Multiple Grid locator support

[kb9kld]

I have been working a lot of 6M and up contacts for grids. I am running into situations where the contact sits on a grid corner and the contact will be good for multiple grids. There is only one field for a grid. I can enter them in comma separated format, and this looks to work for lotw uploads and confirms even though it complains about the format. The grid tracking only picks up I have worked the first grid. I suspect it is truncating the remaining comma delimited ones. Is there an accepted way to log these types of contacts with multiple grids or can an update be made to accommodate these?

Thanks
Jeff
K9KLD

[DL2RUM]

The most safe way is to log these QSOs twice.

[kb9kld]

Unfortunately that does not really work to log it multiple times. The contacts on the other end are logging it once and have a location set up in lotw that contains all the grids. So only one of them will match. I have a few that are four grids when they park on the grid corner. The lotw confirmation will come back with all 4 grids attached as a single record. A few other people have indicated their logging software supports entering up to 4 grids which is the max you could have. I can enter all 4 and the lotw matches, but I just don't get the tracking in Rumlog for anything but the first grid.

[DL2RUM]

Well, you have to manually enter the LoTW confirmations.
Do you have an example of a LoTW ADIF file with multiple grids in it?

[kb9kld]

Here is an example of one of the confirmed records at LOTW. The VUCC_GRIDS field has all four grids that where part of the QSO.

<APP_LoTW_OWNCALL:5>K9KLD
<STATION_CALLSIGN:5>K9KLD
<CALL:5>------
<BAND:2>6M
<FREQ:8>50.30480
<MODE:3>FT8
<APP_LoTW_MODEGROUP:4>DATA
<QSO_DATE:8>20210606
<APP_LoTW_RXQSO:19>2021-06-09 17:12:16 // QSO record inserted/modified at LoTW
<TIME_ON:6>181245
<APP_LoTW_QSO_TIMESTAMP:20>2021-06-06T18:12:45Z // QSO Date & Time; ISO-8601
<QSL_RCVD:1>Y
<QSLRDATE:8>20210609
<APP_LoTW_RXQSL:19>2021-06-09 17:12:16 // QSL record matched/modified at LoTW
<DXCC:3>291
<COUNTRY:24>UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
<APP_LoTW_DXCC_ENTITY_STATUS:7>Current
<PFX:3>AG6
<APP_LoTW_2xQSL:1>Y
<VUCC_GRIDS:27>CM79XX,CM89AX,CN70XA,CN80AA
<STATE:2>CA // California
<CNTY:12>CA,MENDOCINO // Mendocino
<CQZ:2>03
<ITUZ:2>06
<eor>

[DL2RUM]

Tnx, here I see the next problem: The grid square should have four characters only. From the ADIF specs:

VUCC_GRIDS: two or four adjacent Maidenhead grid locators, each four characters long, representing the contacted station's grid squares credited to the QSO for the ARRL VUCC award program. E.g. EN98,FM08,EM97,FM07

Maybe I'm able to add a user field for a grid list. But it's a lot of work.

[kb9kld]

I have seen both 4 and 6 char grids in the ones I have downloaded from lotw. I think that depends on how the contact creates the location. I think an improvement would be to use one of the user defined fields if it could be mapped to the VUCC_GRID field in the ADIF files that Rumlog exports. Those fields can already be mapped to some fields, but that one is not there. I am actually using another program to track the FFMA 6 meter award and I think having that populated in the ADIF that I export to it would allow it to correctly tabulate it. That appears to be what is happening when it updates from lotw. As it is now I have to export the ADIF and then sync from lotw to correct these that are missing. The lotw sync of my entire log is painfully slow, whereas the local adif import is very fast, so I would like to avoid syncing to lotw in the award tracker.

Jeff
K9KLD

[DL2RUM]

I've sent you an e-mail to the given address here.

[kb9kld]

I sent a reply Monday and another today to your follow up. Hopefully it did not get lost in spam.