[chirp_users] Baofeng UV82 Preprogrammed Channels

[Stuart Longland VK4MSL]

On Sat, 14 Jan 2023 21:39:06 -0600
"K0LNY_Glenn" <glenn at ervin.email> wrote:

> Hi,
>  A friend of mine just got a new Baofeng UV82, he is about to take his Ham 
> Tech test.
> I sent him a Chirp install file, but I don't know if he will be able
> to access it with his screenreader in windows 11.

If you're feeling adventurous, I've been doing some hacking of
`chirpc`.  You can find my hacked up `chirpc` here:
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/sjlongland/chirp/feature/chirpc-csv-import-export/chirpc

Assuming you have `chirp-next` somewhere you might be able to download
the above file into the same directory along side `chirpwx.py`, then
open up a command prompt in that directory and run (substitute COM1:
with your radio's serial port):

python3 chirpc --radio Baofeng_UV-82 --serial COM1: --mmap radio.img --download-mmap
python3 chirpc --mmap radio.img --export-csv radio.csv

Then you can open up `radio.csv` in a spreadsheet tool (I use
`gnumeric` in my testing since it's lightweight and does the job) --
that should at least let you "see" what's in the radio, assuming the
spreadsheet tool is itself accessible to screen readers.

Loading setting back in is still a work-in-progress.  I actually have
to re-factor that so I'm not re-inventing wheels on import, but the way
it *should* work is this:

python3 chirpc --mmap radio.img --import-csv radio.csv
python3 chirpc --radio Baofeng_UV-82 --serial COM1: --mmap radio.img --upload-mmap

I'll point out the above is 100% untested -- especially on Windows.
I've been using the GUI to upload/download, but then using `chirpc` to
actually do the updates due to bugs in my particular install.

I can understand the CLI is not for everybody either -- I'm only
proposing this as it might work-around some of the compatibility issues
and at least offer some minimal functionality.

A big downside with this approach is you miss out on integration with
things like RepeaterBook, etc.  Not a problem in my situation since
none of those services seem to cover VK repeaters, but it'd be a big
nuisance for US-based operators that use such services.

I did look into the situation of accessibility, and it seems it's a
mess: wxWidgets (which Chirp-next uses) doesn't seem to have any
working concept of accessibility, and while a module for Tkinter
(Python's built-in GUI library) exists, that enables it on Linux/Unix
not Windows.  I'm not sure how well PyQt5 fares -- historically Qt has
been problematic in the past.

The other options seem to be some modern GTK+ Python wrapper, or
something "terminal"-based (`urwid` perhaps).
-- 
Stuart Longland (aka Redhatter, VK4MSL)

I haven't lost my mind...
  ...it's backed up on a tape somewhere.