> Personally, I don't like internet spots, and I couldn't care less if our
> BUSTED
> routine messes up the rest of the world on contest weekends.
Promoting good will world wide is one of the finer points of amateur radio.
I think you fail to realize something. The cluster system is already
choking on contest weekends. All it would take is one guy with a Telnet
program, an hours worth of programming experience, and a bad attitude
to turn if off. How'd you like to see about 40 busted calls a minute all
weekend long ? You might be able to easily limit radio access to a particular
node, but with whole system open for Telnet connections, it's pretty
hard to keep unhappy people out. The guy you lock out on a radio port
already has a computer - if he has Windows he has a Telnet program,
and there are a hundred ways for him to get right back in.
We've already been thru the LOOPS and the DUPES caused by users
bridging spots from one node to another, thinking they were doing us
a favor. Fortunatly, some of the newer software fixes those kind of
things. Unfortunatly, the old software doesn't. Lot of people are still
using old software ......
It's easy to understand that FRC built and paid for the system, so they
want to use it for contesting on contest weekends. Nothing wrong with
that. But they also, from what you are saying, want it open for input and
at the same time, don't care who doesn't like the output. That sounds like
a pretty one sided deal.
And I think you are missing something in the algorythm. What makes
the cluster system valuable, during contests or just good old DX'ing time
is INPUT. Somebody has to spot something before anybody gets any
value from the system - no spots, no value. Not everyone who uses
the cluster is a contester, some are just plain old DX'ers. If we run them
off by making their favorite DXing tool unusable for 48 hours, we lose
their input.
I could easily understand your opinion if the FRC system was a closed
system, but not if it's connected to the rest of the world, and apparently
it is if you don't care what the whole world thinks.
Seems to me we'd be much better off fixing our software now to
accomodate everyone's tastes, instead of fixing it later to try and keep
out the unhappy campers. Make the contest transparent to those
who don't want to see it, keep everybody happy.
We are already suffering from this, which is easy to filter:
==== 03/05/00 00:22z Killed Spot Redundant - Spotted < 10 mins ago.
18 PC11^21237.1^CE8EIO^0019Z^ ^K1JN^K1TTT^H96^
22 PC11^21237.1^CE8EIO^0022Z^ ^W0AIH^N9ISN^H95^
==== 03/05/00 01:33z Killed Spot Redundant - Spotted < 10 mins ago.
129 PC11^14257.3^LY7A^0129Z^ ^N2MG^WB2BIN^H93^
133 PC11^14257.3^LY7A^0133Z^ ^W9RPM^K0RAK^H96^
How do you filter out bogus spots from somebody who's not happy ?
What do you do when a malcontent sets up a dozen intentional loops ?
How many pounds of spots fit in a five pound bag before the bag breaks ?
The scope of the cluster has changed, irregardless of who likes internet
spots and who doesn't. We need to adapt to the change - the internet
isn't going away. You can close the FRC system - but then you lose the
value of other people's input.
It's easy for me to fix the problem over here, one mouse click and we
don't have to see ANY spots for the whole weekend. You won't even
miss us, I'm sure. Sure, I can sit down and write some more filters,
filter out all the DX spots on ARRL weekends and only pass NA and VE.
But when everybody I connect to chokes, won't be anything to filter.
Two of the three nodes I connect to were down a good part of last
weekend. Something caused them to be busted, I guess....
What happens when half the world shuts down or chokes during
CQWW - will you miss us then ?
> With CT, it's a simple matter of going into the spot window and
> deleting the BUSTED call, along with the original spot for
> that busted call.
With CT it would also be a simple matter to automatically add a contest
flag to the comment field - you'd be helping to keep the bag from
busting and you wouldn't even realize you were doing it.
With ARCluster, it probably wouldn't be too hard to let a user turn
on the 'contest mode' and do the same thing.
It wouldn't solve the entire problem, but it sure would be a start.
73, Jim KH2D
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