SpotHub (DX Cluster Dialog)¶
AetherSDR can connect to multiple DX spot sources—DX cluster telnet, Reverse Beacon Network (RBN), WSJT-X, SpotCollector, POTA, and FreeDV—and display spots on your panadapter. The unified SpotHub dialog centralizes all connection, filter, color, and display settings.
Before you start¶
- AetherSDR must be running. A radio connection is not required to configure spot sources.
- For DX cluster and RBN connections, outbound telnet access to the respective servers must not be blocked by a firewall.
- For WSJT-X, SpotCollector, and FreeDV, the respective applications must be running and configured to broadcast on the expected ports or WebSocket endpoint.
- For POTA, outbound HTTP access to
api.pota.appmust not be blocked by a firewall.
Opening SpotHub¶
- Click
Settings > SpotHub...to open the SpotHub dialog.
The dialog is organized into tabs for each spot source, plus a unified Spot List tab and a Display tab for panadapter visualization settings.
Poll POTA activations¶
This section describes how to configure the POTA tab to periodically fetch current Parks on the Air activations from api.pota.app and display them as spots on your panadapter.
Steps¶
- Click
Settings > SpotHub...to open the SpotHub dialog. - Click the POTA tab.
- Review the Server: indicator, which shows
api.pota.app (HTTP polling). This endpoint is fixed and cannot be changed. - Set Poll Interval: to the number of seconds between each poll. This value is persisted as
PotaPollInterval. - Click Start to begin polling. The status indicator changes to Polling when active. Click Stop to halt polling at any time.
- To change the color used for POTA spots on the panadapter, click Spot Color:. Select a color from the picker. This is persisted as
PotaSpotColor. - To start polling automatically each time AetherSDR launches, click Auto-start on startup so it is active. This is persisted as
PotaAutoStart. - Monitor incoming activations in the POTA Activations console on the same tab.
POTA tab controls¶
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Server: | Indicator | Shows the fixed polling endpoint: api.pota.app (HTTP polling). Not configurable. |
| Poll Interval: | Spinbox | Seconds between POTA API polls. Persisted as PotaPollInterval. |
| Start / Stop | Push button | Starts or stops POTA polling. |
| Auto-start on startup | Toggle button | Automatically starts POTA polling when AetherSDR launches. Persisted as PotaAutoStart. |
| POTA Activations | Text field | Read-only console showing the activation feed. |
| Spot Color: | Push button | Opens a color picker for POTA spots on the panadapter. Persisted as PotaSpotColor. |
Cluster tab controls¶
The following controls appear on the Cluster tab for DX cluster telnet connections.
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Server: | Text field | Hostname of DX cluster to connect to. Persisted as ClusterHost. |
| Port: | Spinbox | Telnet port on DX cluster. Range 1-65535. Persisted as ClusterPort. |
| Callsign: | Text field | Login callsign sent to cluster. Persisted as ClusterCallsign. |
| Connect / Disconnect | Push button | Toggles telnet connection to the cluster. |
| Auto-connect on startup | Toggle button | Auto-connects cluster on launch. Persisted as ClusterAutoConnect. |
| Cluster Console | Text field | Read-only telnet console of raw cluster traffic. |
| Send | Push button | Sends a typed command to the cluster. |
| Spot Color: | Push button | Opens a color picker for cluster spots. Persisted as ClusterSpotColor. |
RBN tab controls¶
The following controls appear on the RBN tab for Reverse Beacon Network telnet connections.
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Server: | Text field | RBN telnet hostname. Persisted as RbnHost. |
| Port: | Spinbox | RBN telnet port. Range 1-65535. Persisted as RbnPort. |
| Callsign: | Text field | Login callsign to RBN. Persisted as RbnCallsign. |
| Rate Limit: | Spinbox | Caps RBN spots per second. Persisted as RbnRateLimit. |
| Connect / Disconnect (RBN) | Push button | Toggles RBN connection. |
| Auto-connect on startup (RBN) | Toggle button | Starts RBN automatically. Persisted as RbnAutoConnect. |
| RBN Console | Text field | Read-only console of RBN traffic. |
| Send (RBN) | Push button | Sends command to RBN. |
| Spot Color: (RBN) | Push button | Color picker for RBN spots. Persisted as RbnSpotColor. |
WSJT-X tab controls¶
The following controls appear on the WSJT-X tab for UDP message listening.
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Address: | Text field | UDP bind address for WSJT-X messages. Persisted as WsjtxAddress. |
| Port: | Spinbox | UDP port for WSJT-X. Range 1-65535. Persisted as WsjtxPort. |
| Start / Stop | Push button | Starts or stops UDP listener. |
| Auto-start on startup (WSJT-X) | Toggle button | Auto-starts listener on launch. Persisted as WsjtxAutoStart. |
| CQ | Checkbox | Show only CQ calls from WSJT-X. Persisted as WsjtxFilterCQ. |
| CQ POTA | Checkbox | Show CQ POTA calls. Persisted as WsjtxFilterPOTA. |
| Calling Me | Checkbox | Show only decodes addressed to your callsign. Persisted as WsjtxFilterCallingMe. |
| CQ color / POTA color / Calling Me color / Default color | Push button | Color pickers for each WSJT-X spot category. Persisted as WsjtxColorCQ, WsjtxColorPOTA, WsjtxColorCallingMe, WsjtxColorDefault. |
| WSJT-X Decodes | Text field | Console of decoded transmissions. |
| Spot Life: | Spinbox | Seconds WSJT-X spots remain on panadapter. Persisted as WsjtxSpotLife. |
SpotCollector tab controls¶
The following controls appear on the SpotCollector tab for Ham Radio Deluxe SpotCollector UDP broadcast listening.
