[Skimmertalk] FT8 Spots

[Pete Smith N4ZR]

As users of the RBN may have noticed, we have three Skimmers running an 
experimental Aggregator that receives UDP messages from WSJT-X and 
forwards FT8 spots to the RBN.

Some folks have noted that many rare DX stations never *explicitly* call 
repeat CQs.  To get around this, Dick, W3OA, has programmed the 
Aggregator to respond to a unique standard FT8 message format that is 
always associated with stations being called, rather than those calling 
them.  We label these as CQ spots, though we're aware it's a misnomer - 
our objective was to hold down the number of redundant FT8 spots by 
applying the same "CQers only" criterion that the CW and RTTY Skimmer 
Servers do.

I think it is working reasonably well.  If you want to get a sense of 
how much FT8 activity there is currently, try connecting to an AR 
Cluster V6 node and applying SET DX FILTER NOT SKIMDUPE.  That gets rid 
of the many duplicate spots reported by CW Skimmers, and you can see for 
yourself how many FT8 spots there are compared to CW.  Pretty amazing.

-- 

73, Pete N4ZR
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