the broadcast is actually a decent way to do it given the limitations of the ct
network protocol. there needs to be some way to update a station's computer
that has crashed, especially in setups where you could use the same band on
different computers. since there is no ack, and no way for any computer to even
know what other computers are on the network that is about the only way to do
it.
unfortunately there are some bugs that do occasionally corrupt the numbers which
causes the problems we have seen.
the biggest improvement has been saving the sent serial number with the qso.
before that there were real problems if you got computers out of sync since it
was only the order of the qso's in the logs that determined the number printed
in the log file... this made it very hard to merge or fix numbers after the
contest. as long as contest sponsors don't penalize for sending numbers out of
order or sending the same number to two stations it shouldn't be a problem.
reserving a number when you start typing is not a good idea. consider the
common case in a m/s of having a run station and another station just listening
on another band finding multipliers before switching bands... if the second
station types in a call with no intention of working him that should not reserve
the serial number. it used to be in ct that when you hit insert to send the
report it would broadcast to the network that the number was used, i don't know
if that still works or not since i haven't done operations like that for a
while. even in that case you could get out of sync if you ended up not
finishing the qso, the number would be reserved by the second station until he
actually worked someone.
Bill Fisher W4AN wrote:
>
> > serial numbers on each band about once minute. CT looks at the incoming
> > numbers and does nothing if they match. Uses the incoming number if it is
> > higher than the internal number. Uses the internal number if it is higher
> > than the incoming number, then broadcasts the new number to all the other
> > stations.
> >
> > As you can see, one bad high number propagates out of control.
> >
> > In addition to looking for the source of bad numbers, I think I will add a
> > command to set any band to any serial number, and broadcast it to all the
> > other computers.
> >
> > I appreciate any input.
>
> My 2 cents:
>
> The broadcast idea is not necessary. The only broadcast you need to do is
> when someone logs a QSO. I don't understand the need to broadcast serial
> numbers. You log the serial number that was sent. If the same serial
> number was sent to two people... so what?
>
> Once typing happens in the callsign field, the QSO number should be
> assigned. If someone else on the network logs a QSO with the same number
> after typing happens, CT ignores it. It still logs the assigned
> number. After the QSO is logged, it looks to the log for the next number.
>
> Relying on a broadcast scares the hell out of me. I'm glad I didn't know
> it before the contest. I also think it is fluff that isn't needed.
>
> 73
>
> Bill
>
> --
> WWW: http://www.k1ea.com/
> Submissions: ct-user@contesting.com
> Administrative requests: ct-user-REQUEST@contesting.com
> Problems: owner-ct-user@contesting.com
--
David Robbins K1TTT
e-mail: mailto://k1ttt@berkshire.net
web: http://www.berkshire.net/~robbins/k1ttt.html or http://www.k1ttt.net
AR-Cluster node: 145.69MHz or telnet://k1ttt.net
--
WWW: http://www.k1ea.com/
Submissions: ct-user@contesting.com
Administrative requests: ct-user-REQUEST@contesting.com
Problems: owner-ct-user@contesting.com
|