⚙️ Settings
All settings are saved to config.toml next to the executable. The category rail and search box replace the older single scrolling list. Modified sections pulse yellow, the sticky save action shows the number of changed sections, and each section can be restored to its last saved values.
After saving, PropView clearly reports whether settings applied immediately, require a browser refresh, or require a full application restart. Restart warnings name only settings whose values actually changed.
In Docker and TrueNAS installs, mount persistent storage to /data. Environment variables set in the container platform are startup overrides, so matching values saved in the web UI can be replaced when the app is stopped and started again.
The Overview category includes a first-run checklist, settings import/export buttons for safe experimentation, and a last-transmitted history panel for station, WXnow, status, MHeard, and weather-alert beacons.
Station
Your callsign, SSID, latitude/longitude (or use the 📌 map picker), APRS symbol, status comment, beacon interval (minutes), and beacon path (e.g. WIDE1-1). Use Preview Station Beacon to inspect the exact packet text before using Transmit Station Now.
Smart Beaconing
Smart beaconing uses GPS speed to choose between a slow/parked beacon interval and a faster moving interval. Enable GPS ingestion first, then set the slow interval, fast interval, and speed threshold for mobile or portable operation.
GPS Ingestion
GPS ingestion lets APRS PropView use a live position instead of only the saved station latitude/longitude. Turn on GPS Ingestion, choose a source, then choose whether GPS should only move your map marker or also update the station latitude/longitude fields.
LOCK prevents active GPS from changing the saved station latitude/longitude. Leave it enabled when you want GPS to move the map marker during mobile use without changing your configured home/base station position.
- This browser/device - Uses browser geolocation from the current desktop or mobile browser. Use this when running the app from a phone, tablet, laptop, or remote browser that can provide location permission.
- Own APRS position packets - Uses your own heard APRS position packets as the live GPS source. Use this when a radio/TNC, tracker, or Mobilink-style setup is already transmitting your current position into APRS PropView.
- NMEA serial GPS - Reads NMEA GPS sentences from a local serial port such as a USB GPS puck, GPS-enabled TNC, or serial feed from another device.
- NMEA TCP stream - Connects to a TCP host/port that provides NMEA sentences. Use this with network GPS bridges, companion software, or devices that expose GPS over TCP.
- NMEA UDP listener - Listens for NMEA sentences sent to the configured UDP bind address and port. Use this when another app or device broadcasts GPS updates over the LAN.
- gpsd daemon - Connects to a local or network gpsd service and consumes JSON TPV fixes. On most Linux/Pi systems gpsd listens on
127.0.0.1:2947.
- Any source - Accepts the latest valid GPS fix from any supported source. This is useful for testing, mixed mobile/base setups, or fallback workflows, but selecting a specific source gives clearer status messages when a device is missing.
Move my map marker from GPS controls whether the live GPS fix moves your station marker on the map. Update station latitude/longitude also writes the live coordinates into Settings when unlocked; save the configuration if you want those coordinates kept after restart.
Digipeater
Enable/disable the digipeater. Configure which aliases to respond to (WIDE1-1, WIDE2-1) and the de-duplication window to prevent re-digipeating the same packet.
IGate
Enable/disable Internet gateway. Choose RF→IS (gate heard RF packets to APRS-IS), IS→RF (gate APRS-IS packets to local RF), or both.
APRS-IS
Server/port (default: rotate.aprs2.net:14580), your APRS-IS passcode, fixed or moving range filter mode, range in miles, and any extra filter expressions. Fixed stations generate filters like r/35/-79/80; moving/mobile clients can use m/80. Extra javAPRS filters such as b/CALL, t/poimqstunw, or -p/CW are appended as entered. Private/local APRS-IS-style servers that do not send a banner or logresp can still populate receive traffic; without login verification PropView keeps that connection read-only.
RF Ports
Add one or more named serial or TCP ports. Serial ports can use binary KISS frames or receive-only TNC2 monitor text for older radios. Kenwood TH-D7/TH-D7E users commonly need PACKET mode, 9600 bps PC speed, and Xon/Xoff flow control. Legacy single serial/TCP controls have been replaced by this multi-port list, but old saved config is imported automatically.
Tracking Blocklist
Use CALL-SSID to reject one station identifier or a base CALL to reject every SSID. Blocked packets are ignored before station, packet, message, propagation, and history updates.
Watched VHF Paths
Watched Paths alerts when direct-heard RF enhancement near the target station area reaches or exceeds the distance to a selected station. Stations heard through another digipeater are excluded. Enter a callsign and use Callook, HamDB, optional QRZ XML, or HamQTH lookup to populate a starting location, then correct the grid or coordinates if the operating site differs from the license address.
Select band, mode, frequency, and confidence, then enter local/target antenna height, transmit power, and antenna gain. PropView shows radio-horizon, EIRP, and capability context while still requiring matching live propagation evidence. Watched path lines can be shown or hidden from the map Line options.
Status, Dynamic, MHeard, and Weather Alert Beacons
Status/DX can transmit a compact propagation summary, rotate preset dynamic messages in sequence or randomly, send a direct-heard RF MHeard list, or beacon severe weather alert text when active. Use Preview Next Beacon and the weather-alert preview before one-shot transmit or enabling periodic beaconing.
Bulletins and APRS Objects
Scheduled bulletins send APRS BLN messages at a configured interval. Scheduled APRS objects transmit named object packets with position, symbol, comment, route, and path. Use previews before enabling periodic transmit, or use the map Obj control to create object entries from a clicked location.
