[CQ-Contest] World Contest Station Database -- new and improved

[Tim Makins, EI8IC]

The database entry-form may be fixed, but what about the output ??????????

If I want to see what other stations are doing, I have to (a) know their
callsign, and (b) enter it into to the 'Query Database' box. One station at
a time ! Quite frankly, this is stone-age computing, Pete !!

If you want to make this database useful, you, or your database-guru, might
like to think about a variety of display options, such as:
* List all stations in a specified country
* List all stations in a specified CQ or ITU zone
* List all stations with antennas on, say, 160m.
* List all stations with towers over 100' high
* List all stations using the xxxxx transceiver or amp

etc. etc. etc.

This shouldn't be too difficult with today's software tools..


Tim, EI8IC
www.qsl.net/ei8ic/
The European HF Contesting Website
Recent winner of the 'DX Zone' Editors choice Award.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Pete Smith" <n4zr at contesting.com>
To: <cq-contest at contesting.com>
Sent: 08 December 2001 23:32
Subject: [CQ-Contest] World Contest Station Database -- new and improved


>
> As long-time readers of this reflector know, the World Contest Station
> Database was begun by Scott Tuthill, K7ZO in the 1995-97 period.
> Information about HF contest stations was harvested from the 3830
> reflector, organized in an Excel format, and made available for FTP.
>
> In 1999/2000, I worked with Scott's blessing to adapt the database so that
> it could be made accessible on the World Wide Web, and so that people
could
> submit revised information through the Internet.  Leigh Jones, KR6X,
> generously provided a web server as home for the database.
>
> Response from the contest community was very good, and the database grew
by
> early this year to over 1700 HF contest stations worldwide.  But as it
> grew, so did the burden of maintaining the database manually.  It had
> reached the point by this past February that I was spending several hours
> of grindingly dull labor a week to do that, and something had to give.
>
> Initially, I tried to develop a way to permit users to update their
entries
> directly via the Web, but this approach foundered on technical and
security
> issues.  Then Mike Reublin, NF4L, came up with the idea of automating the
> off-line updating process instead, and wrote an elegant little piece of
> software to do the job.
>
> Now that this problem is solved, I've deployed a new release of the
> database, with several improvements.  Most notably, the previously
separate
> databases for US/VE and other stations have been combined, so there is now
> only one query form and one form for updating.  The database is faster,
and
> the display of data is more readable.  All the updates that people
provided
> from late February up through yesterday have been added, and the database
> is ready for use.
>
> With thanks to KR6X for his long and patient support, I've also moved the
> database to a new server.  The move should be transparent to most users,
> because the previous link through http://www.qsl.net/n4zr remains in
> service.  You can also access the database at the PVRC home page,
> www.pvrc.org.
>
> Please drop by, and let me know what you think.
>
> 73, Pete N4ZR
> www.qsl.net/n4zr
>
>
> --
> CQ-Contest on WWW: http://lists.contesting.com/_cq-contest/
> Administrative requests: cq-contest-REQUEST at contesting.com
>
>


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