Packet Radio TNC with the Raspberry Pi

** Updated 21-2-18

The Pi plus a USB soundcard is all you need to get started with Packet Radio. Instead of using a dedicated hardware TNC, the Pi can be coaxed to do the hard work of managing the Packet protocol.

Full instructions can be found on the WB2OSZ’z website at: https://github.com/wb2osz/direwolf

Installation

Start with the latest version of Raspbian Stretch and update it as follows:

sudo apt -y update && sudo apt -y upgrade
sudo reboot

The only additional package required is libasound2-dev so install that as follows:

sudo apt install -y libasound2-dev

Now we can install Dire Wolf as follows:

cd~
git clone https://github.com/wb2osz/direwolf
cd direwolf
make
sudo make install
make install-conf
make install-rpi

Now we need to make a couple of changes to the configuration file:

sudo nano direwolf.conf

Scroll down to the line: #ADEVICE – plughw:1,0 and delete the # from the start of both lines.

Scroll down to CHANNEL 0 PROPERTIES and replace NOCALL with your callsign-1, i.e. G4WNC-1. NB: This must be caps.

Press Ctl x followed by y to save and close the file.

Reboot the Pi and run Dire Wolf by double-clicking on the desktop icon.

If you want an APRS client for the Pi then YAAC works well.

You can also add a USB GPS or a GPS Hat to make the Pi into an APRS tracker. Details are on the WB2OSZ website.