www.dl2rum.de

Hi,

I just logged a few QSO's with JOTA stations, and a few weeks ago with lighthouses and noticed that RUMLog uses the part after the / for the country. In the copy I find of the CEPT recommendation one should prefix one's call with the prefix of the country one is visiting, not suffix. In any case the /J suffix for Jota stations, and /LH for lighthouses is something I do like to include in the log (just like /M and /P for mobile or portable stations).

As far as I know /LH and /J are not an official part of the callsign.
For /LH I can help you, see here: http://dl2rum.de/forum/viewtopic.php?f= ... 2070#p2070

Hi,

I guess that all depends on the local rules. In PA country at least the JOTA station have to use the /J suffix during the JOTA. That is specified in our permit. Still, I think that any suffix can be ignored... if visiting a country you have to use a prefix (eg. me visiting Germany would be dl/pe1pip ), using a suffix would be incorrect, at least according to the current version of cept TR61-01.

This has been a long term issue that has driven programmers crazy because many operators incorrectly use the country identifier (Prefix) as a suffix and therefore the programmers have to parse the call sign to try and overcome the prefix being used as a suffix.

The result is that when a legal suffix is used it can sometimes be interpreted as a country identifier instead of its real purpose.

I don't believe that /j or /LH are officially recognised suffixes that could therefore be defined by software like /M and /P are?

There is no answer to this issue because you will never educate some operators to use the prefix in the correct manner, so software programmers like Tom have to use all sorts of programming tricks to cope with it.

Terry G4POP

g4pop wrote:This has been a long term issue that has driven programmers crazy because many operators incorrectly use the country identifier (Prefix) as a suffix and therefore the programmers have to parse the call sign to try and overcome the prefix being used as a suffix.

The result is that when a legal suffix is used it can sometimes be interpreted as a country identifier instead of its real purpose.

Hmmm, I see the point... OTOH, should a programmer accommodate for operator mistakes?

g4pop wrote: I don't believe that /j or /LH are officially recognised suffixes that could therefore be defined by software like /M and /P are?

As for /LH, you're absolutely right. As for /J, in the Dutch license it is specified as mandatory for stations taking part in events organized by Scouting in the Netherlands. But that may very from country to country....

g4pop wrote: There is no answer to this issue because you will never educate some operators to use the prefix in the correct manner, so software programmers like Tom have to use all sorts of programming tricks to cope with it.

Terry G4POP

As for /J, in the Dutch license it is specified as mandatory for stations taking part in events organized by Scouting in the Netherlands

Hi Pip,
That is the problem it's not internationally recognised therefore programmers cannot provide for it, whereas /M is!