xlog2

Part of the hamtools suite — see the hub for how cwsd, xlog2 and usb-paddles combine into an integrated (remote) station.

A desktop amateur-radio logging program — a clone of the classic xlog, rebuilt in C++20 with CMake.

xlog2 ships two interchangeable frontends over one shared, toolkit-neutral core library:

• xlog2-gtk — a GTK 4 (gtkmm-4) UI.
• xlog2-qt — a Qt 6 Widgets UI.

Both read and write the same logbooks (.xlog) and the same settings file, so you can switch between them freely.

Features

• Tabular log view with date, time, call, band, mode, frequency, reports, name, QTH, locator, power, QSL status and comments. Columns can be reordered (drag a header or use its context menu) and resized; the layout is remembered and shared between both frontends.
• Entry form to add, edit and delete QSOs; click a row to load it for editing. RST sent/received default to 599.
• Multiple logbooks in tabs — open several .xlog files at once; the previously open files (and the active tab) are reopened on the next launch.
• Duplicate detection — flags in red when the contact being entered was already worked on the same band and mode that UTC day.
• Frequency → band auto-detection as you type; a "Now" button stamps the current UTC date/time.
• SQLite-backed logbooks (.xlog), saved immediately as you log. The default logbook lives at $XDG_DATA_HOME/xlog2/default.xlog (~/.local/share/xlog2/default.xlog) and is reopened automatically. New Tab opens a transient in-memory log until Save As.
• ADIF import and export; per-band / per-mode statistics.
• UDP network logging — auto-logs QSOs pushed by WSJT-X ("Logged ADIF") or any program sending raw ADIF datagrams.
• Hamlib rig control — polls the radio's frequency/mode and auto-fills the entry form. Connecting is non-blocking, so an unreachable rig never freezes the UI.
• DXCC lookup — entity / CQ-ITU zones / continent from cty.dat (drop one at $XDG_DATA_HOME/xlog2/cty.dat).
• QRZ.com callsign lookup (name/QTH/grid prefill).
• Network CW keyer (cwdaemon) with F1–F9 message macros (the function keys work from anywhere in the window, including the DX-cluster panel).
• DX-cluster (telnet) band map: spots aggregated by frequency with a spotter count, band-filter chips, and double-click to tune.
• Rig audio — plays a cwsd audio_stream_server Opus-over-UDP stream of the receiver audio through a local ALSA device.
• CW Skimmer — a dockable multi-channel CW decoder: it decodes every CW signal in the rig-audio passband at once, showing a waterfall with callsign labels plus a per-signal decode table (frequency / WPM / text / call), with Gate and Min-SNR controls. Decoded callsigns are validated/corrected against an optional Super-Check-Partial list (drop a MASTER.SCP at $XDG_DATA_HOME/xlog2/master.scp), with a "calls in database only" mode. See docs/cw-skimmer-decoder.md for how it works.
• LoTW — Upload signs/submits new QSOs via ARRL's tqsl; Download confirmations fetches confirmed QSOs and marks matches (call+band+mode+date). A LoTW column shows ✓ confirmed / ↑ uploaded.
• Remembers column layout, window size and open tabs in ~/.config/xlog2/layout.ini. (Window position isn't restored — GTK4/Wayland has no API for it.) The LoTW download password is stored there in plain text (file mode 0600); LoTW upload uses tqsl/your certificate instead.

Install (Ubuntu PPA)

Prebuilt packages for current Ubuntu releases are published to the ppa:benishor/hamtools PPA — no compiling needed:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:benishor/hamtools
sudo apt update
sudo apt install xlog2-gtk    # GTK 4 frontend
# or the Qt 6 frontend:
sudo apt install xlog2-qt

Optional extras: xlog2-data (world-map coastline data) and xlog2-syncd (headless logbook-sync backup peer).

Debian / Raspberry Pi OS / other distros — AppImage

The PPA is Ubuntu-only, so for Debian, Raspberry Pi OS, or anything else, grab the self-contained Qt AppImage from the releases (x86_64 or aarch64):

chmod +x xlog2-qt-*-aarch64.AppImage
./xlog2-qt-*-aarch64.AppImage

It bundles Qt 6, so it doesn't need a recent system GTK (the GTK frontend requires GTK ≥ 4.10). LoTW upload still needs tqsl installed on the host. Otherwise, build from source below.

Headless sync peer (xlog2-syncd)

To run an always-on logbook backup / sync peer (e.g. on a spare Raspberry Pi):

• Ubuntu: sudo apt install xlog2-syncd, then systemctl --user enable --now xlog2-syncd and sudo loginctl enable-linger "$USER" (so it runs headless / at boot).
• Debian / Raspberry Pi OS / other: download the xlog2-syncd-*-linux-*.tar.gz from the releases, unpack, and run ./install.sh — it installs a per-user service, scaffolds the config, enables it and turns on lingering.

