[WT-support] After CQWW CW

[Tõnno Vähk]

Hi,

ES5RR was operating my station for 4400 QSOs and he likes WT more and more. He had a few comments and I have some older questions also. I will summarize the things that I have not got any answer to. I just hope that you can comment if those features/modifications are possible and in the to-do list. It is strange that for some reason I don't seem to get very much reaction to my emails:)

Features we (me and several other ES hams using WT now) miss:

1. AUTO SENDING issues.
a. Can you let WT disable AUTOSEND for only this particular QSO when there is "/" in the first 3 or 4 digits entered into callsign window? TR has it and it is VERY convinient with those long calls.

b. Can you let WT disable AUTOSEND when frequency changes (station is going to S&P). For example if the next QSO takes place 1 KHz or more apart (maybe there are better ways to determine QSY). To develop further from here there could be 3rd choice next to AUTOSEND ON and OFF. That would be ON IF F1 is pressed. That means I can go from S&P to CQ with F1 and AUTOSEND switches on itself. And QSY takes it to ON IF F1 status again. I can always set AUTOSEND to completely OFF if no interest in this feature at all.

c. Please introduce a shortcut for AUTOSEND ON/OFF. ON can default to sending after 3 characters for example. It is very inconvinient to look for it constantly in the menu or use text command. CTRL-V would be good.

d. Once we have done a and c, meaning "/" stops AUTOSEND and there is convinient shorcut then we don't need ESC to terminate AUTOSEND! Currently there are still a lot of problems with this as you still often press ESC when you are not transmitting and cursor is on the callsign field. It is difficult to operate when sometimes this AUTOSEND works, sometimes not. Let's forget about the ESC. TR works very fine without it. We just need a good shortcut.

2. AUTOCQ also needs shortcut badly. I know text commands RPT and NORPT but those are not for serious contester. I would recommend CTRL-C (I guess the same as TR uses and very logical and well positioned). It should not be difficult to introduce but would be very useful!

3. Option to fill the callsign field automatically when tuning on station in the bandmap. It is not easy to follow the bandmap and see what spot turns yellow and in many cases you do double job and copy the call although it is in the bandmap. We have discussed this but I don't remember if it was possible. Please comment. Would be very useful in SO2R when you go through the same band again and again and copy the same stations.

4. Maximum Spots Life Time in Bandmap is 60 minutes. Please increase this. Not everybody is using cluster:) In SO2R you want to have the stations there longer.

5. Tail end feature. PTT would stay on after sending TU and you can enter call and push Insert right away without dropping PTT. It could be just some command ($KEY) to activate ALT-K or keyboard mode in the message and Insert would stop it. The same command could be used in messages to send endings like frequencies etc. In TR the PTT drops right after the buffer is empty (all the entered signs have been transmitted).

6. Shortcuts to additional messages or new messages. It is not really possible efficiently to operate the ALT-C to get Additional Messages. I propose to create shortcuts for Additional messages. CTRL-F1 to CTRL-F12 are free exept F1, F2, F3, F9 - those could be repositioned or let's use only the free ones! Another option would be to move F8 to F12 keys somewhere else and create 5 more messages there!? Do we really need to have F8-F10 and F11 used for activating windows, how many times do you do it during the contest?? Please consider maybe reallocating at least F8-F10 and create 3 more messages. Is it possible?

7. Can you introduce $NRPLUS1 and $NRMINUS1 (for example) commands? Those could be put in the message and would be very helpful in M/S for example to send previous or next serial number.

8. Why EXCHANGE FREQUENCY WITH command is greyed out now although two computers are networked? Can you enable it and create shortcut for it like we had in WRTC? Now I guess CTRL-S shortcut is used to swap frequency of two radios not between stations so the shortcut could be CTRL-F! 

9.Bandmap does not remember the Bandmap vs List setting - that might be written into settings (ini?) file as well? Usually you want to have List setting but it always defaults to Bandmap.

10. Can the CW messages by added to INI file? Now it is very cumbersome to rewrite them for every contest again as they are always at default values. Would be nice to have them fixed. Takes a lot of time to open some old log and try to recall how those were set, then open new log again and set the messages.

11. When you enter callsign to callsign window the program shows 0 points till you enter the QSO. This was reported already and would be nice to have fixed to see the potential points immidiately when entering callsign.

12. With new WT versions WT starts minimized. To be more exact the last active window before the start of WT stays on top. It is a bit strange, don't you find? It should be the active window after start?

13. Statistics. I would like to have continents distribution by the number of QSOs not in precentage terms. All the other data is in QSO numbers. Maybe just another option to choose? Would be also nice to get some more info out like best 60 min, 10 min, 1 min rate, stations worked on 6 bands, 5 bands.. Number of QSOs made by each Radio and by each Station in the network.

14. How is ESM mode implementing going, still in plans?

15. And finally another crazy idea. FOOTSWITCH MODE. Like TR has. If it is NORMAL then everything works normally but in CW contest where FOOTSWITCH is not needed for PTT it could be used for other very useful purposes. For example ALT-K (send CW from keyboard) or CTRL-V (hopefully to be shortcut for AUTOSEND ON/OFF:) or CTRL-ENTER or ALT-C or... User could select the command itself from dropdown or direct entry. Right now we use second footswitch for binding to secondary Radio. Well, if this option is not used then second footswitch could also be used for activating other commands.


I am sorry for such long list on items but I tried to summarize everything that is still in my mind and of course thank you for numerous features and updates you have already done to program. I truelly hope that you can comment on those issues so that I would not have to bring them up constantly. If anybody has second thoughts about those requested features please speak out also. I am sure I am now alone to wish many of those things.

73
Tonno
ES5TV