[CQ-Contest] Help Needed with Skimmer/Telnet

[Pete Smith]

I'm writing to request help in cleaning up a minor problem with the 
Skimmer's telnet output.

Those who have been following this will recall that a couple of versions 
ago Skimmer was changed so that when it output a spot, the spot was 
attributed to the call-sign of the owner instead of to Skimmer -- the 
purpose of this change was to prevent spots being filtered out of, for 
example, a logging program was filtering out spots from Europe (and 
*thinking* that "Skimmer" was a Swedish call sign).

The format that Alex chose for the callsign of Skimmer spots was 
"[callsign]-#", similar to the "[callsign]-@" format of spots from DX 
Summit.  I verified that both DX4WIN and N1MM Logger handled such spots 
properly - that is, they were fed from telnet, appeared in the telnet 
window, and then were properly entered on bandmaps, spot lists, etc.

It appears, however, that some logging software is having trouble with the 
format.  For example, some users have found that Win-Test receives the 
telnetted Skimmer spots OK, but fails to pass them on as spots to its 
bandmap or cluster announce windows.  Generally speaking, this means that 
the software is employing some sort of pattern matching test to distinguish 
between spots and WWV announcements, talk messages, and announcements, and 
that the Skimmer spots are "failing" that test, which can and will vary 
from one software package to another.

I am getting in touch with the Win-Test developers to try to understand 
what that particular problem is, but in the meantime, I can sure use the 
help of others who have tested or can test the Skimmer telnet 
output.  Specifically, can someone confirm whether Skimmer spots are 
properly posted to the bandmap or spot list in TR Log, Writelog, CTWin and 
EI5DI?  Are there other contest loggers I have missed?  How about general 
loggers - particularly DXBase, Logger32, AA6YQ's DXLab suite, etc.?

Thanks in advance!

73, Pete N4ZR