The lousy formatting in this message is copied from the original :-( Clive,
if you want to talk to me about what text/plain means (I was part of the
MIME discussion list when this was being worked on) drop me a note offline.
On 11 Jan 99, at 13:09, Clive Whelan wrote:
> However operations have highlighted one rather clumsy, unergonomic feature,
> viz the switching from S&P mode into CQ mode. Although this can be
> accomplished a coup
> le of ways, hitting the ESC key several times will do this, and often this is
> not what I intend in the heat of the moment.
>
> This often results in my trying to send an exchange to someone I haven't even
> called!. I thought perhaps I would become accustomed to this, but experience
> does no
Presumably what you mean is "being in the wrong mode" causes this, not
"hitting ESC" causes this.
I confess that this happens to me with monotonous regularity as well. In my
case it's usually that I hit <ENTER> to start CQing after S&Ping for a
while and my exchange gets sent instead.
But I really don't see any good way around this. (But see below.)
> I wonder if others find this a problem, and would not the solution be to
> disallow ESC for this function, and require solely the use of a more definite
> key sequenc
> e such as Ctrl Tab?
>
NO! Ctrl Tab would be a real pain. I think that the idea of ESC is that if
you hit it a bunch of times you KNOW you will get back to a known state: CQ
mode with no QSO in progress and nothing in the windows.
Diversion for a moment:
I'd be interested in knowing if anyone else has seen what I thought I saw
this last weekend in the current version. At one point I hit a whole slew
of ESCs quickly and then typed a call. Imagine my surprise when I looked at
the screen and saw that somehow I'd ended up in the temporary log window
and TR had happily erased a QSO. I think there's a bug somewhere, but I
suppose it could have been simple sleep deprivation. Maybe.
Unfortunately, since I don't have TR ask me if it's OK when I've finished
editing, I didn't know how to get out of the window without saving my
changes. I hit ESC and carried on, knowing I'd lost a Q.
I have argued before, and I still maintain that the way the editing should
work is as follows:
To save edits: hit down arrow when on the bottom line of the window. This
should move you to the Call window and save the changes;
To quit edit without saving: hit ESC.
The way it currently works ESC does something that's counterintuitive: it
doesn't escape, it commits. This is the only time in TR (that I can think
of) when pressing ESC causes an action to be taken.
Back to Clive's issue:
Most times when the switch between S&P/CQ mode should be made, it ought to
be possible to have TR figure it out and make the change for you
automagically. In my case, hitting enter when the call field is blank
should be a giveaway that I really don't want to send my exchange and I'm
really trying to call CQ. I'm not sure if this is the same as Clive's
complaint or not.
Doc N7DR
----------------------------------------------------------
D.R. Evans N7DR / G4AMJ N7DR@sff.net
"Palindor Chronicles" information and extracts:
http://www.sff.net/people/N7DR/drevans.htp
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