[WriteLog] ARRL DX CW Experience and Issues

[Barry Kutner]

HI Dick - Comments interspersed below:

On 21 Feb 00, Dick Green wrote:

> ISSUES:
> 
> 
> 2. Stereo Toggle / Keyboard Remapping. The Split Audio command needs to be
> implemented as a keyboard toggle. Right now, I use a keyboard remapping
> program to make shift-tilde and tilde execute macros to pull down the menu
> and turn split on and off, respectively. It would be nice to be able to just
> hit a single toggle key. I also use the remapper to move the Insert and +
> key right next to each other (dash becomes Insert and = becomes +). Built-in
> keyboard remapping would be nice, although the priority is low (the
> shareware I found is OK.)
> 
Yes, remapping would be nice. I didn't mind the + key where it was 
for ARRL, cuz I found myself on the numbers keypad most of the 
time, and + is right there. Would be nice to remap the . key to KW!

> 
> 4. Super Check Partial Speed. Often the display speed was too slow to keep
> up with my typing. With my particular brand of CW dyslexia, I often confuse
> S and H, B and D, etc. I need to be able to quickly change a letter to see
> which version of the call is in the master list. Quite few times, the SCP
> display was blank long enough for me to conclude that the call wasn't in the
> database, even though it really was there (i.e., the lookup or display was
> too slow.) This would cause me to backspace and try a different letter, even
> though the call was really in the database. Other logging programs do the
> lookup instantly, and I'm running WL on a 600 MHz Pentium with 128Mb of
> memory and a super fast disk drive. Why is this feature so slow? A fix here
> would have been a big help to my score.
> 
My SCP was plenty fast on both a PII-450 and P-133. ARe you 
using the master.dta that includes DX calls only? There are several 
master.dta's out there, and the one including W/VE is much 
bigger, needlessly.

> 6. Rates. Has this been discussed before? I don't understand the algorithm
> behind the rate display. The other logging programs tell you the QSO rate
> for the last 10 minutes and the last 60 minutes. For WL, the short and long
> time periods are variable! Sometimes the short rate is over a 3 minute
> period or sometimes 5 minutes or sometimes 4 minutes. The long rate might be
> over 63 minutes, 89 minutes or 76 minutes. I think I saw it go over 100
> minutes once. Why does the time period vary? This makes it impossible to
> compare one's performance from one period to another throughout the contest.
> I'm slow at math, so maybe the algorithm is superior in WL, but someone
> needs to explain it to me. Seems to me that it would be better to have a
> little box for each of the time periods, so one could enter the desired
> number of minutes for computing the rate per hour.
> 

Ditto. This has been the most puzzling aspect of Writelog to me.

> 7. F1 bug. Every now and them, WL would display the Help screen instead of
> sending CQ when I hit F1 (I have CT compatibility enabled.) Just hitting ESC
> made the screen go away (without stopping the CQ, fortunately.) Looks like
> there's a timing bug or key debounce problem here. It happened a lot more
> during CQWW CW than ARRL DX CW.
> 
I mentioned this in my note yesterday. It happens when the active 
window (header bar in blue) is not the log window. Maybe you were 
in the packet window or elsewhere, and didn't realize it?

> 8. Filling the Exchange. For some reason, WL was not filling in the exchange
> on subsequent QSOs with the same station. Filling the exchange myself cost
> me a lot of time. This is high priority.
> 
Agree 1000000000% !!

> 9. Filling in Dupes. But it *did* fill the exchange on dupes -- with the
> wrong power! It always put in 100W. Since I work dupes, I had to be really
> careful to check the power against what was shown on the next line in red
> (which was the correct power.) This is a bug.
> 
Didn't fill it in for me. Only showed it to me in red under the 
exchange line.

73 Barry
--
Barry Kutner, W2UP              Internet: w2up@mindspring.com
Newtown, PA         FRC         alternate: barry@w2up.wells.com

--
WWW:                      http://www.contesting.com/writelog
Submissions:              writelog@contesting.com
Administrative requests:  writelog-REQUEST@contesting.com
Problems:                 owner-writelog@contesting.com