[WT-support] "after-contest" impressions from a newcomer

[Laurent HAAS - F6FVY]

Hi Dave

Glad you did well in the IOTA contest.

Dave Sharred a écrit :

> - Another problem I noticed. If a PC goes into reduced power mode (left idle
> for a while) the COM port settings somehow become corrupted - the CW becomes
> "staccato"; very clipped; and actually stopped working eventually. A
> complete reboot sorted this.  not sure why this should happen. I know I
> could stop this by removing the power save features; but I would not want to
> do this just to run a contest/expedition !

Maybe the hardware was saving some energy by stopping (more or less) the 
serial IC drivers ? Some advanced energy management softwares can select 
what parts of the machine to asleep. It may also depends on your PC.

> - We saw some problems in recording EU008 QSO's - sometimes it was flagged
> as needed; but it wasn't !!! We noticed 2 entries in the Worked IOTA table
> window for EU008; I think there should be a software check to ensure that an
> IOTA ref can only have 1 line entry ??

Are you sure the two refs were *absolutely* identical ? I mean, no 
confusion between an O (for Oscar) and 0 (for zero) ??? If you still 
have the problem after reloading your file, I would be interested in 
getting a copy for investigation.

> - We also noticed some spurious Continents being generated in the "worked
> IOTA" window - for example; we had "10-m" and "ON".   Clearly, these were
> our errors; but maybe WT should pick up anything but known continents as a
> busted number ?

As I said in a previous email, the data entry is very permissive by 
choice. We don't want to user to be "locked" for some reasons. The op. 
is responsible for his (her) entries.

> - We still were not sure how best to check for needed mults - packet spots
> were easy (by Colour); but shift F10 didn't seem to work all the time ?  We
> need more documentation / more time to learn I think!

I just updated the Shift-F10 feature at last minute to include the mode. 
  It has to be checked again...

> -Incoming serial numbers - for out going ones, there is a space even on CW
> between RST and number field.  Incomings have no space. It is easier to read
> with a space!

We choosed this option to ease rcvd RST modification with no need to 
change field. It is specially designed for the VHFers who don't send 59 
to everyone !

> - After the contest; I modified the "="  key function, to specify "up"
> after the thank you message (huge pile ups !)  the Gap was too big really
> for this; is there a character to make a smaller gap ?  i.e. I wanted to
> send "TU GD3NKC UP1"

You can use series of ^ char. One ^ lasts an half-dot. Its main purpose 
is to split "dots" letters (like F6I^I^E ...). A bit tricky, but it 
should work.

> 2128MHz test, which has a rule
> change also this year !).

Oh no !!! ;-)

73

Larry - F6FVY