Dayton yet again

[K7LXC at aol.com]

Hello all,

    Could someone use a friendly, non-smoking roommate at Dayton?  The room
will be used primarily for storing clothes.  Or does anyone have rooms
blocked that they would be willing to let me have one?  The location doesn't
have to be downtown -- anywhere actually is fine; I'll have a car.

    I am presenting a talk on "Building A One-Tower Station" at the contest
forum and thought I should be present to give it.

     Roommate references include K1AR/K1DG and others.  

Thanks in advance for your indulgence,  Steve    K7LXC

>From Hans Brakob <71111.260 at compuserve.com>  Sat Apr  6 00:01:56 1996
From: Hans Brakob <71111.260 at compuserve.com> (Hans Brakob)
Date: 05 Apr 96 19:01:56 EST
Subject: Contest exchange
Message-ID: <960406000156_71111.260_EHM100-1 at CompuServe.COM>

Just some random thoughts, none that I particularly want to defend
against dr Bafoonik, or sacrifice any loon feathers over.

I don't see any particular value in the exchange elements being
"meaningful", so long as they are not "predictable". Someone
commented that changing from the traditional "59(9)" common in
many contests would cause a lot of logging mistakes. That struck
me as a weak argument, since one of the skills "tested" should be
the ability to accurately copy the full exchange. If I am a better
"copier" I ought to score better than you do. If I send "589" and
you copy "599" because that's what you "expect", then shame on 
you.

I uncomfortable with the idea of an exchange element calculated
from your call (or whatever), for a couple of reasons.

1) It encourages sloppy copying, because if I get either the call
or the exchange element wrong, it's no great trick for the 
program authors to incorporate a couple of lines of code to
check that out.  Maybe the program can't reliably correct it
(which was right, the call or the checksum?) but it can flag the
contact in real time so that you stick around to get it right.
I don't think the computer should be able to flag a busted call.

2) It will be a rather obscure and difficult concept to explain
to the casual passer-by who stops by with "I'll give you a
contact.... what's the exchange". Thus it discourages participation
by newcomers.

Personally, I'm partial to the SS "Check" (year first licensed)
because it is unpredictable, easy to for the originator to 
figure out/remember, and can't be "looked up" or calculated by
a logging program. (Yes, I've been known to use a different number
some years to foil those who worked me last year.)

Another interesting idea I saw recently was the use of grid
square designators. This has some disadvantages in that they are 
a little long (4 or 6 characters) and sort of predictable, at 
least for "reasonableness" if not exactness, and again the "drop
by" folks may not know their grid number.

Another idea might be the last two digits of your address,
phone number, or waist size in local measurement (W/K guys would
seem slimmer than EU's, on average!).

The thrust of all this is that the exchange should be "copied", 
not calculated or assumed.

73, de Hans, K0HB