[Ham-Linux] RE: Anyone using . . .

[leif at sm5bsz.com]

Hi Nate and all,

> That is certainly some of it.  Probably a lot of it is that many hams
> learned to tame Windows over the past few years and are reluctant to
> believe the promises of us Linux advocates.  I've long thought that
> what was needed to push Linux into the average ham's shack was one
> "killer app".  However, that app has proven to be elusive.  New
> technologies like WSJT continue to appear on Windows first and then an
> alpha imitation is written for Linux/BSD when some interested party
> gets around to it (I'm not knocking those efforts--I just lack the
> required skillset to assist).

Linrad is available for Linux only. It is an SDR package that allows
reception under heavy QRN+QRM when no other radio will work. It has
brought many new users to Linux:-)

The Linrad home page is here:
http://www.sm5bsz.com/linuxdsp/linrad.htm

The usage of Linrad has been growing very slowly because it does not
run under MS Windows. As a consequence the demand for appropriate
hardware has grown very slowly so cost efficient solutions do not
yet exist for people who are unwilling to build their own equipment.

Linrad uses soundcards to get data into the computer. I have made
a chain of converters available to sample two channels at 90 kHz
bandwidth each with extremely high dynamic range. The next version
of Linrad can use the SDR-14 which is a bit cheaper but has much lower
dynamic range although probably good enough for most amateur usages.

My problem is the opposite to what has been discussed. A Windows 
version would open the market for good hardware at lower cost.
I am waiting for others to help with that but the process is 
extremely slow, after months of waiting I have heard nothing.

Is there perhaps someone on this list who knows how I could set up
a Makefile to use with Linux make to produce an executable for
Microsoft Windows? If you have any idea, I would very much
appreciate the complete project.tgz for a program that does
the following:

1) Open an empty window on the screen with size X1,Y1,X2,Y2
These parameters should be fixed in the source code but values
from 25% up to 100% of the screen have to be acceptable.

2) Paint the entire window black (if it is not already by default)

3) Put a coloured pixel at A,B (fixed parameters in the source code)

4) Read one character from the keyboard and exit if the character
is X. Otherwise change the colour of the pixel at A,B 

If someone could help by supplying the appropriate tarball I am
pretty sure I can use it to change the Makefile of Linrad so it
would produce a linrad.exe for use under Windows besides the 
linrad file that will run on the computer on which it was
compiled.

The idea is that experimenters use Linux. Some users already use their 
own bits of source code with Linrad. For Linux, source code only will
be available. Experimenters can do whatever modifications they wish
and then compile a version for their friends who only know how 
to use MS Windows:-)

73

Leif / SM5BSZ