[WriteLog] RE: 1 pix > 1000 words

[Eric Hilding <eric@hilding.com>]

Dave, K4JRB wrote:

> Rick, your spam killer got my message.

Sorry, Dave...I have multiple levels and for most forums simply do not want 
spammers to harvest me.  I have a Procmail recipe that diverts WL posts to 
a separate Unix mailbox.

> My message is that many of us as we get older have allergies that cause
> us to lose our voice or sound terrible.  I originally blamed Atlanta air
> but Scott K0DQ lost his voice at ZF2DQ last year in the ARRL DX even tho
> he used a voice keyer.

Paul, K9PG lost contest hours recently when his voice took a dump.

Trivia:  When I QRT'd from HF 30 years ago, Scott bought my GSB-201 amp :-)

> Any effort to move beyond the robot sounding messages is welcome.
> Hopefully CW and RTTY folks will understand. We SSB guys just want the
> same.

The difficulty here has been trying to help even the CW crowd (of which I 
am one) understand the additional benefits to all this stuff.  FYI, I also 
have a Macro-based footswitch where I can tune the RIT up/down with my feet 
which keeps my hands on the keyboard.  Although I was away from contesting 
for 30 years, my "other lives" experience venues with computers & related 
"stuff" has opened up a whole new dimension ... at least for me ... of how 
to increase the "Fun Quotient" in contesting.

But the real world practical and necessary capabilities for SSB for reasons 
you have validated don't take a monster programming effort.  A few lines of 
code, but so far the logger authors don't seem to "get it".

FYI, the throat Doc I went to again recommended/endorsed the Sharper Image 
Ionic Breeze air nuker.  I bought TWO of the upgraded "Germicidal" versions 
today, after talking with a guy outside the store who said he was been 
extremely happy with his for 3 months.  There went some more ham gear 
;-(   I never had problems with allergies/dust, etc. in my younger days, 
but I think you identified a real problem for many of us "older" SSB ops, 
or so it would appear from others I've heard from.

Additional pre-recorded message options (i.e., 20 vs 10) are only part of 
the equation.  For those willing to pre-record a LOT of callsigns, being 
able to select a config option to look for a fullcallsign.wav file first, 
and only then play individual_letters_numbers.wav types is MAJOR.

As I've said before, the efficiency factor in this can be increased by also 
doing a simple appending of any non-precorded fullcallsigns to a .txt 
file...the new "hit list" to increase the percentage of precorded callsigns 
in the next recording session.

It is all so very, very simple.  Maybe that's been the problem...people 
think it's complicated when it's not.

Tnx for your feedback.

73...

Rick, K6VVA


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