[Skimmertalk] CW Skimmer Telnet command to set sampling rate?

[Dick Green WC1M]

Thanks, Pete. 

Stopping CW Skimmer, editing the file and restarting is a bit awkward, but possible. One problem is that I'd have to hit the Run button after the restart. Perhaps I'll send an enhancement request to Alex :-).

SkimScan is neat, and I think it would work with my equipment, but it's not what I'm looking for.

I'm attempting to create an Assisted SO2R station that only uses local copies of Skimmer for spotting. Of course I could use the RBN or a combination of RBN and one or more local Skimmers, but I like the idea of an all-local system that only spots what my station can hear. It's still Assisted (by a definition I helped create),  but it feels more like something between Unassisted and Assisted: no other human ops involved.

I started out with an Afedri 822x, which is the dual-channel model. The dual-channel seemed like an attractive way to monitor the antennas on each of my two K3s, using a splitter and RX OUT/RX IN, a design suggested to me by N6TV.  This approach frees me from the limitations of IF-based solutions. I like the Afedri's combination of network and USB access at a reasonable price. Unfortunately, the dual-channel implementation doesn't work with CW Skimmer (both I/Q streams are muxed into 4-channel audio) and while there's a Skimmer Server plug-in for the dual-channel Afedri, it always assigns the lowest frequency to channel 0, which would force me to always have the attached K3 on the lowest frequency band.

So, I returned the 822x and bought two single-channel Afedri SDR-Net units. In this case, it's possible to run separate instances of HDSDR and CW Skimmer for each SDR and route the spots via Telnet into Writelog. It works really well, but frequency changes are problematic. I want the LO to be fixed in the center of the sample rate (e.g., 7,048,000 Hz when on 40m with a 96K sample rate), not following the rig frequency (which moves the scan window, like IF mode). The only way to do that is to manually change the frequency in HDSDR (or the Adfedri SDR-Net Control Box program) and also in CW Skimmer. The Afedri SDR-Net Control Box program can send the frequency to Skimmer via Telnet, but the frequencies for each band are fixed and not what I want.

So, I modified my antenna-switching software, AntennaMaster (AM), to set the SDR LO via an Adfedri-supplied program and the CW Skimmer LO via Telnet. This works great. In fact, it works so well that I'm considering getting two more SDR-Net units to operate independently of the K3s on unused antennas for other bands. That would give me Skimmer on four bands simultaneously (of questionable value at this point in the solar cycle, but what the heck.)

The only thing I can't do is set the Skimmer sample rate. I'd like to do that so the scan window is optimized for the size of the band. Say, 48K on 30m, 96K on 40m, 192K on 20m, 15m and 10m, etc. Probably not really necessary, but nice to have.

The other thing I'm looking to do is communicate with HDSDR via its DDE interface so I can set it's frequency from my program too. But I've been unable to find any documentation on that interface. Anyone know where I can find it?

73, Dick WC1M

-----Original Message-----
From: Pete Smith N4ZR [mailto:n4zr at contesting.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, October 5, 2016 10:55 AM
To: skimmertalk <skimmertalk at contesting.com>
Subject: Re: [Skimmertalk] CW Skimmer Telnet command to set sampling rate?

Dick, to the best of my knowledge, the only Telnet commands implemented are those shown in the "Telnet Commands" section of the CW Skimmer Help file - which does not include a sample rate command. The CW Skimmer.ini file has a section for each type of radio.  The one for the SoftRock looks like this:

RigNo=1
[sdrSR]
SignalRate=96000
CenterFreq=14040000
CenterOffset=0

Since the ini file specifies the sample rate (signal rate), it should be possible to create a batch file that would stop the software, edit the sample rate to a new value, and restart.

You don't mention if you are using one of the multi-band Softrocks, but if so you might want to look at SkimScan SR by W3OA, to be found at http://dickwilliams.byethost17.com/SkimScanSR.html?i=1. While it does not provide for changing the sample rate, it offers the ability to band-hop on a variety of user-programmed schedules.  It's a very clever piece of work.

73, Pete N4ZR
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On 10/5/2016 3:06 AM, Dick Green WC1M wrote:
> Hello all.
>
>   
>
> Is there a Telnet command for CW Skimmer to set the Sampling Rate in 
> SoftRock mode?
>
>   
>
> I'm able to use the SKIMMER/LO_FREQ command to set the LO frequency, 
> but there doesn't seem to be a similar command to set the sampling 
> rate. Is it unimplemented or just undocumented (I should be so lucky.)?
>
>   
>
> 73, Dick WC1M
>
>   
>
>   
>
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