Re: [Xlog-discussion] Log as diary

[Stephane Fillod]

Martin Ewing AA6E skribis:
> Here's a small suggestion.  In my old written logs, I would enter various 
> non-operating information: changes in antennas, new equipment, mailing 
> batches of QSL cards, propagation notes, and what-not.

This is a feature I miss too.
Generally, I piggyback the REMARK field of the previous QSO,
but it's ugly.

> I don't see any facility for that in any logging software I've used, 
> including xlog - everything is a 'contact'. 
> It would be nice to have a "comment" record not related to a contact.  Text 
> with no special formatting, except maybe a date field. 
> I see that I can make a QSO entry with remarks but no call sign.  I suppose 
> that's OK as far as the database is concerned, but it doesn't get displayed 
> well -- off the right of my screen, usually.  Would a no-call record screw 
> up ADI exchanges?

As is, yes. But xlog can be hacked to handle the case nicely.
BTW, does the ADI format has an ability to store comment only records?
Talking about the xlog format, maybe we can agree upon a format extension
for such "comment" record. The "flag" to tell this is a "comment" record
could be, as you suggested, an empty call field.

Out of the common xlog fields, only DATE and GMT would be useful.
The REMARKS field will be too small, so the unused field should be reclaimed.
IIRC, the log pane is made using a tabular widget. Not sure whether how a
particular row can be replaced with a free form line. The answer is
certainly in the source, Luke...

73
-- 
Stéphane - F8CFE

PS: Martin, your pointer on Zim[1] is quite interesting
[1] http://www.pardus.nl/projects/zim/