[CQ-Contest] Contest Logging History

[jamesdavidcain at gmail.com]

Hi Steve,

 

I think you are right. 

 

I wrote a four-page article published in QST, July 1990, "The Mind of the
Contester." I just re-read it for the first time in years. I wrote that
databases were available for CT then if our computer had "expanded memory."
I even mentioned "Supercheck Partial." I don't remember installing any such
fripperies. 

 

For what it's worth, that section of my article was sub-titled "The
Downside."

 

I thought in 1988 that computer logging and duping was great, but that
computer operating sucked. Still do. 

 

Cheers, jim k1tn

 

------------

 

Not quite as you remember it, Jim.

 

I started using CT in 1988 - Version 5.something. Unfortunately, I don't
have that manual anymore, but I do have the CT Version 9 manual, from 1994. 

 

>From the manual:

 

"CT uses database files to look up prefix, country and section information.
The CQWW.CTY, ARRL.CTY and IARU.CTY files have been merged into one
database, CTY.DAT, which contains CQ zones, IARU zones, ..." 

 

That implies that CQWW.CTY, ARRL.CTY and IARU.CTY predate version 9, and the
AD1C-maintained CTY.DAT was introduced in Version 9. I bet AD1C can tell us
even more. 

 

73,

Steve, N2IC

Contest logging program historian :)

 

 

 

On 05/05/2019 07:36 AM, jamesdavidcain at gmail.com wrote:

"Before everyone paints N1MM Logger as some kind of villain, let me remind

you that prefill has been a standard feature in contest loggers since K1EA's

CT, in the late 1980's. Steve, N2IC"

 

I remember CT from 1988 (yes I was there). Once you logged the location, CT

thereafter filled it in when you logged the station again. You had better

copy the location correctly the first time. There were no databases that I

recall for "prefilling" such info. There wasn't even an "internet."

 

Jim Cain K1TN