Help › Getting started

Installing the agent

The agent is a small program that runs on a computer in your shack. It talks to your radio and connects your station to your RemoteMyShack account. The radio's control, audio and scope all go through it.

Download and run it

1. Go to the download page and download the agent for your computer: Mac, Windows, Linux, or Raspberry Pi (64-bit or 32-bit). On Linux or a Raspberry Pi, you can instead install it with one command; see Linux and Raspberry Pi below.
2. Install and run it; the download page has the steps for each kind of computer. On a Mac or Windows PC, the RemoteMyShack icon appears in the menu bar or notification area.
3. The first time, a browser window opens to the agent's setup page.

If the browser doesn't open, open http://127.0.0.1:8073 yourself on that computer. By default, the setup page only opens on the shack computer itself, not from other devices on your network.

The setup page

The setup page has a tab for each kind of gear (Radios, Amplifiers & tuners, Rotors and Antenna switches, each with a count of what's set up), then Remote access and Diagnostics. A first-time setup goes through two numbered steps:

• 1. Connect your radios, on the Radios tab. Add each radio, over the network or with a USB cable. Each radio is listed with its connection status, such as Connected to IC-7610 · 12 ms, and Open console, Edit and Remove buttons.
• 2. Reach it from anywhere, on the Remote access tab. Link the agent to your account. The agent opens the approval page by itself after your first radio is added; Link to remotemyshack.com here, or in the agent's menu, does it again. See Linking your station.
• Optional: private access with Tailscale, also on Remote access. For people who already use Tailscale. See Private access with Tailscale.

The page refreshes itself every couple of seconds, so you can watch a radio connect. The agent's version is shown at the bottom, with Check for updates.

The menu bar icon

On a Mac (menu bar) or Windows PC (notification area), the RemoteMyShack icon's menu shows whether your station is online (or, until it's linked, Link to remotemyshack.com…, which opens the page that links it), each radio with what it's tuned to (or Off, or Not responding), and TX while one is transmitting. It also has Open console, Setup…, the agent's version (such as Version 1.0.34) above the update item, and Quit RemoteMyShack, which takes the station offline. Hovering over the icon shows the version too. When a new version is waiting, the icon gets a small dot at its top right until it's installed.

Using the radio's own controls

While the agent is connected, it keeps asking the radio for its settings, and some radios close their menus when that happens. To use the radio's front panel or menus, choose Pause radios. The agent disconnects from every radio, unkeying any that is transmitting, and stays online. Consoles show that the radios are paused at the shack. Choose Resume radios when you're done. Restarting the agent also resumes them.

Updates

The agent checks for a new version when it starts and every six hours. Each check sends only a random number the agent made when it was installed, the kind of computer, its version and whether it's linked to an account (see the privacy policy). When there is one, the setup page shows Update now and the menu shows Update to the new version. Updating takes a few seconds: the agent stops any transmission, installs the new version, checks it against the published checksum, and restarts by itself.

Updates install themselves when no one is using the station. Once no console has been connected for 10 minutes and nothing is transmitting, the agent installs a waiting update on its own, so an update never cuts off someone who's operating. To update only when you choose, untick Install updates by itself at the bottom of the setup page.

New versions reach stations a few at a time over about a day, so your agent may hear of one later than someone else's. Check for updates on the setup page always finds the newest version.

Above the page, Console opens a console for your radio right on the shack computer, and Setup brings you back here.

Where settings are kept

Your radios, their network passwords and the station link are stored only on the shack computer, in a settings folder:

The same folder holds tx-log.csv, the station's own copy of the transmit log.

Keep the computer on and awake

Your station is only reachable while the computer is on, awake, connected to the internet and running the agent. If it goes to sleep, your console shows the station as offline until it wakes.

• Turn off sleep. In your computer's power or energy settings, set it to never sleep while plugged in. The screen can still turn off; that's fine.
• Have it start at login. Turn on Start at login in the agent's menu (menu bar on a Mac, notification area on Windows and Linux desktops), or Start when I log in to this computer at the bottom of the setup page. The agent then starts whenever you log in, so the station comes back by itself after a power cut or a restart. (Installed on Linux or a Raspberry Pi with the one-line command, it runs as a service that starts at boot, so the option isn't shown.)
• For a restart with no one there, log in automatically. The agent starts when you log in, not before. So that a power cut doesn't leave the computer waiting at its login screen, turn on automatic login: on a Mac in System Settings › Users & Groups › Automatically log in as (not offered while FileVault is on), on Windows with netplwiz (untick Users must enter a user name and password). Also set the computer to turn itself back on after a power failure if it can (Mac: System Settings › Energy › Start up automatically after a power failure; on a PC it's usually a BIOS setting).
• Leave it running. Closing the agent takes the station offline. If you're transmitting at that moment, the radio is unkeyed first.

A Raspberry Pi makes a good, quiet, low-power shack computer, since it can simply stay on.

Linux and Raspberry Pi

On a Raspberry Pi or a Linux computer with systemd, one command installs the agent:

curl -fsSL https://remotemyshack.com/install.sh | sudo sh

It picks the right build for the computer (64-bit PC, 64-bit Pi, or 32-bit Pi), checks the download, and installs the agent as a service that:

• starts at boot and restarts by itself if it stops;
• runs as its own remotemyshack user, which can reach USB radios' serial ports and sound cards;
• listens on your network, so you can open its setup page from another computer at http://<the Pi's address>:8073/ (the installer prints the address);
• updates itself when the station is idle, or when you say so, like on a Mac or Windows PC.

Run the same command again to upgrade. To see the agent's log, run journalctl -u remotemyshack-agent -f. To remove it, run the uninstall command the installer prints.