HAMEXAM(1)

💖 HAMEXAM(1) — the General Commands Manual glow-up 💖

okay bestie, welcome to hamexam, the study guide for USA FCC amateur radio (ham radio) license examinations 🎀 yes literally, it's the thing that quizzes you until you actually know it. iykyk.

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✨ NAME ✨

hamexam — study guide for USA FCC amateur radio (ham radio) license examinations 🌸

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

hamexam {t,g,e,q}

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✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

so here's the vibe: hamexam throws questions at you in random order from whichever question pool you picked, and it does NOT stop until you've answered every single one correctly. it's giving "we are not leaving this group chat until you pass" 💅

the session can be terminated with end-of-file (^D), and you can restart it later — it remembers where you were, no cap 🫶

some questions refer to figures. the figures for the selected question pool get displayed in a separate window using $PNG_VIEWER, if it is executable. if $PNG_VIEWER is undefined, then eog(1), gwenview(1), gpicview(1), ristretto(1) will be used — whichever is first found to be an executable command. and if $PNG_VIEWER is not an executable command (e.g. ""), or if none of the other viewers are installed, then questions which refer to figures will be noted and skipped. noted. skipped. moving on ✨

licenses are issued by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), but examinations are administered by Volunteer Examiners. okay so the government hands out the paper but the actual humans in the room are volunteers, iconic honestly 👑

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🌈 OPTIONS 🌈

if no pool is specified, usage, version, and help information is displayed.

in normal usage, one of the following options should be specified:

• t — Element 2, the Technician Class pool (for examinations administered July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2026). this is the entry-level license, the baby's first ham license, the starting point bestie 🍓
• g — Element 3, the General Class pool (for examinations administered July 1, 2023 through June 30, 2027). Element 2 is also required.
• e — Element 4, the Extra Class pool (for examinations administered July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2028). Elements 2 and 3 are also required. this is the final boss 🔥
• q — the question pool is selected interactively. choose your own adventure, main character energy only 💜

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🦋 FILES 🦋

a directory ~/.hamexam is created to hold the names of the questions which remain to be answered correctly. it's your lil progress tracker, your little save file, your reminder that you ARE making it 📁✨

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💫 SEE ALSO 💫

for more information regarding licensing, ref.

https://www.arrl.org/licensing-education-training

for information regarding the question pools, ref.

https://www.ncvec.org/

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👑 COPYRIGHT 👑

hamexam is Copyright (c) 2011-2024 John Nogatch AC6SL <jnogatch@gmail.com>.

hamexam version 1.11.2

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

bestie the ALL CAPS WARRANTY DISCLAIMER is not me being dramatic, that's literally the license talking 💀

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💀 BUGS 💀

the question pools are normally good for 4 years each, but are sometimes modified; ref.

http://www.ncvec.org/

hamexam does not automatically update the question pools from the VEC Web site.

so yeah, you gotta go fetch the new pools yourself, it will not do it for you 🙈

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and that's the whole page babes 💖 that was hamexam(1), straight out of the General Commands Manual — version 1.11.2, the 2011-2024 John Nogatch AC6SL era. go pass that exam, you're gonna slay 🎀✨🦋