Ham LINUX

This Page will chronicle my efforts to bring LINUX to the forefront in my Shack. As a frustrated WINDOWS User for many years, I find the constant “upgrades” (almost weekly now) and changes in WINDOWS to be a constant annoyance. I have been a LINUX user for many years, and every year or two, I revisit the possibility of moving my main Shack PC to LINUX. I know there are others who have done this, and it seems like time to get more serious about it.

I will be assembling a computer and installing LINUX and select software from the Ham community that will run on LINUX. I know this is a limited set of applications, but it is time to start down a path that could be an alternative to WINDOWS. I realize that there are some apps that I want to run that will never run on LINUX, so I will still have a WINDOWS computer, but I would like to transition that to be the secondary machine in the Shack.

This Page will be an evolving  work-in-progress, but I will keep the Page public, for anyone that wants to follow my progress, or make suggestions (highly welcome!)

One of my first questions – is there an email Group for Ham Software for LINUX? If so, where? If not, why not??

Update July 2026

I have been meaning to update this page and get more active in using LINUX for my Ham Radio activities, as much as possible. In fact I now only use WINDOWS on the computers I have directly connected to radios. That is mainly because I see no other option if I want to use the best available software like N1MM+ for contesting. Using Remote Desktop software (like NoMachine) let’s me use my WINDOWS apps but live mostly on computers using LINUX. Things like circuit design and software design can be done exclusively in LINUX.

I have been wanting to take a new look at LINUX for the shack, but had not heard anything that really motivated me to do so. There seems to be a little more interest lately in looking at this LINUX Page. I am going to connect an IC-7300 to a LINUX-only computer and see what I can do. I am probably going to start with Digital Modes and WSJT-X software, since this software is LINUX-ready and has been so popular. It should be easy to setup and get it going …… right?

Remote Desktop Software

I have multiple computers that I use at two different locations. I am now using ZeroTier to create a virtual LAN. Doing this allows me to treat all of the computers as if they are at one location. Some of my computers now run only LINUX.

Some Good News on LINUX for Hams

While it seems necessary to use WINDOWS for some applications, there are some that are now being made available for LINUX. One of the most notable is WSJT-X, the software that is used with all of the new Digital Modes. Another is AntScope, the native application that is used with Rig Expert Antenna analyzers. I will be experimenting with these in the near future, to see how they perform compared to the legacy WINDOWS applications.

While not exactly a mainstream Ham application, there is now some very capable circuit design software that can be used under LINUX. I have been using KiCad and am extremely impressed with the functionality and the robustness of this application suite.

Is WINE a Viable Option?

I also would like to know what ever happened to WINE, the Windows emulator for LINUX. I have not heard much about it recently, and I have never heard claims that any of the more popular WINDOWS Ham applications can be run under WINE.