[CQ-Contest] Ingenious prefixes and the RBN

[Radio K0HB]

That would be so UNFAIR!


On Wed, Apr 18, 2018 at 13:52 John Unger <w4au at verizon.net> wrote:

> Gee, does this mean that folks will actually have to tune the radio,
> listen to the station, and copy the "ingenious" prefixes correctly
> rather than just clicking on a spot...:-)
>
> 73 - John, W4AU
>
>
> On 4/18/2018 8:46 AM, N4ZR wrote:
> >
> > This may be old news to many of us, but VE3NEA's CW Skimmer Server
> > determines how "skeptical" to be about a callsign, based on a file of
> > all expected callsign patterns. This assessment in turn affects how
> > many repetitions of a callsign it must "hear" before issuing a spot.
> >
> > From time to time, this causes problems for contesters who have gone
> > out of their way to get a truly unique callsign for use in contests
> > like CQWPX.  For example, normal Belize callsigns are V31@@ (where @
> > is an alphabetic wild card), but I have recently been told about the
> > issuance of a V3@ callsign for contest use.
> >
> > Revising the callsign pattern file in a truly systematic way involves
> > getting data from QRZ.COMon the number of "hits" for each callsign and
> > massaging the data with exotic techniques (exotic to me, anyway) to
> > turn callsigns into patterns and aggregate the numbers of hits to
> > determine how common the pattern is.  It's a lot of work.
> >
> > With a little time remaining before CQWPXCW, I'm offering an interim
> > fix.  If you have received what you believe to be a unique prefix and
> > have not used it before March, 2017 (the last systematic overhaul of
> > the pattern file) e-mail me by May 1 and I will incorporate the new
> > pattern in the RBN's pattern file distribution, which will be made
> > available to all RBN nodes by May 10.  I can't promise you that all
> > node-ops will download the new file before the contest, but the server
> > will at least "nag" them to do so.
> >
> >
> > 73, Pete N4ZR
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > CQ-Contest at contesting.com
> > http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/cq-contest
>
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>
-- 
73, de Hans, K0HB
--
"Just a boy and his radio"™