[PaQSO] PaQSO Party Update

Tue Mar 21 14:59:28 EST 2006

A few years ago, when the Cabrillo logging robots were starting to roll out, I asked a few of the gurus involved a few questions on how to they worked, idea being to find out how to set up or adapt a robot for the PaQP.

The general reply was "we're too busy with the big international contests to bother with a state QSO party."

I answered back something to the effect that I wasn't asking them to do it, just for enough info to make suggestions.

The general reply once again was "we're too busy with the big international contests to bother with a state QSO party."

Whether you prefer Cabrillo-style, ADIF, CSV or whatever... it sure would be nice to be able to set up a logging robot to automatically receive the log, read the format, score the log, store the log and acknowledge receiving the log (with or w/o errors).  

Now maybe the powers-that-be have a little more time now; and I don't want to sound like I'm picking on them (ok, not much at least) because they were at the time busy debugging problems.  Regardless, it sure seems to me that it should be possible, giving all the computer expertise available through this list, the Nittany ARC, and other amateur radio-related sources, that we should (if so desired) be able to set up our own automation and take some of the burden off of Mike and the NARC/PaQP log checkers.

Or am I missing the obvious here, not that that'd be anything unusual?

73, ron wn3vaw
n3sh 2006 probably op & general purpose troublemaker

From: Jimk8mr at aol.com
Date: Tue Mar 21 13:42:54 CST 2006
To: Bodine.669 at att.net, paqso at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [PaQSO] PaQSO Party Update

In a message dated 3/21/2006 10:00:41 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,  
Bodine.669 at att.net writes:

W3USA,,,_U.S.A.,10-08-05,16:32:35,16:32:35,7.2,LSB,018,SNJ,1000,,Pennsylvania 
 QSO  Party_ARM
N3PVZ,,,_U.S.A.,10-08-05,16:36:44,16:36:44,7.2,LSB,LUZ,SNJ,1000,,Pennsylvania 
 QSO  Party_28
KN4SK/R,,,_,10-08-05,16:43:29,16:43:29,7.2,LSB,012,SNJ,1000,,Pennsylvania  
QSO Party_IND

Fortunately KB3EIA accepted your log, but from my experience (sending lots  
of logs to ARRL, etc., plus running the Ohio QSO Party, though someone else  
does its log processing):

Whatever software you are using puts out a very weird file!

The "industry standard" these days is the "Cabrillo" format, which in spite  
of frequent whining is not at all difficult for users (I can't comment on the  
software writing angle).  This would show qsos as something like  this:

QSO:  7045 CW 2005-10-09  2147  W3USA   0060  CRA  K2UBG     127 SNJ

from W3USA's Crawford county log for working K2UBG on 40 meter CW .

Cabrillo also includes a dozen or so lines of header which includes  
information like the name, address, category, club, etc., for the submitting  station.

What Cabrillo logs do NOT show are things like qso points, multipliers,  
dupes, time on/off, etc. There is no summary sheet as such.

This is because most contest sponsors now do all the scoring, dupe  checking, 
etc., using such a Cabrillo log as a raw data input. It spares the  entrant 
of doing this, and the sponsor of having to detect and correct all the  
mistakes made by those who score it wrong.

A lot of information in your log is pretty unnecessary for a contest  
sponsor:  the country for each qso, the notation  "Pennsylvania QSO  Party_" ,  
"1000" (whatever that is?), the time listed  twice, etc.

Your log does not appear to include the qso number you sent, which is  
relevant information. 

>From an earlier post by Mike, I gather that KB3EIA's crew is not set up for  
working from just an electronic log in  Cabrillo format, i.e. without a  
summary sheet. It sounds like they need to find some Penn State business or  
computer science student in need of an academic project  :>)

73  -  Jim     K8MR
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