[CQ-Contest] LoTW and contest submissions

[Ron Notarius W3WN]

My recent experience is that more and more contesters ARE submitting their
logs to LotW.  One recent contest (Pa QSO Party) showed a 25% hit rate
almost immediately on my personal log upload, and the last time I checked,
it was approaching 75%.  Several other major DX contests of the last few
weeks have seen sparse activity from me due to family commitments, but those
too show very high hit rates.

Yet my overall matches hover around 15%, and will continue to do so for
quite awhile -- as very few of my QSO's from 1995 and earlier will ever get
matched.

Logbook of the World IS the future.  But not tomorrow's future.  It will
continue to grow, and while the growth started off slow, I think it is
picking up.

Regarding Cabrillo... you do know that LotW will accept Cabrillo files, in
addition to ADIF, right?  The security encryption process handles both
formats.

Now while it would be a touch more convenent to send off one log entry
instead of two, consider this:
When you enter a contest, your logs are being used to compare to other logs,
and after a period of time, discarded.  And only the contest log checkers
see them (that may change in the future if some get their way on open logs,
though)
When you upload to Logbook of the World, you are making a "permanent"
upload, to a server and database system, not a transient one to a contest
checker.  All the more reason to make sure it's secure.  And I do believe in
the encryption process, the contest information headers are stripped away,
so as things currently stand, that doesn't make for a very good contest
entry.

But -- you're only sending one additional email.  Not ten, not five, not
even three.  Two emails instead of one.  You know what?  Big deal.

And... if your contest entry isn't going to ARRL, you'd have to send two
anyway.

Having said all that... I'm sure that Logbook of the World could use some
tweaking and TLC.  If I knew the software well enough, I'd offer my
services, but I'm not up on the latest in HTML.  I'm sure that Newington
will consider any offers of help with all due diligence!

73, ron w3wn

-----Original Message-----
Date: Mon, 17 Dec 2007 10:44:49 -0500
From: "B. Scott Andersen" <bsandersen at mac.com>
Subject: [CQ-Contest] LoTW and contest submissions
To: cq-contest at contesting.com

The efficacy of LoTW continues to be discussed. Of 7300+ QSOs
I have 1775 QSL records. This represents a 24% hit rate. I a still
do not have DXCC or even WAS with LoTW, though both awards
hang on the wall from paper card confirmations.

If this is indeed the future, then perhaps the ARRL should push it
harder. For ARRL sponsored contests the QSOs portion of the log
could be submitted through LoTW and only the heading part of the
Cabrillo file with the entrant's mode, power, call sign used, assisted
vs. unassisted, etc. would be declared. The question in my mind is:

--> Why should I have to convert my log to Cabrillo when I'm just
--> going to upload the thing to LoTW again as a whole second step?

Why am I doing this twice?! I'm especially curious for why I should
have to give the same organization (the ARRL) my log electronically
twice! Can't they just take the data once and then draw reports, copy
it,
move it, or search that data set as they see fit?

If contesters were required to submit their computer entries via LotW
instead of Cabrillo it would probably increase the QSL rate for
everybody, make the system appear more effective, and save many
of us who are already uploading our logs to both places a step.

This couldn't happen overnight. There is some work to do at the
ARRL and by logging program developers to make this work.
There would need to be some standardization for the way that the
exchanges are captured (ADIF is weak on this), for example,
but that has been a problem in ADIF anyway, IMHO.

If the contesting community pushes back because "it is too hard",
then maybe the ARRL would consider other mechanisms for getting
logs digitally signed that are easier for people to manage such as
hardware keys (USB dongles) or time-based tokens (little key fobs
that give you a new magic number every 60 seconds).  The key
management in the PKI system they have in place today is confusing
to some. I make no value judgement; I only make an observation.
I can't help but wonder if there are alternatives that would be
easier for people to adopt and embrace.

I'm not trying to start a fight; I'm just trying to save a step--and
get a better hit-rate on those QSOs I do upload to LoTW. It is
here. We should use it. But we should be also looking for ways
to make it better and more relevant.

My 2-cents.

-- Scott (NE1RD)

B. Scott Andersen  | "Magic is real, unless declared integer."
bsandersen at mac.com | -- The collected sayings of Wiz Zumwalt
Acton, MA (NE1RD)  | http://www.bsandersen.com