feel free to send us any feedback you may have, through e-mail and now through voice mail at +1-888-455-0305 or using the Skype IDs “LeadCrayon” or “KB5JBV”. We’d like to put your voice on the air. And most of you are hams out there, so we know you can do it. So until the next live <strike>fiasco</strike> episode, best regards and 73.

Russ and Richard

• KI6FEN – Likes keeping older equipment alive with Linux
• Rob VE3FRJ – Rob had a little trouble finding his apps after an install
• Jeff KB5WCK – Left a comment thanking us for mentioning his website and Russ mantioned 73’s.org. Then Richard turned it into a real commercial for everybody’s websites
• Gene K8EE – Thinks Linux is in practical, He listens to the podcast but can’t figure out why we use Linux and everybody knows we are just Microsoft haters. Russ and Richard respond in kind with extreme prejudice and packet for flavor.

Announcements:

• Paul M0TZO and Pete M3PHP want everybody to check out http://hamtest.net we want to take it Viral. Put hamtest.net on your blogs, websites, talk about them in the forums you visit. Talk about them in IRC and you other podcasters talk about them on your shows. Spread the word.

Links and Notes:

• This time we talk about stuff that just works after a Linux install since one of the emails intimates that everything works in Windows and nothing works in Linux.
• Web Browsers: Firefox, Iceweasel, Epiphany, Opera, etc. (NO IE)
• Mail Clients: Evolution, Thunderbird, Icedove, Claws, etc.
• Word Processing: OpenOffice.org, gedit, abiword, etc.
• Media Players: Rhythmbox, Banshee, Amarok, Totem, mplayer, xine, etc.
• CD Burners: Brasero, Gnomebaker, K3B, etc.
• After trying to sort out chickens and eggs and carts we agreed that talking about stuff that works and from now on we will go back to fixin’ problems.
• We wrapped up by answering some questions for the live audience in the chat room. Check the show schedule at http://lhsinfo.org for the next live recording

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Part I & II)
• John Ellison – Melt Away
• Shauna Burns – I’m Dirty

I will not be available to record LHS tonight. So we’ll do it tomorrow night, as long as Richard is OK with that. Plan on it unless you hear something different. Podcast, tomorrow night, 7/1, 8:00pm CDT. Be there.

73 de Russ

Similarly, if you have a microphone and Audacity or some other way to record your voice, feel free to e-mail us an audio question, comment, segment, promotion or suggestion and we’ll be happy to put those on the air in a future episode as well. Every little bit helps and with a little bit of audio input from our listeners we can jazz up the podcast even more. Hope to hear from  you soon.

73 de Russ (K5TUX) and Richard (KB5JBV)

As usual, we start out Episode #016 talking about feedback from listeners. We always love to hear what people are saying about us, and we especially like feeling useful when we can answer the questions that come from you. A comment from a listener leads us to our rather unusual topic for this episode: Windows. Now, before you tune out–we don’t actually talk about Windows directly. What we do instead is present all the ways in which we believe Linux is Windows’s equal, from ease of installing applications to productivity out of the box to support and development.

So as always we hope you enjoy this latest episode of Linux in the HAM Shack. Thanks for listening and 73 to all.

Russ (K5TUX)

• Pat on Twitter said “Yes VK’s can have 2×4 call signs” and Russ explains
• Joe NE3R likes Xastir for APRS. Joe is a Windows free Microsoft consultant
• Some Windows bashing ensued
• Bill KA9WKA Just found the program and is really enjoying it. Got Xastir running on his EEE PC. and tells us about www.pendrivelinux.com
• Reminder that we record the show live. Go to www.lhsinfo.org for more information on dates and time
• Hal W4OE is having problems with his Signal Link USB and KAM packet controllers
• W9ZEB Just found the podcast and said Thanks for doing it. He even left a nice write up on his blog about us at
• Joe NE3R Left us some nice words on his blog too at cryptojoe.blogspot.com Russ jumped in and squeezed all the goodness out of the post
• Kent VE4KEH Made the very first donation ever to Linux in the HAM Shack and wants a show on Pulse Audio

Announcements:

• Monsterb at Linux Cranks said he likes the show the other night on IRC. Go visit Linux Cranks. WARNING! They’re show is not family friendly and it is OGG only. you can find them at www.linuxcranks.info
• I found some other useful programs. the first one is The MintCast.  MintCast is a beginner level Linux podcast. You can find them over at www.mintcast.org
• The second is Productive Linux. This one is more about getting stuff done on the desktop.

