Run the install command

Your approval email contains a one-line command starting curl -sSL https://listen.madrock.net:8443/join/bootstrap.sh.... Run it exactly as sent, as a normal command (don't retype it, copy-paste the whole line), on the computer that's physically connected to your SDR dongle or scanner — not your laptop, unless that's the same machine. It needs sudo and a few minutes; it installs everything and saves your node's credentials to /etc/kestrel-listen/.

Lost the email or the command already scrolled past? Log in at the operator login and open your node — the same command is shown again at the top of the page until it's been run once.

Confirm your hardware was actually seen

Log in and open your fleet, then your node. Two tables tell you what Kestrel itself detected on its most recent check-in:

• Detected devices on this node — your RTL-SDR/SoapySDR dongle should appear here by its serial number. A row that's greyed out ("stale") means it hasn't reported in over a week — check the USB connection and that refresh.sh has run recently.
• Detected audio devices — for a scanner+soundcard setup. A red "capture failed" here usually just means the device was busy (already in use by a running stream) at the moment of the test, not that it's broken — retest, and only worry if it's consistently red with nothing using the device.

Have an AntSDR E200, Pluto+, or LibreSDR instead of a plain USB dongle? These connect over Ethernet, so Kestrel can't discover one on its own the way it does a plugged-in RTL-SDR/HackRF -- it won't show up in the tables above by itself. Use the Network SDR section further down your node's page to enter its IP address; your node then tries to reach it for real on the next refresh, and only counts it as usable once that check succeeds (shown as a green dot next to it in the device table -- amber means declared but not yet checked, red means checked and unreachable). All three of these devices share the same real 56 MHz capacity, well beyond a single USB dongle, so a handful of channels spread a few MHz apart is no problem on one of these. If this is your only SDR (no USB dongle plugged in as well), also set SDR type override (its own section on your node's page) to SoapySDR (HackRF etc.) -- without it, your channels save fine but nothing on the node actually runs to serve them.

Add your first channel

On the same page, use the channel form to add a frequency. Start with one you know is active locally — a nearby repeater or a busy marine/ATC frequency is easiest to verify by ear. Set:

• Modulation — FM for most VHF/UHF repeaters and marine, AM for airband.
• Squelch — if you're not sure, leave it and adjust after you can hear whether it's staying open on noise or missing real traffic.
• Status — leave this as Development or Testing for now. Nothing marked this way is shown to the public as a live feed, so there's no rush and no risk in experimenting.

Deploy, then verify it's actually running

Click Deploy to sensor. This pushes your saved settings out — watch the status line, which polls automatically and will tell you plainly if it fails rather than hanging silently. Deploying only proves your configuration reached the node, not that the receiver itself is working, so also open Live channel tuning & audio levels for your node and confirm you can actually see/hear signal on the channel you just added — that's the real proof, not just a green status line.

Antenna basics, briefly

A cheap dongle antenna will get you started but a proper antenna for your target band, mounted as high and clear of obstructions as practical, is the single biggest improvement you can make — far more than gain settings. If you're chasing a specific weak or distant signal, that's the first thing to change, not the squelch.

Go live

Once you're happy with a channel — squelch behaves, signal is real, no constant false triggers — set its status to Live. It'll then appear on the public console under your node's persona (Air/Sea/Land). You can flip individual channels back to Testing at any time without affecting the rest of your node.