MORSE(1)

💖 MORSE(1) — morse(1) but make it make sense 💖

ok bestie listen up, this is the morse manual page and honestly? it's giving "secret weapon for radio hams" and we're gonna get through the whole thing together, nothing skipped, no cap 🎀

✨ NAME ✨

morse, QSO, morseX11, morseLinux, morseOSS, morseALSA — a Morse-code trainer and QSO generator for aspiring radio hams 🌈

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

morse [-i] [-I] [-r] [-n num] [-R num] [-N num] [-C charset] [-w num]
      [-f num] [-v num] [-g num] [-f num] [-e] [-c] [-b] [-a] [-l] [-m]
      [-t] [-T] [-s] [-q] [-p num] [-E num] [-M num] [-d] [-A] [-B] [-S]
      [-x num] [-X num] [word...]

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

so morse is a Morse-code trainer, and its whole entire purpose in life is helping aspiring radio hams pass the 5-word-per-minute Element 1 test 👑 It's so flexible about where it gets your practice text from, literally:

• it can read test text from a text file on standard input, or
• take test words from its command-line arguments, or
• generate random text (that's -r), or
• play back whatever you type (that's -i) 💅

and there's a helper program bestie, QSO, that generates plausible QSOs that you can pipe right into the standard input of morse. obsessed 🫶

the options, all of them, in order, no skipping 🙈

• -i — plays whatever you type back at you.
• -I — same energy as -i, except it does not turn off keyboard echoing.
• -r — generates random text. it starts out slanted towards easy letters, and then slants towards the ones you keep getting wrong. it's lowkey studying you 👀
• -n NUM — makes your words (groups) NUM characters long. valid values are between 1 and 20.
• -R NUM — sets the total time, in minutes, to generate text.
• -N NUM — sets the total number of words (groups) to generate. default is 0, and 0 means unlimited, periodt.
• -C 'STRING' — selects which characters to send, pulling from this STRING only. default is all available characters.
• -w — words_per_minute
• -f — frequency_in_hertz
• -v — volume (zero to one, and it's rather nonlinear, just so you know 💀)
• -g — alternate_frequency (it toggles via control-G in the input FILE at a word break)
• -F — Farnsworth_character_words_per_minute
• -e — leaves off the <SK> sound at the end.
• -c — complains about illegal characters instead of just quietly ignoring them.
• -b — prints each word before doing it.
• -a — prints each word after doing it.
• -l — prints each letter just before doing it.
• -m — prints morse dots and dashes as they sound. heads up bestie, this printing-intensive option slows the wpm down!
• -t — you type along with the morse, but you don't see what you're typing (unless you make a mistake). you're allowed to get ahead as much as you want. if you get too far behind, it stops and resyncs with you. you can force it to resync at the next word end by hitting Ctrl+H. hit ESC to see how you're doing, and Ctrl+D to end. (the rightmost space in the printout marks where the average is. farther-left spaces separate off blocks of letters that are about twice as probable as the average to occur, three times, etc.)
• -T — like -t, but you do see your characters (after they are played).
• -s — stops after each character and makes sure you got it right. this implies -t.
• -q — quietly resyncs with your input (after you make a mistake).
• -p NUM — makes you get it right NUM times, for penance 😭 this implies -s.
• -E NUM — if your count of wrong answers minus right answers for a given character exceeds this, the program will start prompting you. if it's above the maximum error prompt, it will never prompt. this implies -t.
• -M NUM — if you get more than this number of characters behind, it pauses until you do your next letter. 1 behind is normal, 0 behind means never pause. this option implies -t.
• -d — dynamically speeds up or slows down depending on how you're doing. (if it's also -s, then -d only speeds up!)
• -A — adds ISO 8859-1 (Latin-1) signs to the test set.
• -B — adds uncommon punctuation to the test set.
• -S — adds uncommon prosigns to the test set.
• -X — sets the error volume. error volume 0 means use the console speaker.
• -x — sets the frequency of the error tone.

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🦋 the basic International Morse code that the program will train you in 🦋

            A  .-          N  -.          1  .----       .  .-.-.-
            B  -...        O  ---         2  ..---       ,  --..--
            C  -.-.        P  .--.        3  ...--       ?  ..--..
            D  -..         Q  --.-        4  ....-       (  -.--.
            E  .           R  .-.         5  .....       -  -....-
            F  ..-.        S  ...         6  -....
            G  --.         T  -           7  --...
            H  ....        U  ..-         8  ---..
            I  ..          V  ...-        9  ----.
            J  .---        W  .--         0  -----
            K  -.-         X  -..-        /  -..-.
            L  .-..        Y  -.--        +  .-.-.
            M  --          Z  --..        =  -...-

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🍓 the extra characters you unlock with the -B option 🍓

            )  -.--.-      "  .-..-.      _  ..--.-
            '  .----.      :  ---...      ;  -.-.-.
            $  ...-..-     !  -.-.--      @  .--.-.

🌸 the procedural signals (prosigns) that also come along if you use -B 🌸

• <AR> — "+" over, end of message
• <AS> — "*" please stand by (<AS> 5 Wait 5 Minutes) (".-...")
• <BT> — "=" (double dash) pause, break for text
• CL — going off the air (clear)
• CQ — calling any station
• K — go, invite any station to transmit
• <KN> — "(" go only, invite a specific station to transmit
• R — all received OK
• <SK> — "%" end of contact (sent before call) ("...-.-", known also as <VA>)

🎀 the less-used prosigns you get if you use the -S option 🎀

• <AA> — "^" new line (".-.-", the same as :a, ae)
• <BK> — "#" invite receiving station to transmit ("-...-.-")
• <KA> — "&" attention ("-.-.-")
• <SN> — "~" understood ("...-.")

💜 the characters you get if you use the -A option 💜

• :a — .-.- (also for ae, the same as <AA>)
• `a — .--.- (also oa, danish a with ring over it)
• ch — ---- (bar-ch ?, bar-h ?, ISO 8859-1 code 199 and 231 ?)
• -d — ..--. (eth, overstrike d with -, ISO 8859-1 code 208 and 240)
• `e — ..-..
• ~n — --.--
• :o — ---. (also for oe)
• :u — ..-- (also for ue)
• ]p — .--.. (thorn, overstrike ] with p, ISO 8859-1 code 222 and 254)
• paragraph — .-.-.. (ISO 8859-1 code 167 ?)

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👑 for the raw beginner trying to learn morse code, here's the recommended sequence 👑

1. start learning the alphabet:

morse -r -s -T -d -w 5 -F 15 -p 5 -E -10

2. then drill drill drill:

morse -r -s -T -d -w 5 -F 15 -p 5 -E 0

3. real-time drill, with hints if you really need it:

morse -r -T -d -w 5 -F 15 -M 2 -E 4

4. simulated test:

QSO | morse -e -T -d -w 5 -F 15

5. the dreaded random-letter test:

morse -r -T -d -w 5 -F 15

6. finally try for greater and greater speed:

morse -r -T -d -w 13 -F 24

bestie ik it looks like a lot of flags but that's literally the whole path, from "what is a dot" to "I am speed" 🔥

✨ AUTHORS ✨

• Joe Dellinger <joe@montebello.soest.hawaii.edu>.
• Updated 2005 by Eric S. Raymond <esr@thyrsus.com>.
• Updated 2010 by Thomas Horsten <thomas@horsten.com>.
• Other contributions by Jacek M. Holeczek and Marc Unangst.

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and that's the whole page, bestie 💅 this is morse from the MORSE(1) manual, dated 02/11/2026, and you're gonna pass that test fr fr 🫶✨