Category: Miscellaneous

All kind of posts without a specific category.

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WSPRnetIn the series ‘what is WSPR?’ I did some reading last night. If I understand it correctly WSPR is a little computer program made by K1JT that is used to detect propagation on the amateur bands. It is using a very weak digital signal which is produced by your sound card in your computer and send out thrue your transmitter. Your computer also listens on the frequency to spot other ‘WSPR beacons’ and tells the central WSPR server via internet of the status.

WSPR means: Weak Signal Propagation Reporter. The program uses your sound card in QRSS mode and scans a 200Hz band for a signal of 6Hz wide with a baud rate of 1,46 Baud. 4-FSK modulation. Apparently there is 1 tone from your sound card. The nice thing about it is that you’re be able using mini wattage (a few hundred mW) to make big distances. A transmitting cycle lasts 110 seconds and there is minimal information packed.
The signals are received and decoded and sent to a central server and put on a map and a list.

So far the theory, in part 2 my search for a mac version of the program (as my faithful readers know, I’m a real Mac-lover).

Links: original instructions from K1JT
The program
The website (of the central server)

OZ1PIF manual to WSPR

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wsprI read more and more lately about WSPR. For instance, this morning I did see this article from VK2PTM. I getting more curious what this WSPR is and how it’s working. And you radio amateurs out there know what we guys and gals do about curiosity…. we will disappear into our Research & Development department and find out what the fuzz is all about!
So that’s my plan for the coming weeks: let’s find out. I’ll report my findings here on this blog.

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Earlier on I wrote about logging software. I still use MacLoggerDX from Dog Park software. It’s a fine program and all my logs up to now have been made with MacLoggerDX.
However, I don’t like logging in a local application. For a couple of reasons:

– local logging makes the logbook unavailable from another location;
– it’s hard to show your logs online somehow;
– it’s hard to match your logs with someone else’s logs.

That’s why I was looking for an online log application. At first I thought such an application wasn’t yet available until I stumbled upon HamLog.eu, which was exactly like what I wanted! I’m going to upload my logs to this site and see if I like it. If I only had a local widget which collects my radio data from my rig and adds it to the logging information, then I will be in logging heaven 😉

Update:

Last night I tried to import my log from MacLoggerDX to HamLog. It wasn’t working very well, HamLog only recognized 5 entries of my log. I didn’t put more time in it because I was very tired. This morning I opened my mail and there was a mail from Csobádi Zoltán (the webmaster of HamLog.eu, HA9RQ).
He wrote very nicely that he had noticed that I was trying to upload my log and that things didn’t work out. So he looked into it and detected that I was using a Mac and HamLog didn’t interpret the Mac ENTER right. So he converted my log by hand! Now that’s what I call: good service!

Thank you Zoli, keep up the good work!