[Dxbase] County Hunters Tools and HAM CALL CD ROM has 30% error rate

[Bob Brunius]

Jack,

Thanks for your reply.

OK,  "fill CDROM data" functionality is not available on the short cut 
menu. Sorry I'm a little slow on the uptake. It sounds like that will be 
in the next release. I hope that autofill the blank fields in all record 
from the CD ROM will be implimented.

What I am really wanting is the county field entered into the QSO 
records. I found a WEB page that will give you the county based on the 
ZIP code. Because zip codes are coded into the FCC data base and in the 
CD ROMs and the county isn't neccessarily, there might be a valuable 
tool if you could extract the zip code from the address tables and add 
that field into the QSO record. The next step would be to access the 
county lookup WEB page using the zip code like you do with QRZ and the 
call sign.

Is there a way to select a QSO in the event that I have not worked the 
county before?  A custom filter or something like that? I want to start 
QSLing only in the event I haven't worked the county. Actually what I 
want is to QSL if I haven't received a card from the HAM and ( its been 
over 6 months since I sent him a card or I haven't sent him a card) and 
I haven't worked the county. How about that as a productive database search?

Jack, I'm suprised to hear that 30% of the information in the CD ROMs is 
bad. I'm using Bucks HAM Call and I have been mailing QSL cards using 
the address data directly. Out of about 1000 cards that I have sent 
domestically using that information I have only received 4 cards back 
from the USPS for "bad address." Also, when you say I should review that 
information, review it against what? When I looked up the call signs of 
the returned QSL cards on QRZ it showed the same addresses. So again 
even if I had reviewed the addresses against QRZ I still would have had 
the same return percentage. That is only about a half of a percent 
anyway. What calculations are you using to get 30%?

I think that 400 Qs on 160M from the Pacific NW in two nights is a lot. 
I got a WAS in that 400 QSOs! So humor me please.

Thanks,
Bob
AC7PN




Bob,

Sorry that you seem to be looking for functionality that was never 
implemented in this version of DXbase.  Shortcuts are assigned for main 
menu items but not for the pop up menus.

400 Qs is really not very many, but maybe you ought to wait for our next 
release where we plan to implement the sort of functionality you seem to 
want.  But be forewarned that our testing shows that about 30 percent of 
what comes off the address CDs is outdated and just plain incorrect.  So 
lest you believe that a third-party database is somehow the "cats meow" 
and you fill up your log fields with what it gives you, be forewarned 
you may find you do yourself more harm than good.  It's our experience 
that you really want to review what gets offered by the CD data before 
you keep it.

Cheers,
Jack