[Elecraft] OT Linux for Elecraft K3 use - Which Distribution to use?

[Nate Bargmann]

* On 2011 02 Jun 07:47 -0500, R. Kevin Stover wrote:
> For ease of install you can't beat the Debian based distro Ubuntu.
> I'd suggest a really lightweight desktop manager like Fluxbox, XFCE, or
> the like because you don't have the horsepower to run Gnome or KDE.
> 
> I run Ubuntu 10.10 amd64 with an XFCE desktop manager.

I can recommend XFCE as a good desktop.  It is easily installed with the
Ubuntu distribution as Xubuntu which is simply a much lighter
installation than the standard Ubuntu with no loss of functionality.  It
is light enough that I have run it from a 4 GB thumb drive when on the
road with the work laptop.

> For rig control your going to need Hamlib.

More precisely, version 1.2.13 or later.  I did a lot of work with the
K3 support that made it into that version so the K3 is much better
supported.  There are still some issues with Fldigi that I have found
where if one changes band and mode at once from a bookmark that the mode
is changed first and then the frequency is changed.  That results in the
mode being changed on the first band and then it being whatever was last
used on the target band.  I haven't brought that issue up with W1HKJ
yet, however, as he has a more pressing need.

> For logging I use CQRLog (MySQL database back end).
> For digimodes I use FLDigi.
> The nice thing about both of those packages is that they support the
> K1EL winkeyer. My version is the USB.

I have the Master Keyer 1 that supports K1EL protocol.  So far, so good.

> There is a Linux version of the K3 utility you should be able to
> get to from the Elecraft website.

The latest version does seem to work well.  One just needs to be sure to
have the curl package installed for querying of firmware updates to
work.

73, de Nate >>

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