Radioconda: Gateway to Software Radio

Radios are ubiquitous in everyday life, and so many open-source software tools exist that make the world of radio more accessible to domain experts, hobbyists, and the general public. In our experience, the biggest pain point in the world of software-defined radio (SDR) is simply accessing the software. Discovering, installing, and running any particular piece of software tend to be tasks that only particularly dedicated individuals have the patience to see through. Even for such a dedicated person, less time spent on that process would be welcome. In this presentation, I will introduce the Radioconda distribution and installer, which builds on the cross-platform conda-forge software ecosystem to make it easier to install a growing set of software radio tools. Radioconda currently includes 65+ radio-specific packages, notably GNU Radio, Gqrx, Hamlib, and driver libraries for the most common SDR devices. I'll describe why I think a conda-based cross-platform distribution is a powerful approach, and how you can start using it yourself and even contribute to the maintenance effort if desired. I'll also look to the future and explore how I see Radioconda evolving with the next-generation of conda-based tools and expanding to include more packages relevant to the amateur radio community.