Either way, set [sync] secret in ~/.config/xlog2/layout.ini to match your other nodes, then systemctl --user restart xlog2-syncd. Follow it with journalctl --user -u xlog2-syncd -f.

Building

A C++20 compiler, CMake ≥ 3.16, and the dev packages for SQLite, Hamlib, libcurl, Opus, ALSA, PipeWire, D-Bus and libsodium, plus gtkmm-4 (for the GTK frontend) and/or Qt 6 (for the Qt frontend). PipeWire and D-Bus are required (rig-audio playback / sidetone and RealtimeKit RT scheduling); libsodium backs the sync mesh's encryption.

On Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo apt install build-essential cmake pkg-config \
    libgtkmm-4.0-dev qt6-base-dev \
    libsqlite3-dev libhamlib-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev \
    libopus-dev libasound2-dev libpipewire-0.3-dev libdbus-1-dev \
    libsodium-dev
# Optional, runtime only — for LoTW upload:
sudo apt install tqsl

Then:

cmake -S . -B build && cmake --build build -j

This builds both frontends — build/xlog2-gtk and build/xlog2-qt. Build just one with the options:

cmake -S . -B build -DXLOG_BUILD_GTK=ON -DXLOG_BUILD_QT=OFF   # GTK only
cmake -S . -B build -DXLOG_BUILD_GTK=OFF -DXLOG_BUILD_QT=ON   # Qt only

Run:

GDK_BACKEND=wayland ./build/xlog2-gtk
./build/xlog2-qt

After changing headers or adding/removing source files, prefer a clean rebuild (rm -rf build && cmake -S . -B build && cmake --build build -j).

Layout

src/core/        toolkit-neutral library `xlog_core` (no gtkmm/Qt):
  domain/          Qso, LogBook (SQLite), Adif, Bands, Dxcc, DxSpot
  logic/           QsoMapper, DxccDeriver, CwExpander, Statistics, DupeMessage,
                   StrUtil, TimeUtil
  settings/        Settings + IniFile (the layout.ini codec)
  platform/        IUiDispatcher (UI-thread marshalling), ProcessRunner
  services/        Rig (Hamlib), Udp, Lotw, Qrz, CwKeyer, DxCluster, Audio
  presenter/       LogPagePresenter, MainPresenter — all business logic
  view/            ILogPageView, IMainView, FormData (interfaces + DTOs)

src/             gtkmm frontend: MainWindow, LogPage, DxClusterPanel,
                 XlogApplication, GlibDispatcher, UiUtil, main.cpp
src/qt/          Qt frontend: QtMainWindow, QtLogPage, QtDxClusterPanel,
                 QsoTableModel, FlowLayout, QtDispatcher, main.cpp

debian/          Debian packaging (one source → xlog2-gtk + xlog2-qt binaries)
packaging/       .desktop files, release.sh, publish-ppa.sh

The core links only SQLite/Hamlib/libcurl/Opus/ALSA/threads — never a GUI toolkit — so the UI/business-logic boundary is enforced by the build. See CLAUDE.md for the detailed design notes.

Packaging & releasing

• Versioning: Semantic Versioning; see VERSIONING.md. The version's single source of truth is project(VERSION ...) in CMakeLists.txt; releases are annotated vX.Y.Z git tags.
• Cut a release: packaging/release.sh X.Y.Z (bumps version + changelog, commits, tags), then git push origin master --follow-tags.
• Publish to the PPA: packaging/publish-ppa.sh builds signed Debian source packages and uploads them to ppa:benishor/hamtools, which builds the binaries. Needs devscripts, debhelper, dput and a GPG key registered on Launchpad; pass --no-upload to build without uploading.

Tests

No test framework; tests are throwaway main() programs linked against xlog_core. Pure logic needs no GUI:

g++ -std=c++20 -Isrc/core/domain -Isrc/core/logic \
    /tmp/foo_test.cpp build/libxlog_core.a \
    $(pkg-config --cflags --libs sqlite3 hamlib libcurl) -o /tmp/foo_test

Related projects

Part of a small suite of Linux ham-radio tools:

• cwsd — the rig-host daemon xlog2 talks to: rig control (rigctld), network CW (cwdaemon), the Opus rig-audio stream, and remote paddle keying (remote_key).
• usb-paddles — USB Morse-paddle firmware read by xlog2's HidPaddleInput.
• multimaster — the LAN gossip-mesh library behind xlog2's logbook sync and distributed QRZ cache.

License

GPL-3.0, like the original xlog. See LICENSE.