I am having trouble with WFview working with remote access via VNC. Here’s the kicker, yesterday morning it was working flawlessly via VNC. Something changed and now when I launch WFview via VNC, it fail.- see steps below. However, if I launch WFview from the machine hosting the VNC server, it works perfectly. The only thing I remember doing is uninstalling light-locker because it was throwing errors. It seems that since it’s working fine on the host machine, the settings in WFview and the radio are still good. It seems like the issue is with the ports.
I’m puzzled about what could have happened. Any help will be appreciated.
Rebooted the machine running the VNC client (Mac OS)
Reinstalled light-locker
Reinstalled Tiger VNC server
Reinstalled WFview from the install script
Tested with Real VNC client (same result)
Scratching my head
Steps to reproduce the problem
Radio on
Launch WFview remotely via VNC session
Error:
alsa_output.usb-Burr-Brown_from_TI_USB_Audio_CODEC-00.analog-stereo.monitor:
Server audio output device does not exist, please check.
Transmit audio will NOT work until this is corrected
**** please disable the server if not required ****
After dismissing the error by clicking on OK, I get a second error:
alsa_output.usb-Burr-Brown_from_TI_USB_Audio_CODEC-00.analog-stereo.monitor:
Server audio input device does not exist, please check.
Receive audio will NOT work until this is corrected
**** please disable the server if not required ****
After dismissing the error, WFview launches and appears to be working in as much as it can power on and off the radio and can control the frequency
I then launch WSJT-x and it can control the radio and CAT Test and PTT test both work. However, WSJT-x does not monitor and decode any data from WFview.
I then close WSJT-x
Next, I click disconnect from the radio, and WFview immediately terminates so I have no access to settings
That’s correct. The VNC client is running on the Mac to access the vnc server running on linux. Also on the linux machine are the Wfview server, WSJT-x and GridTracker.
I’m not using vnc to do anything with the the WFview server on the linux machine. It’s just used to access WSJT and GridTracker on the same machine as WFview. If you’re saying vnc isn’t remotely supported, then what configuration would I use to allow me to use WSJT and GridTracker remotely?
install a wfview client on your mac.
install wsjtx on your mac
I don’t know about gridtracker on mac but you probably can connect it to
wfview/wsjtx as well. I see there is even a mac binary.
connect the stuff together on your mac.
to me there is no need to use vnc. and if your vnc fails, it has nothing to do with wfview. a 7300, wsjtx nor gridtracker.
If you want your vnc to work, try to find out if it’s your client side or the ubuntu side and get the hints at the places where they do support vnc.
Maybe a bit harsh but I don’t see anything that has to do with your wfview setup…
I 100% agree that it’s not the wfview setup that’s the issue.
When I’m physically at the linux box, wsjt works fine using Hamlib NET rigctl via the wfview server. No problem.
Last week, i could go to the mac and vnc into the linux box, launch wsjt and it worked fine - just like it did when running it locally on the linux box. I was a happy camper.
Then something changed and now when using vnc to access the linux box, it started causing the errors described in my original post. What I don’t understand is why it still works locally, used to work via vnc, and now vnc causes errors. I think it’s related to ports working differently in a vnc session versus a local session. Does that make any sense?
Also, I may being going at this wrong. I have the wfview client installed on the mac. Are you saying all I need to do is install wsjt on the mac and connect to the mac wfview client?
if it all works at the server side, I can’t come up with a reason why it cannot get it to work on the mac. I don’t own a mac nor ubuntu, I am full linux, more towards enterprise stuff.
Most of our users would enable the “Radio Server” in wfview on your linux machine and then connect from your Mac using wfview with the linux ip address specified as the radio’s ip address. It’s that simple, VNC is not needed to do this at all.
But we can work on the problem anyway as to why your linux computer isn’t accessing the radio. It’s just that it probably isn’t VNC related. And yet, there’s a lot of stuff in your post which sort of implies otherwise.
Questions:
Your two log files are said to be “from host machine” and “from client machine” and yet they are both seemingly from the same computer, can you explain? What are you meaning by these terms?
If you are not running a wfview server (that’s what we call it when wfview accepts IP connections from other copies of wfview on other computers), then wfview does not need any access to the USB audio from the radio. None. So please ignore any wfview audio issues when you are not running a wfview server.
With that said… what’s so confusing is you clearly have enabled the wfview server option, and yet, you are accessing over VNC.
I prefer for you to decide either VNC or wfview server, not both, and then come back here after you understand the options available. It is really challenging for us to understand what you’re trying to do right now.
With your help, I think the root cause of the problem has been definitively identified, and it is I. And yes, at the moment I’m not feeling all that bright.
I think I must have been suffering from severe confirmation bias when reading the remote operation instructions. I had read a post several months ago about using VNC so I subconsciously made the instructions fit my perceived, but incorrect, notion of how it should work. How did I go down that road?? Armed with a better understanding of where I went astray, I’m sure I’ll be back up and running in no time and with a much cleaner configuration.
I was first licensed in 1966 and discovering WFview has reinvigorated my interest in ham radio. I also wanted to install it on Linux as a way to learn a different OS, but hey, I’m a dentist and not a software engineer so my learning curve has probably been a little steeper.
On the upside, I’m a big believer in the benefit of failing fast, so given my recent struggles I should be in really good shape. I actually do feel I’ve learned a lot and I’ve enjoyed the process along the way. This forum has contributed greatly to that learning.
some people do use VNC, it depends on the use case really. Used over VNC could be nice for something you want to leave running all day and night, like a spotting or reporting utility. But for user interaction, I think running the wfview to wfview connection gives you the most smooth experience (especially as this includes audio).
just don’t sweat – I always favor easy solutions before making stuff complicated.
Thanks by the way for the gridtracker stuff. Tried that additional s/w and it was as easy as it gets. Installed the rpm, started wsjtx up, started gridtracker and apart from stuff like km instead of miles etc, it just worked.
just try to get the client running on your mac, get the sound from wfview etc into wsjtx, and when done, fire gridtracker!
I actually do feel I’ve learned a lot and I’ve enjoyed the process along the way. This forum has contributed greatly to that learning.