[TRLog] TRLog in the RTTY Sprint (long)

[Tree N6TR]

> It would be better to have a somewhat cut down version for windows and 
> still have the program live than have NOTHING which is what we WILL HAVE in 
> time. It is unavoidable, TRLOG and most other programs that are DOS only 
> will die.
>
> OTOH as I said before, it may not be economically justified to do the 
> development. IT would take one like Tree who is not in it only for the 
> money. I do believe that TRLOG is a labor of love for Tree as much as 
> anything else.

There are very few people who are smart enough to write software for 
windows - yet dumb enough to waste that effort on something like
contest logging.

Maybe when I retire - in about 15 years, I will have time to think
about this - but it is more likely that someone else will have to 
do it.  I don't pretend to be a windows programmer - and doubt I
will have the motivation to become one.

As far as machines that run DOS - from my vantage point at Intel,
I see DOS being always supported by the BIOS.  Nothing that is 
coming along would remove the backward compatability of the BIOS.
In fact, all of the BIOS engineers here at Intel rely heavily on
DOS for their day-to-day work.  Probably the lack of legacy serial
ports is a bigger worry than DOS.

I agree having the program bundled as a windows program would be 
great.  That isn't the issue here.

As far as RTTY - TR is not trying to pretend to be a great RTTY 
program.  In fact, I came really close to not letting anyone know
it did RTTY tests.  Instead, the intent was to open up this mode
for people who needed something to do RTTY - and wouldn't otherwise
go out and get one of the "real" RTTY packages (this describes my
personal situation exactly).  Most of the RTTY coding was done 
during the first half of real RTTY contests - and tested during
the second half.

I think it is great that some people have given it a try and 
published their results here on the list.  I will try to add
the features they identify as being major obstacles.  

Over the past 9 months, I have been involved in a job transition
here at Intel.  This has essentially required me to work two jobs
at once and it aas left even less time for ham radio and even my
family.  Also, we moved to a new building, which is about 20 minutes
furture from my house, so I have lost the "morning opening" on 
e-mail before I leave home.

I am glad to say that a major product milestone was achieved on 
Friday and things will start slacking off a little.

I still have about 300 e-mails with bugs and enhancements to plow
through.  Some of them are over a year old.  I hope to make some 
progress on that list during the next couple of months.

Finally, I am working on a technical solution to the CQP problem with
DX stations.  Hopefully, I can find a way to allow the DX prefixes from
the CTY.DAT file to be printed in the QTH received field.  AD6E has
assured me that nobody is losing any QSOs because of this.  

See you in the SS CW from Louisiana.

73 Tree

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