Help me out here. I'm struggling to understand how the new cw/ssb lockout
modes would be used (my brain still isn't fully functional after 44 hours in
CQWW CW...)
First-one-wins in a network makes sense for spotting radios in multi-multi
and M/S operations. Is that the intended use? However, when set on one
computer in the network it would have to work only for that computer
(presumably, the spotting radio's computer.) Otherwise, if it affected all
radios in the network, only one station in the multi could transmit at a
time! Am I correct in assuming that the lockout applies only on computers on
which it is set?
Last-one-wins doesn't make sense in a multi environment -- you don't want to
interrupt someone else's QSO, right?
Seems to me that the only use for Last-one-wins is a single-op running two
computers, each with it's own radio (the way CT users have to do SO2R.) The
way I understand it, last-one-wins allows the S&P radio to automatically
interrupt the CQ radio, ensuring that only one signal is transmitted at a
time (without this feature, it's easy to make a mistake and transmit on both
radios at the same time, breaking the rules.) This duplicates the CQ
interruption feature you get in the one computer/two radio case by splitting
the tx and keyboard focus. Am I correct that this is the intended use of
last-one-wins mode?
However, to be as fully functional as the single computer case, Auto Restart
would have to work after the interrupting radio ceases transmission. Does
it? If not, you would have to hit F1 on the CQ radio after each transmission
on the S&P radio. If Auto Restart works in last-one-wins mode, then I can
see a significant advantage to using two computers: even though the hands
are moving between two keyboards, there's less fooling around with shifting
the keyboard focus. In the single computer case, I often move the keyboard
focus to the second radio to dupe a call and immediately get an answer on
the CQ radio, requiring me to move the keyboard focus back (I have macro
keys for all this, but it's a pain.) Sometimes I accidentally type the call
in the S&P radio entry window and have to retype it in the CQ window. If
Auto Restart works in this case, I would seriously consider networking my
notebook to run the second radio.
OK, now the hard one: The Help file says if you have two radios on one
computer, last-one-wins is the mode to use. For what? What functionality
does this mode offer over the existing SO2R switching, interruption and auto
restart features? Near as I can tell, there's no way to make both radios
transmit at the same time in this configuration -- as soon as you shift the
transmit context, transmission ceases on the radio from whence it came! I
couldn't detect any effect when I set last-one-wins on a single computer
with two radios. What am I missing?
If I'm right about the intended uses, then maybe more intuitive names could
be selected for these commands. First, they no longer apply just to RTTY.
Second, last-one-wins isn't a lockout mode at all -- it's an override. If
I'm right about the uses, how about "Spotting Radio" and "SO2R on Two
Computers", or "Spotting Radio Locked Out" and "S&P Radio Can Interrupt"? If
those aren't general enough, how about "Networked Radio Locked Out" and
"Networked Radio Interrupts"?
I realize that I could be totally out of it here and have missed the obvious
cases for these modes. So... help me out!
73, Dick WC1M
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