Decode Amateur Radio and other digital modes with your computer and a free online shortware radio.

[Szymon]

Hi Friends,

I've been playing around with the free online shortwave receiver and I had an idea.

http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/

I wanted to see if I could redirect the output of the online shortwave receiver into a free open-source digital mode decoder software. In theory, this should work and it looks like it is.

If you're up for the challenge and would like to decode your own digital modes from the shortwave radio, here are the steps. It's a bit fiddly, but worth the pain.

You will need an opensource digital cable connector

https://vb-audio.com/Cable/VirtualCables.htm

Next, you will need an application to decode the FT8 amateur radio digital mode that's being brodcasted on 14.074Mhz.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/wsj...4.exe/download

So all you have to do is install the virtual cable software, then install the wsjtx software.

Switch on your online shortwave SDR radio, tune to 14.074Mhz



Open the wsjtx software and click on file -> settings



Switch over to the new VB Audio patch cable as indicated in my next screenshot.




Once, done sit back and wait until the Band Activity screen starts populating with various messages from amateur radio operators.



You can use this webpage to lookup the callsign prefixes.

https://www.mapability.com/ei8ic/maps/prefix/neeu.php

See how you go. It looks a bit complicated but the concept is simple.

Cheers,
Szymon