Links and Notes:

• This install was done on an AMD 1.0 Ghz. Processor with 512 Megs of memory
• A Jackalope is a critter native to west Texas.
• Normal upgrade ordeal. clicking the upgrade button never works for me.
• Downloaded the Ubuntu Live CD and it worked fine except Nautilus did not work for me.
• Kubuntu live cd loaded and ran just fine with no issues
• Time to install
• Installer worked just like it was supposed to.
• Ran fine after install
• After install from machine off to desktop ready took 63 seconds to boot.
• Plenty of good tools Firefox, Gimp, Compiz, Open Office, etc.
• Default media player is Rhythmbox
• No animal on the desktop (Thank God)
• Wireless networking worked with no issues
• Did not try the EXT4 file system

• First Richard gave us a description of SSH
• With towel in hand Russ began to speak about SSH
• you can use SSH for remote to your machines over the internet or your network
• SSH uses Port 22
• You need your port 22 open on your firewall if logging in from out side the local net work
• you need to install the SSH client and SSH server as needed
• Russ is so smart
• Type SSH -y username and remote machines address and you are off to the races
• you will be ask for a password. then you are in.
• Now you have a terminal connection to the remote machine matching the user you sign as
• Forwarding X-Windows is possible but beyond the scope of this episode
• Russ says that running Firefox over SSH may end in tears
• Try YFKlog via SSH
• SCP uses SSH to copy files from a local to remote machine
• Russ suggest PUTTY for SSH in Windows, Richard suggest CygWin for SSH in Windows
• In the wrap up Russ suggest Checking the MAN pages and playing with SSH and you will find it to be a great tool

• We will talk about Debian in a few weeks
• We are looking to have another round table episode. Let us know if you are interested in being involved
• Russ finds life between the peaks very lovely

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Part I & II)
• John Brown’s Body – Give Yourself Over
• Bryan Litchfield – Early Morning

In the first of our informational segments, Richard describes his installation of Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope) and gives his thoughts and general appreciation for the system. In the second segment, I ramble on about SSH (secure shell) and all of its various uses, from logging into remote systems to copying files to forwarding X applications to a local machine. I’d say it even turned out pretty coherent thanks to some extensive editing. Just kidding. Maybe.

Enjoy the episode, and don’t forget to flood us with that feedback.

• Tim KI6BGE tells us he is finally up and running with Ubuntu on his laptop
• Jerry KD0BIK thanks us for mentioning Practical Amateur Radio Podcast
• Blog post from Tim VK5FNET at the Homebrew Blog Talking about Linux in the Ham Shack and Solder Smoke
• XE1GXG  in Jalisco Mexico tells us by way of 73’s.org that he enjoys the show and there is no swine flu in Jalisco
• Thanks to the Japanese Blog Atworld.jp/radioshack for the mention
• A New five star review at Itunes for the show
• KI6FEN Would like to know why Linux is better than the alternatives because everybody tells him to use something different
• Myron KC5OHG Downloaded Ubuntu and wants to know how to install it.
• Alex OZ9AEC with corrections to Episode 12 concerning Grig. An icon for Grig can be found at “/usr/share/pixmaps/grig/ic910.png” ( I am Russ, I am! )
• Jeff KB5WCK tells us he put a link on his website for us at kb5wck.com and ask what software we use to record the podcast
• KI4YMD uses xlog for logging and a signallink usb with FLdigi but needs help with SSTV

Announcements:

• Resonant Frequency is now running on Drupal check it out www.rfpodcast.info Russ even likes it and does a mini review
• We did not mention South East Linux Fest

Links and Notes:

• You can get Linux for free
• Most of the more common software is open source and there is a Linux version
• You don’t have to go to best buy to get Linux. You can download it from Home
• Windows and Apple application are closed source. In Linux you get the source code and are free to modify it to fit your needs
• Richard runs a couple of windows machines and has to reboot them very often. He also runs Linux machines he doesn’t have to reboot for months
• The myth of support is that Windows online support is helpful and you can’t get support for Linux. The truth is Windows support people are inept and Linux support can be found in community forums, online tutorials, Howto’s, and some distro’s allow you to sign up for online tech support at a cost that is much lower than the cost of a copy of Windows or OSX. Yes if it is pre-installed you are still paying for the operating system.

