[WT-support] Software review and advanced SO2R mode

[Olivier Le Cam]

Hi Pete,
> I am now writing a review of Win-Test for the US National Contest 
> Journal (NCJ).  I have the software fully operational on my SO2R setup, 
> and am able to understand most aspects of it pretty well, but I would be 
> glad to hear from users as to what they find the biggest strong points 
> of the software (as well as any deficiencies that you feel need 
> improvement).

As a co-author, I am badly placed to speak about it openly. 
Nevertheless, we thought WT to be a software close to the practices and 
the assets of the well known MS-DOS softwares (CT, NA...) while adding 
to it the impossible graphic features under MS-DOS.

We also take care on the Ethernet network and interfaces settings 
facilities, and tried to optimize as much as possible the code to get it 
working fine also on old computers (say, P-166 and ~64 Mb of RAM).

> I have one specific question, having to do with the Advanced SO2R mode, 
> for which very little documentation seems to be available on either the 
> Win-Test or Hamradiosolutions web sites.  

I cannot contradict you on this point. I tried to describe this as best 
as possible in the release file, but it misses doubtless a specific 
manual on this part. It is under writting but still not finished. CT1BOH 
also described some of the possibilies though the Cq-contest list 
(http://lists.contesting.com/pipermail/cq-contest/2005-February/060359.html).

> Does this mode actually 
> require the EZMaster, or can any or all aspects -- scenarios, etc. -- be 
> implemented with another SO2R controller, such as the DXDoubler?  

Yes, in dead. Except one thing: the $R2R2 variable, which is used to 
(hot) toggle the headphone to the "secondary radio" through the SO2R 
interface. As fas as I know, only EZMaster does support this by software 
control. I guess that some DXDoubler or ZS4TX owners will probably give 
more more informations on this topic.

 > In
> exploring this feature, I found that the modify scenarios dialog seems 
> to provide a variety of different message configurations, with the idea 
> that one can switch easily from a short CQ to a long CQ, for example, 
> but I could find no explanation of the coding used in the various 
> scenarios.  

There is some information there in the release file available on the 
mailing list archive : 
http://www.f5mzn.org/pipermail/support/2005-January/069583.html

Hope this helps,

Thanks and 73,
-- 
Olivier / f5mzn