WXnow Transmit
WXnow can send APRS weather packets from a local WXnow.txt, with optional position included in the packet. When positionless weather is selected, PropView can seed a matching weather-symbol position packet and then transmit the positionless WX report. Use Preview WXnow before Transmit Now.
Web Interface
Host/Port — Bind address and port for the web UI (default 127.0.0.1:14501). Use 0.0.0.0 to allow network access.
Opening Browser — Choose which browser APRS PropView opens at startup, or choose Do not open automatically for headless Pi/VM/service deployments where browser auto-open is not desired.
Font — Choose a display font for the entire UI.
UI Theme and Density — Choose interface brightness, a visual skin, an accent color, and Comfortable, Compact, or Wallboard density independently from the map tile theme. Mission Control, Industrial, Neon Grid, Radio, iVIEW, and HackR alter panel materials and controls. iVIEW uses translucent liquid-glass surfaces; HackR uses a compact intelligence-console layout and night-vision map. Radio uses transceiver-style dual analog propagation meters whose needles follow the current direct and regional scores. Terminal Green Screen replaces the graphical dashboard with a numbered text console: use 1–8 for menus, F1 for help, F3/F12 to close, F5 to refresh, and F9 to switch between text and map views.
Dashboard Layout — Map tools are grouped into View, Stations, Layers, and Appearance menus. On narrow screens, open the Status drawer for beacon, connection, source-health, notification, and theme controls. Map & Display → Visualizations also lets you hide optional weather, lightning, alert, source-health, watched-path, and propagation-context panels for this browser.
Visualizations — Independently enable the propagation aura, new-path reveal, map color harmony, condition backdrops, expressive home marker, watched-path flow, quiet direct-heard activity moments, and Off/Basic/Enhanced live packet animation.
Units — Choose Imperial or Metric for distance, map weather temperature, APRS WX station temperature, wind, and precipitation displays.
Map Tiles — Use the default online OpenStreetMap tiles or point PropView at a custom XYZ tile URL such as a local MBTiles/XYZ server. Custom URLs must include {z}, {x}, and {y}.
Ghost After (min) — Stations not heard within this time will fade (pulsing dashed border, reduced opacity). Set to 0 to disable ghosting.
Expire After (min) — Stations not heard within this time are completely removed from the map. Set to 0 to never auto-expire. Ghost time should be shorter than expiry time so stations fade before disappearing.
Update Checks - Enable or disable automatic GitHub release checks and set how often the app should poll for a newer published version during long-running uptime.
Tracking
Max Station Age — How long (minutes) to keep a station in the database before cleanup removes it. Cleanup Interval — How often (minutes) to run the cleanup process.
Alerts — Band Opening Channels
Trigger an alert when propagation exceeds thresholds (min RF stations + min distance). Cooldown prevents repeated alerts. Quiet hours suppress alerts during specified times. Channels: Discord webhook, Email (SMTP), and SMS via email gateway.
The Alert Tuning Helper analyzes recent RF path history as rolling one-hour windows and recommends direct/regional station count, distance, and cooldown values that sit above your normal local baseline.
Use Send Test Alert to send a preformatted test message to selected Discord, Email, and SMS destinations without waiting for a real alert trigger.
Alerts — Message Notification Channels
Separate channel toggles for forwarding incoming APRS messages to Discord, Email, or SMS — independent from band-opening channels.
Weather
Enable weather with a US zip code or ICAO airport code. Current conditions use Open-Meteo. Alert sources can be automatic, Weatherbit with a user API key, or disabled. Auto uses NWS for US stations and Open-Meteo risk indicators outside the US.
When using WXnow as the current conditions source, the Open-Meteo condition fallback can still provide general condition text and icon while temperature, wind, humidity, and pressure come from your local station.
Weather Alert Distances - Banner range controls local warning banners, weather-alert beacons, and alert symbol behavior when using radius scope. Polygon range controls the wider map-only NWS alert overlay.
Map Overlays - Turn radar and alert polygons on or off, adjust radar opacity, enable radar animation, and choose which alert categories should be drawn on the map. When NWS alerts do not include native polygon geometry, PropView can use affected county/zone geometry as a fallback for drawable overlays.
Alert Polling - NWS county/zone UGC scope is available for US locations. Other alert sources use point-based or provider-defined coverage.
Adaptive Severe Weather Polling - When one of your configured trigger events, such as Tornado Watch or Severe Thunderstorm Watch, becomes active, alert polling automatically speeds up to the elevated interval so newly issued warnings are detected more quickly. After the trigger clears, polling stays elevated through the configured cooldown before returning to normal.
MQTT Integration
MQTT is for sending APRS PropView events and propagation status to other systems. It is not needed for normal APRS, digipeater, IGate, mapping, or messaging operation; enable it when you have an MQTT broker such as Mosquitto, Home Assistant, Node-RED, EMQX, or another dashboard/automation system that should receive PropView data.
Common use cases include showing current propagation level on a wall dashboard, triggering Home Assistant or Node-RED automations when a band opening alert fires, logging propagation metrics into another time-series system, or bridging PropView status to a shack display without scraping the web UI.
Configure the broker host, port, topic prefix, optional username/password, Home Assistant device identity, and optional watched callsigns. The default topic prefix is aprs/propview. APRS PropView publishes retained propagation metrics on aprs/propview/propagation, retained summary values on aprs/propview/score and aprs/propview/level, retained Home Assistant status on aprs/propview/ha/status, watched station state on aprs/propview/watched/<callsign>, and alert/event payloads on aggregate and typed event topics. MQTT reconnects live after saving settings.
