Installation

Installation

Pre-built downloads live on the Releases page. Both packages are self-contained — they bundle the .NET runtime and native libraries (PortAudio, SQLite, Skia), so there's nothing else to install.

📡 You need an amateur radio license to transmit. See Transmitting and Safety.

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Linux (x86-64)

Download HTCommander-x86_64.AppImage — a single self-contained file. No install:

chmod +x HTCommander-x86_64.AppImage
./HTCommander-x86_64.AppImage

To integrate it into your app menu, drop it in ~/Applications (or use a tool like Gear Lever / AppImageLauncher).

Self-contained folder (alternative)

dotnet publish cross/HTCommander.UI.Avalonia/HTCommander.UI.Avalonia.csproj \
  -c Release -r linux-x64 --self-contained true -o out/
./out/HTCommander.UI.Avalonia

Prerequisites

• Bluetooth with BlueZ (standard on modern Linux). Pair the radio in your desktop's Bluetooth settings first, then launch HTCommander.
• Audio: PipeWire, PulseAudio, or ALSA (PipeWire on Fedora 40+ works well).
• Nothing else for the AppImage; the self-contained folder also needs no system .NET.

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macOS (Apple Silicon)

Download HTCommander-macos-arm64.zip — a self-contained HTCommander.app (bundles the .NET runtime, the IOBluetooth bridge, PortAudio, SQLite, Skia). Unzip, then:

# Not notarized yet, so macOS quarantines the download and reports it as
# "damaged". Remove the quarantine flag once, then open it:
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine HTCommander.app
open HTCommander.app

On Apple Silicon the xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine step is required — the "damaged" message can't be bypassed by right-clicking → Open. (Tip: type xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine and drag the app into Terminal to fill in its path.)

• Apple Silicon (M-series) only for now.
• Pair the radio in System Settings → Bluetooth first.
• macOS will prompt for Bluetooth (and Microphone, for voice PTT) permission on first run — allow both.

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PortAudio (audio library)

Both packages bundle PortAudio, so audio/voice works out of the box. If audio is unavailable on macOS, install the system library with:

brew install portaudio

Building from source needs PortAudio present: brew install portaudio on macOS, or install portaudio / libportaudio2 from your Linux distro's package manager.

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Next steps

Once installed, head to Getting Started to pair and connect, then Features for a tab-by-tab tour. Having trouble? See Troubleshooting.