callrx

Beautiful amateur radio callsign lookup for the terminal

Look up any US amateur radio callsign from the FCC Universal Licensing System directly in your terminal — with color output, clickable links, and a clean table layout.

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Demo

Links are clickable in iTerm2, WezTerm, Windows Terminal, Kitty, and other OSC 8-capable terminals.

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Installation

Homebrew (macOS / Linux)

brew install binarynoir/callrx/callrx

Or tap first, then install:

brew tap binarynoir/callrx
brew install callrx

Upgrade later with brew upgrade callrx. The formula installs the prebuilt release binary for your platform — no Rust toolchain required.

Download a binary

Grab the latest binary for your platform from the Releases page:

Platform	File
macOS (Apple Silicon)	callrx-vX.Y.Z-aarch64-apple-darwin.tar.gz
macOS (Intel)	callrx-vX.Y.Z-x86_64-apple-darwin.tar.gz
Linux x86_64	callrx-vX.Y.Z-x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz
Linux ARM64	callrx-vX.Y.Z-aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz
Windows	callrx-vX.Y.Z-x86_64-pc-windows-msvc.zip

macOS / Linux:

tar -xzf callrx-*.tar.gz
sudo mv callrx /usr/local/bin/
callrx --version

Windows: extract the .zip and add the folder to your PATH.

Build from source

git clone https://github.com/binarynoir/callrx
cd callrx
cargo build --release
./target/release/callrx --version

Requires Rust (stable toolchain, 1.75+).

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Usage

callrx [CALLSIGN]
callrx lookup <CALLSIGN> [OPTIONS]
callrx history <CALLSIGN> [--raw]
callrx completions <SHELL>

OPTIONS:
    --json       Output raw JSON from callook.info
    --raw        Plain text output (no color, no formatting)
    --no-links   Disable clickable hyperlinks
    --no-cache   Bypass the local cache; always fetch fresh data
    --help       Print help
    --version    Print version

SHELLS: bash, zsh, fish, elvish, powershell

Examples:

callrx W1AW                    # Quick lookup (served from cache if fresh)
callrx lookup KD9ABC           # Via subcommand
callrx lookup W1AW --json      # Raw JSON (pipe to jq)
callrx lookup W1AW --raw       # Plain text (pipe to grep)
callrx lookup W1AW --no-cache  # Force a fresh API fetch
callrx lookup W1AW | grep Grid # Colors stripped when piped
callrx history W1AW            # Show all past lookups of W1AW
callrx history W1AW --raw      # History as plain text (for scripts)

Local cache

callrx caches every successful lookup in a local SQLite database for 7 days (matching callook.info's weekly FCC sync schedule). Subsequent lookups for the same callsign are served instantly from the cache and show a "Cached X ago" note in the output.

The cache database lives at:

Platform	Path
macOS	~/Library/Caches/callrx/callrx.db
Linux	~/.cache/callrx/callrx.db
Windows	%LOCALAPPDATA%\callrx\callrx.db

Use --no-cache to force a fresh fetch. The fresh result is still written back to the cache so the next lookup benefits from it.

Lookup history

Every successful lookup — whether served from the cache or fetched live — is recorded in the local SQLite database. Use callrx history <CALLSIGN> to see when a callsign was last looked up:

callrx history W1AW

W1AW · 3 lookups

  2026-06-11 10:30   live     just now
  2026-06-10 09:15   cached   1 day ago
  2026-06-09 14:22   live     2 days ago

live means the data was fetched fresh from callook.info; cached means it was served from the local cache. Use --raw for plain text output suitable for scripting.

Shell completions

Generate and install a completion script for your shell:

zsh:

callrx completions zsh > ~/.zsh/completions/_callrx
# Ensure ~/.zsh/completions is in your $fpath (add to ~/.zshrc if needed):
# fpath=(~/.zsh/completions $fpath)
# autoload -Uz compinit && compinit

bash:

# Add to ~/.bashrc to load on every session:
eval "$(callrx completions bash)"

fish:

callrx completions fish > ~/.config/fish/completions/callrx.fish

PowerShell:

callrx completions powershell >> $PROFILE

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Data source

Data comes from callook.info, which mirrors the FCC Universal Licensing System (ULS) and updates weekly. callook.info is not affiliated with the ARRL or the FCC — it is an independent service.

For the authoritative FCC record, click the ULS Record link in the output.

Thanks to callook.info

callrx would not exist without callook.info and its clean, free JSON API. It is built and maintained by Josh Dick (W1JDD, joshdick.net) as a service to the ham radio community.

If callrx is useful to you, please consider donating to callook.info to help Josh cover hosting costs and keep the service running. 73!

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Supported terminals (clickable links)

OSC 8 hyperlinks work in:

• iTerm2 (macOS)
• WezTerm (macOS, Windows, Linux)
• Windows Terminal v1.4+
• Kitty
• GNOME Terminal 3.26+
• Most VTE-based terminals

Links degrade gracefully to plain text in unsupported terminals or when output is piped.

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Development

Requires the stable Rust toolchain (pinned in rust-toolchain.toml).

# Build
cargo build                       # debug build
cargo build --release             # optimized binary at target/release/callrx

# Run
cargo run -- W1AW                 # run against a callsign
cargo run -- W1AW --json          # the shorthand accepts the same flags as `lookup`

# Test
cargo test

# Lint & format (matches CI)
cargo fmt --check
cargo clippy --all-targets -- -D warnings

CI (.github/workflows/ci.yml) runs fmt, clippy -D warnings, build, and test on Linux, macOS, and Windows for every push and pull request. It can also be run on demand from the Actions tab.

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Releasing

Versioning is automated with release-please and driven by Conventional Commits — you don't edit the version in Cargo.toml by hand.

1. Merge work into main using conventional commit messages:

   Commit prefix	Effect
   fix: …	patch bump (0.1.0 → 0.1.1)
   feat: …	minor bump (0.1.0 → 0.2.0)
   feat!: … / BREAKING CHANGE:	major bump (0.1.0 → 1.0.0)
   chore: docs: refactor: ci:	no release on their own

2. release-please opens and maintains a Release PR that bumps Cargo.toml + Cargo.lock and updates CHANGELOG.md. Review and merge it when you're ready to ship.

3. On merge it creates the vX.Y.Z tag and a GitHub Release (notes from the changelog), builds binaries for all platforms and attaches them, then regenerates the Homebrew tap formula so brew upgrade callrx picks up the new version.

Build targets: macOS (Apple Silicon + Intel), Linux (x86_64, ARM64, ARMv7), and Windows x86_64.

Manual / re-release: the Release workflow can also be run from the Actions tab ("Run workflow" → enter an existing tag), or triggered by pushing a v* tag directly.

One-time setup:

• In Settings → Actions → General, enable "Allow GitHub Actions to create and approve pull requests" so release-please can open the Release PR.
• Add a HOMEBREW_TAP_TOKEN repo secret: a fine-grained PAT (or classic token with repo scope) that can push to binarynoir/homebrew-callrx. The update-homebrew.yml workflow uses it to commit the regenerated formula to the tap. The default GITHUB_TOKEN cannot write to another repository.

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License

MIT