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| UDP Port: | Spinbox | UDP port SpotCollector broadcasts on. Range 1-65535. Persisted as SpotCollectorPort. |
| Start / Stop | Push button | Starts or stops UDP listener. |
| Auto-start on startup | Toggle button | Auto-starts listener on launch. Persisted as SpotCollectorAutoStart. |
| SpotCollector Spots | Text field | Read-only console of received SpotCollector spots. |
FreeDV tab controls¶
The following controls appear on the FreeDV tab for WebSocket feed of FreeDV QSO reporter spots. This tab is only available when AetherSDR is built with WebSocket support.
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Server: | Indicator | Shows the fixed WebSocket endpoint: qso.freedv.org (WebSocket). Not configurable. |
| Start / Stop | Push button | Connects or disconnects the FreeDV WebSocket. |
| Auto-start on startup | Toggle button | Auto-starts FreeDV on launch. Persisted as FreeDvAutoStart. |
| FreeDV Spots | Text field | Read-only console of FreeDV activity. |
| Spot Color: | Push button | Opens a color picker for FreeDV spots. Persisted as FreeDvSpotColor. |
Spot List tab¶
The Spot List tab displays a unified, searchable table of all live spots from all connected sources.
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Bands: | Checkbox group | Per-band checkboxes toggle visibility in the table. One checkbox per band (160m, 80m, 60m, 40m, 30m, 20m, 17m, 15m, 12m, 10m, 6m, 2m, etc.). Checkboxes use a flow layout that wraps to a new row when horizontal space is low, keeping labels readable. |
| Clear | Push button | Empties the current spot list. |
| Spot table | List / Table | Sortable table of spots. Double-click a row to tune the radio to that frequency. Columns: Time, Freq, DX Call, Comment, Spotter, Band, Mode, Source. Column visibility can be toggled via a right-click context menu on the table header; the menu stays open while multiple columns are toggled, allowing several columns to be shown or hidden in one pass. |
Display tab¶
The Display tab controls how spots are visualized on the panadapter, including Signal History tunables and DXCC coloring. In v26.5.1, the tab was reorganized to have a top toggle row, common sliders, then a two-column section with DXCC Coloring (left) and Signal History (right).
Display tab controls¶
| Control | Kind | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Spots: | Toggle button | Master toggle for DX spot overlay. Persisted as IsSpotsEnabled. |
| Memories: | Toggle button | Toggles memory-channel overlay on panadapter. Persisted as IsMemorySpotsEnabled. |
| Auto: | Toggle button | Automatically switch slice mode when clicking a spot that includes mode info (e.g. CW, FT8, RTTY). Persisted as SpotAutoSwitchMode. |
| Signals (Signal History) | Toggle button | Gold markers for detected voice-width signals on the panadapter. Persisted as SHistoryMarkersEnabled. Same toggle as View > Signal History Markers. |
| QRM (Signal History) | Toggle button | Red markers for persistent carriers and wideband interference. Persisted as SHistoryQrmEnabled. Same toggle as View > QRM History Markers. |
| Clear All | Push button | Clears all DX spots, memory feed, Signal History markers and QRM markers from the spectrum. |
| Levels: | Slider | Number of vertical stacking rows for spots. Range 1-10. Default 3. Persisted as SpotsMaxLevel. |
| Position: | Slider | Vertical position on panadapter. Range 0-100. Default 50. Persisted as SpotsStartingHeightPercentage. |
| Font Size: | Slider | Spot text size. Range 8-32. Default 16. Persisted as SpotFontSize. |
| Spot Lifetime: | Slider | Seconds before a spot fades away. Non-linear steps from 10 sec to 24 hrs. Persisted as DxClusterSpotLifetimeSec. |
| Override Colors: | Toggle button | Forces a single text color for all spots. Persisted as IsSpotsOverrideColorsEnabled. |
| Spot text color picker | Push button | Opens QColorDialog to pick spot text color. Default #FFFF00. Persisted as SpotsOverrideColor. |
| Override Background: Enabled | Toggle button | Enables custom spot background color. Persisted as IsSpotsOverrideBackgroundColorsEnabled. |
| Override Background: Auto | Toggle button | Auto-picks background color for contrast. Persisted as IsSpotsOverrideToAutoBackgroundColorEnabled. |
| Spot background color picker | Push button | Opens QColorDialog for spot background color. Default #000000. Persisted as SpotsOverrideBgColor. |
| Background Opacity: | Slider | Opacity of spot background color. Range 0-100. Default 48. Persisted as SpotsBackgroundOpacity. |
| Spot Lines: | Toggle button | Draws vertical lines from the spectrum up to each spot label. Disable during contests to reduce visual clutter. Persisted as IsSpotsLinesEnabled. |
| Total Spots: | Indicator | Live count of spots currently tracked across all sources. |
| DXCC Coloring (section) | Indicator | Section header for DXCC coloring controls in the left column below the divider. |
| DXCC Colors: | Toggle button | Colors spots by worked/confirmed/needed DXCC status. Persisted as IsDxccColoringEnabled. |
| Log File (ADIF): | Push button | Loads an ADIF log file to drive DXCC coloring. Auto-watches the file for changes after selection. Persisted as DxccAdifFilePath. |
| Imported: (DXCC stats) | Indicator | Shows QSO count and entity count when a log is loaded. Format: <N> QSOs / <M> entities. |
| DXCC Color swatches (New DXCC / New Band |