[Elecraft] S: Re: Elecraft Utilities

[James Bennett]

After reading a half-bazillion posts on this I feel compelled to add my two cents worth. 

I've been around computers a very long time, starting my career back in the days of IBM's "big iron" mainframes. Have had my share of Windows-based PCs at work and at home, and ten years ago converted to being a "Mac head". Early last year I got my first Raspberry Pi and more recently acquired the newer version 3. I also run a Ubuntu Linux guest on my iMac under VMware Fusion. My primary reason for having these Ubuntu and RPi Linux instances was to set up WSJT-X, WSPR, and Quisk so I could experiment with and operate a tiny QRPp SDR while my K-line is used as my primary station rig.

What I see as huge stumbling blocks in this whole Linux thing are twofold: the need in many cases to compile an application, and having to deal with pre-requisite packages. A pre-built package, with everything in it, is IMHO, the only way to go. I can't begin to count the number of hours I've spent dorking around with this pre-req crud and getting an application correctly compiled. These are hours I would have much sooner spent actually using the application instead of tracking down what the correct version of pre-req I need, where to get it, yada, yada. That stuff is fun for a while but not how I want to spend my time.

Anyone new to Linux and used to simply downloading an application from the web or dropping a disk into their machine on Windows or a Mac will have a real eye opening experience when they first attempt compiling an application on Linux. The opportunity for failure is huge and thinking that Elecraft would consider for one second having to support this sort of thing - hahahahahaha!!!! Yeah, if you are a Linux guru it might be a piece of cake for you, but for the rest of us - major PITA.



Jim Bennett / W6JHB
Folsom, CA