[CQ-Contest] CW Open and the RBN

[K9MA]

I wonder if those whose calls were mis-decoded were not looking at 
spots. (Even though there is no unassisted category in the CWops Open.) 
Perhaps those who plan to operate unassisted in other contests should 
run a test before the contest to make sure this isn't happening.

73,
Scott K9MA


On 9/5/2021 8:10 AM, Pete Smith N4ZR wrote:
> I ran into an interesting phenomenon using RBN spots in the CWO. 
> Several stations were repeatedly mis-decoded by the RBN, and I think 
> the cause probably had to do with spacing.  I have BCC'd those I 
> specifically noted, to avoid embarrassment, but here's the story:
>
> Stations that left insufficient space in a CQ between "CWO" or "TEST" 
> and the start of their callsign were "rewarded" with spots for ON and 
> OK or TN (for example) instead of their real N and K prefixes.  
> Stations that inserted slightly additional spaces between letters in 
> their suffix (this seems to have been particularly prevalent with last 
> letters like "E" and "I") found their callsigns truncated (with the 
> last letter left off)'.
>
> If you think this might have been happening to you, you can test it by 
> searching on the beta RBN web site for possibly truncated or expanded 
> versions of your call.  You can even use a wildcard (*) at 
> beta.reversebeacon.net/main.php to search for all the possible 
> additions - some won't work because they result in imaginary 
> prefixes.  Personally, I was delighted to learn that despite a lot of 
> running, my call was not miscopied in this way by the RBN.  My CQs 
> were all machine-sent, which may explain it.
>

-- 
Scott  K9MA

k9ma at sdellington.us