• Issues with QSSTV
• Problems finding usb0
• lspci and lsusb commands
• An alternative to QSSTV for Slow Scan TV
• The current version of QSSTV seems to be a little deaf
• Use a piece of software written for Windows
• Enter WINE
• Add WINE from the Repo’s or from Winehq.org
• At WINEHQ you can find an application database of programs that are known to run under WINE. If it is not in the database that doesn’t mean it doesn’t run under WINE.
• When WINE is installed then download MMSSTV from
• at the command prompt in a terminal type “wine program-name” Probably mmsstv.exe
• Don’t be afraid of the wine configuration area
• Change your station information in MMSSTV
• Set your audio levels
• You will need a copy of MS paint to install in wine to edit pictures for MMSSTV but we would never tell you to do so
• If you choose to use Windows. Please use a legal copy.

• Russ does a shout out to Code Weavers at codeweavers.com
• Richard sends a shout to Fresh Ubuntu Podcast
• Richard shamelessly plugs Resonant Frequency at rfpodcast.info

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Part I & II)
• Sean Smith – Satellite
• The Black Seeds – One By One

Thanks as always to everyone for downloading the podcast. Please tell everyone you know about us, and if you have a couple of bucks burning a hole in your pocket, feel free to donate to LHS so we can improve the program. In the next couple of episodes we’ll have our first formal interview segment so stay tuned for that.

• KE7BAF about WUBI. Checkout WUBI at www.wubi-installer.org
• Timis Via Twitter told us we are #1
• Tom the Trucker left a wonderful review over at Itunes for us
• N8XJA Tony found us through Itunes and is re-inspired by the show to pursue his Linux Dream
• Rochester NY Amateur Radio Association added us to their website as a valuable Resource. Check it out. http://rochesterhamfest.org/
• Mentioning the Dane Alex OZ9AEC and his Amateur radio software for Linux some of those are Gpredict Sat Tracker http://gpredict.oz9aec.net and Grig http://groundstation.sourceforge.net/grig
• A Comment from Petr OK2CQR. Developer of CQRlog which we highlighted on an earlier episode. CQRLog can be found at http://www.cqrlog.com/
• Myron says The Live show is pretty neat. Don’t forget the Live recording session every other week check out the main page for more details. www.lhsinfo.org
• Bob WD4BOB Has added some info to his page about the show go check out his blog at http://wd4bob.com/wd4bob/home/home.html Thanks Bob
• KC7DEZ Barry Wants to get on packet and we are researching ways to get that happening. If you are good with packet and Linux get in touch with us.
• WA3FKG Ken Posted about us in his Blog http://www.wa3fkg.com/
• Josh Looking looking for basic info on Ham radio.

Notes:

Richard is a tester so this is the way he does it. If you are sure that rig control is going to run the way it supposed to then skip the Grig stuff.

• Make sure you have hamlibham2 installed. Use Grig from the repositories to help make sure your rig control is working. Use “grig -h” at the command line for help.
• Russ talks about creating a launcher for Grig in the menu.
• Get you rig ID number by typing “grig – -list” for a list.
• Make sure your rig is in VFO mode. Rig control will not work in memory mode. Once you have it working move on over to FLDIGI.
• You can control a radio with libhamlib2, rig cat, mem map. We assume that you already have FLDigi installed and running. Go to the rig control tab. Under rig control go to the hamlib tab. Check the box that says “Use hamlib”. The next box says “use hamlib PTT” leave this unchecked. I did not try this you can experiment with it later. Find your Radio in the drop down list. Port will be the port your cat cable is on with the same settings you use in Grig. Initialize! There you go explore and have fun.

Links:

• grig
• fldigi

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux & Tomato (Part I & II)
• Brad Sucks – Overreacting
• Valleum – CB Radio

73 de Russ (K5TUX)

We’d like to thank the multitudes we had in the chat room for the live broadcast of Episode #013. It was our best turnout yet with more than 25 participants from all over the world. We’d like to encourage everyone to jump in on the next broadcast, which will be on May 13th at 0100Z. The LHS release schedule is being pushed back a week because I will be out of town at a conference during the first week of May. Thanks again to all our downloaders and everyone who takes the time to send us feedback and questions. There would be no podcast without you.

Note: We had several audio problems attempting to record this episode due to erratic network connectivity. Everything is cleaned up and organized nicely except for one brief audio dropout that could not be recovered. You’ll know it when you hear it.

73 de Russ (K5TUX)

73 de K5TUX

And that’s not all. We address listener comments, feedback, questions and talk with the live guests in our chatroom. It’s the longest and most action-packed Linux in the HAM Shack yet, and we’re just getting started. Thanks for listening, and don’t forget to keep the feedback coming.

