[Elecraft] K4 and Linux Infrastructure

[Fred Jensen]

Well, all good discussion, but I advise that you do not hold your breath 
for "open firm/software in the K4," or basically any access at all.  
It's just beyond what any manufacturer can do.  I suppose Eric, who is 
noted for his business skills, could start up an "E-tunes" app store for 
the K4, with developer standards, testing, and the like.  I doubt that's 
remotely close to the top of his To-Do list however.

Having just had my 79th birthday yesterday [thanks for all the HB's!], I 
remember when Heath came out with an analog computer at what would have 
been the beginning of the "Science Hobbyist" revolution.  Without the 
Internet, there were no Email lists of course, but the number of "I did 
this and it didn't do what I expected" inquiries was way more than they 
expected.  Fortunately [for Heath] the customer base was very rapidly 
exhausted and the Heathkit Analog Computer silently sailed into the sunset.

73,
Fred ["Skip"] K6DGW
Sparks NV DM09dn
Washoe County

PS:  Anyone who tells you "79 feels just like 78" is smoking their socks.

On 6/3/2019 4:02 PM, Jeff Scaparra wrote:
> Missed reply all.
>
> At some level even if they do "only" have apps they will have this problem.
> App developers will need to be able to modify and test things. Also I doubt
> that there would be many apps if this is a separate process than mainstream
> linux/windows. why would a hobby developer want to build a separate thing
> just for one pretty expensive radio when they could just build the app for
> linux or windows and support everyone.
>
> Maybe they have some trick to make app onboarding easy.
>
> My 2 cents
> Jeff N6SDR
>