Learn

Free, structured modules that take you from complete beginner to confident practitioner — with optional Learning Paths to guide your route, one short lesson at a time.

The goal of this hub is to take you from curious beginner to shipping a real project of your own — something like GopherTrunk itself: a software-defined-radio trunking scanner built in Go. Getting there touches a lot of ground — how radio works, how signals become numbers, how software is designed and version-controlled, the hardware it runs on, how modern AI tools fit into the workflow, and how to build AI features into your own software. Each module below covers one of those pieces, in plain language, one short lesson at a time. Not sure what order to take them in? A Learning Path is an optional guide that recommends a route through several modules toward competence in a bigger area, like RF software or hardware.

You don’t have to follow a path, take modules in order, or finish them all to build something. Start where you’re weakest, follow the journey from first principles to a finished application, and watch your progress fill in as you go. Your progress is saved in your browser — and to your account when you’re signed in, so it follows you across devices. Pick up any module exactly where you left off, or reset one to start over. Lessons are self-contained and cross-linked, so you can read straight through or jump to just what you need.

Learning Paths

Not sure where to start? A Learning Path is a guided, ordered route through several modules toward competence in a bigger area — like RF software or hardware. They are guidance only: nothing here is required, and every module can be taken on its own.

  1. RF Software Development Write the software that turns raw radio into decoded data — the GopherTrunk skill set. 10 modules
  2. RF Hardware Understand the radios, antennas, and front-ends that put signals in front of your software. 4 modules
  3. Software Engineering Foundations Become a well-rounded developer, from first program to shipping and licensing. 9 modules
  4. AI Software Development Build software with — and powered by — modern AI. 8 modules
  5. Cybersecurity Understand systems well enough to defend them. 5 modules
  6. Digital Trunking & Scanning Go from first radio wave to following live trunked voice systems. 5 modules

Your journey to shipping a project

17 modules take you from first principles to a real, shipping application like GopherTrunk — an SDR trunking scanner. Follow them in order, or jump straight to what you need. Your progress fills in as you go.

  1. RF & SDR
  2. Git & GitHub
  3. Linux & the Command Line
  4. Networking & the Internet
  5. Cybersecurity Fundamentals
  6. Intro to Software Dev
  7. Digital & Trunked Radio
  8. Intro to Hardware
  9. AI in Software Dev
  10. Building AI Into Software
  11. Software Licensing
  12. Programming in Go
  13. Digital Signal Processing
  14. Containers & Deployment
  15. Databases & Data
  16. Web Development
  17. Scanning & Monitoring
  18. Ship a project like GopherTrunk

Browse all modules

  1. RF & SDR Radio and software-defined-radio fundamentals — from your first wave to decoding digital trunked voice. 32 lessons 6 units
  2. Git & GitHub Version control from the ground up — branching, collaboration, and the GitHub features teams rely on every day. 30 lessons 6 units
  3. Linux & the Command Line The operating system and shell every developer leans on — files, permissions, processes, pipes, scripting, and services — from your first command to a Raspberry Pi humming by the antenna. 29 lessons 6 units
  4. Networking & the Internet How data actually moves — packets, IP, DNS, TCP, HTTP, and TLS — plus firewalls, VPNs, the command-line tools to debug it all, and how to put your own service safely on the network. 29 lessons 6 units
  5. Cybersecurity Fundamentals How attacks work and how to stop them — the CIA triad, cryptography, authentication, common attacks, hardening, secure coding, and the ethics of it all, including the RF-monitoring side a scanner like GopherTrunk lives in. 29 lessons 6 units
  6. Intro to Software Dev How software is built — the history, the languages, the principles and patterns, and how to choose your tools and ship your own software solo. 43 lessons 7 units
  7. Digital & Trunked Radio How land-mobile radio went digital and learned to share channels — the history, the end-to-end signal chain, and every trunking system GopherTrunk follows. 33 lessons 6 units
  8. Intro to Hardware The hardware a developer actually chooses between — servers, PCs, phones, single-board computers, and microcontrollers — what each is for, what runs on it, and how to pick. 29 lessons 7 units
  9. AI in Software Dev How AI coding tools actually work, the providers and models, the ways to use them, and how to choose your stack and start today. 28 lessons 6 units
  10. Building AI Into Software Go from using AI tools to building AI-powered features into your own software — model APIs, prompts in code, structured output, tools, retrieval, agents, evaluation, and shipping responsibly. 28 lessons 6 units
  11. Software Licensing Every software license from open source to proprietary, using open source in what you sell, how to read any agreement, and choosing the right license and user agreements for your own software. 41 lessons 7 units
  12. Programming in Go The language GopherTrunk is written in — from hello world to goroutines, interfaces, and reading a real Go codebase. 30 lessons 6 units
  13. Digital Signal Processing The math and code that turn a stream of radio samples into data — filters, FFTs, mixing, and clock recovery, the way an SDR really works. 30 lessons 6 units
  14. Containers & Deployment How software actually ships and runs — containers, Docker, systemd, CI/CD, and the cloud — using GopherTrunk's own deployment as the worked example. 30 lessons 6 units
  15. Databases & Data Every app needs somewhere to keep its data — tables, SQL, keys and joins, the relational and NoSQL and vector stores, and how to query, model, and run a database from your own code. 32 lessons 6 units
  16. Web Development How the web is actually built — HTML, CSS, and JavaScript on the front end, HTTP servers and REST APIs on the back, auth and real-time and security, and shipping the whole thing to production. 32 lessons 6 units
  17. Scanning & Monitoring The operator's side of the hobby — building a listening station, finding and identifying systems, following trunked calls in the field, and logging, recording, and monitoring them with a scanner or SDR. 31 lessons 6 units