Is there software to decode Morse Code?

Turning on any of my vintage shortwave radios always brings some CW or Morse Code. In the 60s I learned the basic of Morse Code but I never really learned all the dots and dashes. To me, it always seemed like a tedious and complicated means of communication.

I know in the early days of radio, it served a purpose, but these days it's pretty obsolete. I recently learned that getting a Ham License no longer requires Morse Code. Honestly I wanted to get a ham license in the 60s but never did because of the morse code requirement back then.

I also have heard that most of the morse code heard on shortwave radios these days is NOT created by hand pressing a key, but rather done with machines (I'm not sure how it's done).

Anyhow, I was wondering if there is any sort of software that will decode morse code and turn it into plain text? I assume one would need to input the radio signal into a computer, via microphone or using a direct cord to input. Then software would decode it and print the text on the screen.

Does such a thing exist?

One further thing. I have noticed that most CW heard on the air these days is so fast that few people could manually decode it. I guess that is all machine created code, which in my opinion, needs a machine to decode it too.....

NOTE: Morse Code is not to be confused with Horse Code, as seen on the Mr.Ed tv series, in which Mr Ed communicated using short and long whinnies in series.... :) (Mr Ed was the greatest).

Reply to
tubeguy
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Reply to
Fox's Mercantile

There are many programs that will decode and encode Morse code and many other digital modes. Some free and some you buy. The will work fair just picking up the sound off the computer microphone, and usually better by putting the audio into the sound card input.

Go here:

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There are stand alone devices that will do it. On Youtube there are even some for a small microprocessor called an Arduino that can be built to do the decoding. The Arduino can be bought from China for less than $ 5 and you need a display for about the same price. There are about 5 wires to hook up from one to the other. and 2 resistors and capacitor. That hooks to the radio speaker.

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Reply to
Ralph Mowery

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