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Mac OSX in the world of SWL's
By Stefano I3-2782/VE, MDXC#361
 

In this years Apple-Mac computers have become very popular, especially with the introduction of Intel processor.
There are some programs available over the net for amateur radio use, but the first stop is MacHamradio by Steve Muncy NI5V and Lee Imber WW2DX, a nice site with a great, updated collection of almost all OSX-Radio software available.

In this page I'll try to present the best free software available for our hobby.

 

First of all... logging!

RUMLog by DL2RUM
[ website ]

"RUMlog is a short-wave logging and QSL handling/printing tool for Mac OSX. In version 3 RUMlog was completely rewritten and is a Universal Binary now.

The logbook of the world is full supported, you can get different statistics for paper QSls. It’s just a mouse click to upload or download new QSLs to/from the ARRL server.

It is a very simple terminal integrated. It is useful for PR connection to a DX-cluster. Or just use it to monitor the local digipeater for DX-announcements. RUMlog will separate DX-spots and alert you when there is a "new one". Or you can use the Telnet function to connect an Internet DX-cluster everywhere you want.

RUMlog is available with an interface for transceiver control. Supporting Kenwood, Elecraft and ICOM. (IC-7400/IC746PRO, IC-7000 and IC-706). A documentation file is included in the package."

There are no SWL logging fields in this logbook, so you can use the "Note" field to write down correspondent callsign. If you need to upload your log to eQSL I've write a tool that convert adif file generated by RUMLog in eQSL adif with swl correspondent field support.
[Download adif converter]

There are others logging software made for Mac. I've found that RUMLog is clean, fast, full of utilities and... free!

 
Digital modes?

Fldigi by W1HKJ
[ website ]

Fldigi has all you need. Many digital modes supported, radio control, integrated log, waterfall, etc..
A special note goes to PSK Browser window in Fldigi, it's like the Superbrowser of Ham Radio Deluxe.

 
SDR

DSP Radio by DO8SEM
[ website ]

DSP Radio is a frontend for Software Defined Radio (like Softrocks). Like in other SDR programs you can control everything: frequency, demodulation, volume, filters, bandwidth. I've tested the old version with SoftRock 40/80 and works fine.

Some notes:
- Last release runs in OSX 10.5, so if you have older version of OS the program doesn't work.
- It is preferred to use an external audio card with high sample rating. (96-192KHz)

 
A big miss!

A big miss for me is SSTV software. All the programs I've found are not freeware or really old. I hope that in future someone write down some lines of code for SSTV...

That's all for now, for a complete collection of OSX software please visit MacHamradio.
Enjoy your SWL activity with OSX!

 
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