During the WW CW weekend I used WL for the first time in a multi-op
environment.
On rare occasions one could be confronted with the need to re-boot a
computer in the middle of a contest. In our multi-two
station, the start-up process typically involves:
1. booting Windows.
2. logging into Windows.
3. starting WriteLog.
4. confirming the choice of log file to open.
-- might need to confirm that one wants to integrate in QSOs which had not been
saved before.
5. clicking "OK" on the "Welcome to WriteLog Packet. Please use the File menu
to select a COMM port." to make it go away.
6. clicking Setup/Register to Accept Network Connections.
7. clicking Setup/Link To Network and confirming the proposed choice of
computer to which to connect.
8. clicking Setup/Network Name and entering a name for the radio to use on the
Network Frequencies display. (This gets forgotten
when WL is closed.)
9. If two radios are controlled by this operating position, one must go to the
QSO Entry form, change the keyboard focus to the
second radio, and then again use Setup/Network Name to enter a name for the
second radio.
10. Select/open the WL Packet window and click the File menu and selecting
'local network' (or perhaps 'Telnet') to get spot
processing to resume.
11. If using Telnet, log into the Telnet spotting system.
12. Use sh/dx 100 or some similar command to the packet spotting network to
attempt to repopulate the bandmap and the packet spot
windows. (All the contents of these windows are lost when WL closes.)
13. Start the CW decoders.
14. click Entry/Change Operators to select the operator on duty (to recover
personalized voice keyer files and log subsequent QSOs
appropriately).
15. click Radio/Headphone Split to restore split headphone operation (this
setting is forgotten when WL is closed).
16. click Radio/Headphone Latch to restore headphone latching (also forgotten
when WL is closed).
17. click Entry/Enter Sends QRZ-Exchange (this setting is sometimes forgotten).
18. click Tools/Soundboard options and then Continuously Record Audio to File
to restart the audio record process.
Depending on your particular setup, you might need fewer (or more!) steps
before WL has been restored back to full operating.
That's a LOT of MANUAL steps to do correctly while tired in the middle of a
long contest. A manual checklist posted next to the
screen can help avoid overlooking any key steps... but I feel that we could be
doing better. So here are my questions for the
collective wisdom of the reflector:
What can be done to automate the above process of re-establishing logging in
the middle of a contest?
Thanks for any suggestions.
-- Eric K3NA
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