Shortwave listening and everything radio including reviews, broadcasting, ham radio, field operation, DXing, maker kits, travel, emergency gear, events, and more
The new SDR-Control app that lets you use certain iCOM radios as remote controlled SDR stations for Macbook or iPad does not yet (May 2022 now) officially support my iCOM IC-R8600 but Marcus Roskosch from https://roskosch.de/ told me that he recently purchased an IC-R8600 and the app already works on an experimental basis.
I immediately bought the app, installed it on my MacBook, connected a network cable between home router and radio and tried it out…
I also show how I use bhi DSP units to filter out noise to enhance speech at the radio and at the computer audio.
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Bill Hemphill, who shares the following guest post:
Radio Schedules in a Simple Android Database
by Bill Hemphill
I am a program listener. I really enjoy listening to various radio stations direct and by internet streaming. Over time, I have come up with a couple of spread sheets that lists the program, station, time, date, etc. For example, following is the spreadsheet for the shortwave radio programs/stations that I enjoy:
As the program schedules change, I update the spreadsheet. This has worked quite well for me. I usually sort on the weekday and then print out the spreadsheet as a list by time and frequency for each day.
While this method works, it does mean that I have these multiple page printouts that I have to refer to. This got me thinking that it would be great to have this on my Android phone/tablet. Then I could refer to it no matter where I was located.
At first, I tried to use Google Sheets, but found that using a spreadsheet on the phone or even a tablet to be a pain. I then tried entering it into a calendar program, but also found that very cumbersome. Continue reading →
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Markku Koskinen, who notes the following new and updated programs for the Icom IC-705 general coverage transceiver:
The app appears to control basic functionality like tuning, band, mode, filter, and CI-V address switching. The app is free and should work on most Android devices.
Thanks, Rob! CATSync seems to allow control of a web-based SDR from any OMNI Rig-supported radio via CAT control (which is the majority of transceivers). It appears CATSync allows control of tuning and mode changes via your radio and from the web SDR interface back to your rig.
One interesting use of this would be to use a remote SDR for receiving while using your home antenna for transmitting. This could help those inundated with RFI at home. While this might not be an allowed practice for contesting (having your receiver and transmitter in two different locations) it’s certainly permitted if you want to check in with a net or chat with friends. You don’t need CATSync to do this–you can always manually tune a web SDR separately–it would simply facilitate keeping both your RX and TX on the same frequency.
CATSync has a free trial with limited control–you can purchase the full version for 9.95 EUR.
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Dennis Dura, who shares the following GoFundMe campaign by Steven Clift to help with the continued development of the 1 Radio News application. Here’s the summary from Steven’s GoFundMe page:
1 Radio News needs a total rebuild to work great on Android 9 and 10.
I’ve kept this world radio news hobby alive with just enough revenue to cover developer costs since 2013!
Unfortunately, Google and Android change what is required to keep what once worked great functioning well.
Without your help, 1 Radio News will be no more.
With your support, I will pass 100% of your donation to developers to make this happen. We need to raise $1000 by the end of January.
EVERY donor, at any amount, will get a free pass for a new 1 Radio News Pro in-app subscription for the life of the app.
The new Pro will be launched with a simple $1/month subscription to cover the cost of feature improvement and updating the radio streams and curated collection of the best hourly and daily news. If you don’t want to chip in now, you’ll be able to help us on a monthly or yearly basis later.
1 Radio News Pro is Dead! Long live the 1 Radio News!
The current 1 Radio News Pro “as is” will sunset at a date to be determined in 2020. If you’d rather get a refund for the current 1 Radio News Pro and not participate in our effort to keep this app alive, just get in touch via the app and I’ll give you your money back even if you used the app for half a decade.
I do my best to keep this list of applications up-to-date and am always on the lookout for new ones. Thing is, new apps are developed every day–certainly a moving target for this editor.
This is where you can help…
Please comment on this post with your favorite radio-related iOS, Android, and Windows Phone applications. Please link to the app and/or mention what operating system you use. Of course, please tell us what you love about your choice apps.
A prize! Woot!
Next Friday (August 23, 2019) I’ll pick one random comment from this post and send the lucky reader a copy of Pirate Radio: The incredible saga of America’s underground, illegal broadcasters by Andrew Yoder. This classic pirate radio history book even includes an audio CD with clips from famous (and infamous!) pirate radio stations.
(Source: The Verge via Richard Cuff and Kim Elliott)
An experimental unit within Google has been quietly developing a new app for discovering and playing podcasts. Called Shortwave, the new app was revealed by a trademark filing embedded below, which describes it as “allow[ing] users to search, access, and play digital audio files, and to share links to audio files.”
Nothing in the trademark filing specifies the kind of audio being accessed, but a Google representative said the focus of the app was on spoken word content. There is little public information about the app, although Google has played with smart captioning, translation, and other AI-assisted features in previous podcast products.[…]
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Frans Goddijn, who shares the following article and video originally posted on his blog:
