Radio Mobile Deluxe WINE

January 10, 2018

Radio Mobile Deluxe is free but not open source radio propagation Windows software that runs on Linux well via WINE. Installing Radio Mobile Deluxe is straightforward:

Download rmwcore.zip and extract to ~/rmw. Download English (or other) language code e.g. rmw1166eng.zip and extract to ~/rmw Install Visual Basic 6 runtime:

winetricks vb6run

Make a script ~/rmw.sh containing

#!/bin/sh

wine ~/rmw/rmweng.exe

Then:

chmod +x ~/rmw.sh

Create a new app icon by creating a file ~/.local/share/applications/rmw.desktop with contents:

#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open
[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Exec=wine ~/rmw/rmweng.exe
Name=Radio Mobile Deluxe

Use the Radio Mobile Deluxe menu shortcut or in Terminal

~/rmw.sh

Antenna Patterns

Radio Mobile Deluxe .ant antenna pattern files require Windows/DOS \r\n CRLF line endings even when run under WINE. Convert Unix LF line ending files with

unix2dos myfile.txt

When using Python to write text files in Linux, by default the line endings will be \n LF line endings. Force Python to write Windows/DOS CRLF from Linux when using functions with options such as:

numpy.savetxt(newline='\r\n')

That works across operating systems.

Radio Mobile Deluxe through version 11.6 does not reload modified .ant files. You must close/reopen the entire RMD program to reload a modified antenna pattern file.

err:module:import_dll Library MSVBVM60.DLL (which is needed by L"Z:\rmw\rmweng.exe") not found

Fix:

winetricks vb6run

Alternative open source wireless propagation software:

Splat RF is also great for radio coverage prediction outdoors.
PyLayers is for indoor site-specific radio coverage prediction, also suitable for UWB.