73 de K5TUX

• Cheryl Jones, XYL – Mount Vernon, Missouri, USA
• Tony Bonante, KB3CDA – West Mifflin, Pennsylvania, USA
• Lee Levine, KD7ETH – Phoenix, Arizona, USA
• Bob Mulroy, WD4BOB – Tampa, Florida, USA
• Alex Csete, OZ9AEC – Ribe, Denmark
• Al Bedelph, VK7AX – Ulverstone, Tasmania, Australia
• Ronny Julian, K4RJJ – Dallas, Georgia, USA

Links:

• Xastir – APRS packet receiver and location plotter
• CrunchBang Linux – Dark-themed, minimalist and popular Linux distribution
• OpenBox – Lightweight window manager
• Acer EeePC – Widely used netbook computer
• YFKlog – QSO logging software by DJ1YFK
• CQRlog – QSO logging software
• TLF Logging – QSO logging software

YFKlog Perl Dependency Packages:

• libcurses-perl
• libdbd-mysql-perl
• libdbd-sqlite2-perl
• Possibly others depending on previously installed packages

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Parts I & II)
• Joe Peters – Burning Building
• Five Star Fall – What Planet Are We On?

• M0TZO – Paul in London, England, UK
• M3PHP – Pete in Oxford, England, UK
• WD4BOB – Bob in Tampa, Florida, USA
• KB3CDA – Tony in White Oak, Pennsylvania, USA
• KD0BIK – Jerry in Denver, Colorado, USA
• WA0EIR – Ted in Clinton, Iowa, USA
• KC5VQD – Graham in Blue Ridge, Texas, USA

Links:

• Ham Radio Deluxe
• SQLServer Express
• PuTTY
• sshfs
• The Practical Amateur Radio Podcast
• CQ Magazine
• DX Anywhere
• Pretty Good Projects
• hamtests.net
• Psk31lx
• International Beacon Project
• HamCon Colorado
• HamCom
• NTP (Network Time Protocol)
• yfklog
• TLF

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Part I & II)
• Charles David Sharp – The Sage
• Wiser Time – Free

That being said, because of the unusual format of the program some of the dialogue may seem a little strange. In most cases it can be explained as one of the hosts reading questions or reciting information provided by the live participants in the chat room at the time of recording. We also managed to wrangle a special third co-host for the middle portion of the program.

All in all it’s a wild and crazy ride. Thank you as always for downloading the podcast, and special thanks to those who helped us out by joining us for the live recording of the program. Please check the web site for the next time you can hear us record live and participate in the program yourself.

Enjoy this special edition of Linux in the HAM Shack and we’ll be back in a couple of weeks with a program on logging software, a review or two of CrunchBang Linux and much, much more.

73 de K5TUX and KB5JBV

Just a heads up.

73 de K5TUX (and KB5JBV)

• KG4SBY – Jim in Spring Hill, Florida, USA
• KI6BGE – Tim in Torrance, California, USA
• VE2GZI – Bruce in Saint-Lazare, Quebec, Canada
• K7JM – John in Jefferson City, Montana, USA
• K5LXP – Mark in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA
• W5AGW – Andy in Kingwood, Texas, USA
• VK2BAC – Adrian in Gorokan, New South Wales, Australia
• WD8LQB – Stephen in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA

Links:

• Creative Commons
• McDougall’s Home
• Mandriva
• Midnight Commander
• alien
• ShackStick
• The Practical Amateur Radio Podcast
• WD8LQB Morse Code Practice Podcast
• Crunchbang Linux

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Part I & II)
• Matt Commerce – Back in the Game
• Albert Forssell – Life on a Beach

As always, thank you so much for listening to the program. Please help spread the word about Linux in the HAM shack by tweeting about us, posting on your blogs, telling your fellow hams and just getting the word out. We appreciate it, and we’ll do the same for you if you send us your information.

Tons of feedback in this episode and then we tackle digital modes from RTTY to Throb. Enjoy.

73 de Russ

• WA0EIR – Ted in Clinton, Iowa, USA
• AD7MI – Scott in Leavenworth, Kansas, USA
• VE6LE – Richard in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
• KG6ZYC – Heather in Campbell, California, USA
• VK7AX – Al in Ulverstone, Tasmania, Australia
• KD8ARO – Henry in Walton, West Virginia, USA
• KK7DS – Dan in Hillsboro, Oregon, USA

Links:

• Spinning and Grinning Blog
• d-rats
• Totally Cool Tech
• Shackbox
• Tech Podcast Network

Music:

• Gamma Leonis – Bacon, Linux and Tomato (Part I & II)
• Relics Jetboat – The Protest Song
• Dust Rhinos – Ragged Crow