[RTTY] Suggestion for upcoming RTTY Roundup

[Tyler Stewart]

Oh, good point!  Yes, definitely if you are separating say the 599 from the
QTH or something else that contains letters, use a space or even a new line
if conditions are tough.  I was only thinking about the situation where
numbers are getting repeated or perhaps not usually important like the RST.
If you are sending an alpha piece of data like the QTH or section, you
should never use dashes as it doesn't save any time and you don't get the
benefit of USOS.

Ty K3MM
 

-----Original Message-----
From: Bill Turner [mailto:dezrat1242 at ispwest.com] 
Sent: Saturday, December 31, 2005 4:01 PM
To: Tyler Stewart; 'robert'; RTTY at contesting.com; 'Shelby Summerville'
Subject: Re: [RTTY] Suggestion for upcoming RTTY Roundup


ORIGINAL MESSAGE:

At 12:15 PM 12/31/2005, Tyler Stewart wrote:
>Guess it depends on how smart your decoder is
>(both computer and human software) and whether you can type well which way
>works better.  My preference is for dashes...


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It's not a question of smart or dumb decoders, it's an inherent issue 
with Unshift On Space (USOS). What you are doing by sending dashes is 
foiling USOS, not a good idea, IMO. Nearly every TNC and software 
uses USOS by default, for good reason.

For those new to RTTY, USOS resets your FIGS/LTRS case back to LTRS 
every time a space is sent or received. When copy is poor because of 
QRM/QRN and dashes are being used, the reset never happens and you 
get print like this:  599-48-48-48 instead of 599-RI-RI-RI. If you 
send 599 RI RI RI (without dashes) then USOS can reset back to LTRS 
with each space and you will get at worst 599 48 RI RI.

The idea of using dashes goes back to the early days of RTTY 
contesting before anyone realized the value of USOS. WF1B, bless his 
heart, included dashes in his default macros and people have been 
using them ever since. Sending dashes does indeed make sending 
faster, but you pay the price. I've been harping on this issue for 
years and gradually more and more people are seeing the light. Try it 
and see if the number of requests for repeats falls off dramatically. 
I'm betting you will change too.

To sum it up:
Dash = bad.
Space = good.
:-)

73, Bill W6WRT