weechat-radio:$ Email

The Email tab

In wcr gui only (not the TUI or WeeChat). The station panel stays: mode, frequency, preset. The centre pane switches from live chat to email: inbox, outbox, sent, drafts, compose.

New mail puts a badge on email in the top bar. The tray icon can ping when you are not looking at Email. Guest names that start with ~ do not get an address; Email is hidden for them. In Setup, click live chat or email to leave setup. The logo does the same.

On the live map

Email shows as traffic, not a fifth operating mode. Your pin keeps its normal mode colour, with an e beside that same logo while mail is recent. The mode list uses the logo in orange plus that e. When mail went through another station's gateway, an orange arc links you and that gateway. The map ticker shows MAIL M7TJF -> G0ABC (callsigns only — never the internet address). Hub-only send still marks your pin when mail leaves or arrives.

Rewinding the map uses the mode and the lines from that time, not whatever the station is doing now. Pin colours for that rewind start once the hub has been recording them; lines come from the traffic already stored.

Your address

A licensed callsign is M7TJF@mail.weechatradio.com (your callsign). There is no domain box. Tell that address to people on the internet once.

Compose To: is an internet mailbox only, such as alex@example.com. Mail to another ham is still live chat. In Setup, Mail gateway is the internet-radio callsign on your dial. Radio+ without that callsign stays grey and the tooltip says to set it.

How mail travels

On radio-plus, mail goes over the air to your Mail gateway, and that station uses the hub. Watch a mail go out to Alex and the reply come back.

Send

Send never keys immediately. A confirm lists the destination, size, mode, frequency, preset, and a rough airtime. Internet and internet-radio say the message goes via the hub and does not use the radio. To, subject, and body stay on the form until the message is actually Sent.

Pure radio cannot reach the hub. The tab stays grey. The tooltip says to use Internet, Internet+Radio, or Radio+ with a gateway. Denying third-party chat relay does not stop a gateway from posting mail.

On HF and VOX the mail speed starts at the preset's robust rung and only gets slower. It does not move onto QPSK or OFDM. Chat is paused for the burst, and a chat frame already on its way to the modem goes first. Then the modem is put back, including carrier sense.

When it says Sent

Hub (internet, internet-radio): Sent after the hub says Resend accepted the message. A rejection is Failed.

Radio-plus, every PTT:

[tx]

Keying the burst is Outbox [tx].

[gw]

The gateway has every chunk.

Sent

Sent is only the gateway's acceptance, after Resend accepted it. Until then the line stays in the outbox.

A retry that has heard nothing back, with more than four chunks still missing, keys only the first chunk so the gateway can answer.

A toast timer does not mark Sent.

Status of each mail

Every mail in the list has one coloured chip. Screen readers hear the mark with it, for example [ok] Delivered.

[..]

Queued. Waiting for the radio or the hub.

[tx]

On air. Keying to the gateway (Radio+).

[..]

Waiting for gateway. The burst is done; the gateway has not answered yet (Radio+).

[gw]

At gateway. The gateway has every chunk and is handing it to the hub.

[ok]

Sent. Resend accepted it. The word after the subject says with Resend, no delivery report (no final answer a day after Sent) or delivery unknown (offline).

[ok]

Delivered. The recipient's mail server took it.

[..]

Delayed. Resend is still trying.

[no]

Bounced. The recipient's mail server refused it.

[no]

Spam. The recipient marked it as spam.

[no]

Failed. Not sent, or Resend could not send it. The opened mail says where it stopped.

[..]

No record. The hub has no delivery record for it.

Inbox mail shows Received. Open a mail to see the full reason and a timeline in local time: created, on air, burst done, at gateway, accepted by Resend, then the final answer.

Retry on Failed mail sends it again from the start. Re-send on Bounced mail opens compose with the same To, subject and body, so you can fix the address.

No read status. Mail goes out as plain text with no tracking, so nobody can tell when it is opened. The Email tab never says "read".

Receive — pull, not push

On radio-plus, Check mail asks the gateway for a short list (from, subject, size). You fetch a message and confirm the radio step. Nothing arrives on the radio until you ask.

Modes

What each mode can do with mail. Colours match the live map.

internet

Send to the internet: hub only. Confirm says there is no radio.
Read inbound mail: Email tab syncs; badge and tray

internet-radio

Send to the internet: this station is the gateway. Its own mail uses the hub when the hub is up.
Read inbound mail: sync over the internet. It also accepts radio-plus mail and posts that.

radio

Send to the internet: grey. Use Internet, Internet+Radio, or Radio+ with a gateway.
Read inbound mail: no path to the hub

radio-plus

Send to the internet: always RF to the Mail gateway callsign, then that station posts to the hub
Read inbound mail: Check mail over RF. Confirm every time.

Frequency and preset stay station-wide, same as chat. A 4 KB mail on hf-deep takes a long time on the air. The confirm exists so you see that before you key.

Optional copy to your own mailbox

Off by default. In Email settings you can ask the hub to also copy mail to a personal address (for example your usual inbox on a phone).

• The hub emails a confirm code to that address. The toggle stays pending until you enter the code. Your station and the hub both have to accept it, so confirm while the hub is up.
• When it is on: mail you send can be BCC'd there; mail that arrives at the hub is copied there. Their Reply still waits at the hub. Copy-to does not steal the Reply off the radio path.
• The copy follows your callsign. On radio-plus the hub adds it when the gateway posts your mail, so the gateway operator's own copy-to is never used on your message.
• Do not auto-forward that mailbox back to callsign@mail.weechatradio.com or you will loop.
• The personal address never goes over RF.

Limits

• Plain text only, about 4 KB. No attachments.
• Desktop GUI only.
• Not a Gmail or Outlook client. The app never stores a mailbox password.
• Not Winlink.
• No encryption on the air. Mail on RF is as readable as chat. You are the control operator for third-party traffic to a non-ham.

A Saturday on the hill

You are M7TJF. Mode radio-plus, 144.950, preset vhf-fm. The club box G0ABC is internet-radio on the same dial. The club secretary is alex@example.com.

1. Send the mail

   Email tab, To alex@example.com, Send, confirm the radio warning. The club box and hub send the mail.

2. Reach Alex

   Alex sees From M7TJF@mail.weechatradio.com.

3. Wait at the hub

   They hit Reply. The hub stores it. The club radio stays quiet until someone asks.

4. Fetch the reply

   You tap Check mail, open the reply, confirm the airtime. The body comes over 144.950.

5. Check your own inbox

   If copy-to is on, step 3 also left a copy in your personal inbox. That copy does not use the radio.