[CQ-Contest] Interesting new rule in EUHFC

[Richard Ferch]

Without making any judgment as to the appropriateness of this new rule, I 
note that several people have questioned whether TRLog can include 
frequencies in the log.

TRLog can indeed be used to produce a log file or even a Cabrillo file with 
frequencies, but the post-contest process requires some manipulation of 
files. If you aren't a TRLog user, you can skip to the next message now!

First, the LOGCFG.DAT configuration command to get frequencies into the log 
(this requires an interfaced radio, of course) is

LOG FREQUENCY ENABLE = TRUE

If you put this in your LOGCFG.DAT file before the contest, your log file 
will have the kHz part of the frequency in the columns where serial numbers 
would normally appear, in the format

.824 for 1.824
.528 for 3.528
.016 for 7.016, 14.016, 21.016 or 28.016 depending on the band (the band 
information is in the log file in the usual place and format).

As a side note, if you use this in another contest where serial numbers are 
part of the exchange, then provided your sent serial numbers were all in 
proper order (I'm not sure whether I'd want to rely on this if I was doing 
SO2R) you can put them back into the log using POST /L /C , then answer N, 
N, Y, N, N, 60 to the consecutive questions (it's the third one, Y, that 
gets you the serial numbers). The original LOG.DAT will contain frequencies 
and the new LALLBOTH.DAT will contain serial numbers.

Back to EUHFC - as I understand it, the organizers do not insist on 
Cabrillo, but I have no idea whether they would accept an ASCII log in 
LOG.DAT format with frequencies, which would look something like:
  80CW  07-Aug-04 2323 .507  S50A      599 63       63   1
(the sent exchange is not in the LOG.DAT file, only in the summary file).

If you want to create a Cabrillo file, you have two barriers to cross: one 
is getting TRLog to produce a good Cabrillo file for this contest, and the 
other is adding the frequency information. BTW, there have been requests 
for POST to do this in one step, but to the best of my knowledge this has 
not been implemented yet.

Anyway, the first problem is that the EUHFC is not on the list of contests 
that POST will produce a valid Cabrillo file for (I believe it will produce 
a file called LOG.CBR, but the exchange information will be damaged; it is 
not a valid Cabrillo file). What you have to do is change the CONTEST line 
in your LOGCFG.DAT file to a contest that is supported and has a 
similar-looking exchange. Luckily, there is one: IARU. So, after the 
contest you should edit LOGCFG.DAT to read CONTEST = IARU, and add a line 
MY ZONE = xx where xx is the two-digit year you sent as your exchange 
during the contest. Next, run POST to create a Cabrillo file. Now edit the 
Cabrillo file to change CONTEST: IARU-HF to CONTEST: EUHFC . If everything 
worked the way it should, the rest of the Cabrillo file should be OK, 
although it will not contain exact frequencies yet.

To add the exact frequencies: Download the program CBRFRFIX from 
http://www.storm.ca/~ve3iay/download.html . You can run CBRFRFIX in a DOS 
(command line) window; it will ask for the file name of your Cabrillo file 
(LOG.CBR, for example), the original log file with the frequency 
information (LOG.DAT, for example), and the new output Cabrillo file 
(LOGFREQ.CBR, for example - it must be different from the input Cabrillo 
file name). The new Cabrillo file will be just like the original except it 
will contain exact frequencies (exact to the next lower kHz, that is).

So, if you are a TRLog user and you have a computer-interfaced radio, you 
can still try for a plaque in the EUHFC!

Hope someone finds this useful.

73,
Rich VE3IAY

PS: If anyone wants to use CBR2ADIF to create an ADIF file from the 
Cabrillo file, EUHFC is not on the list of contests that CBR2ADIF supports 
right now, but I will try to get it into the next version before the 
contest date comes around. CBFRFIX does not look at the contest name, so it 
should work for any contest, but CBR2ADIF needs to know the contest name so 
it can decode the exchange information.