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1-10 of 107 messages
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What’s up with didadidadidah ?
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by OLDFART13 on August 29, 2004
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I haven't noticed this problem. I have noticed that the ARRL bulletins use the period quit a bit but I have never been bothered by it. I use dahditditditdah but not at the end of every sentence.
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What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by NI0C on September 5, 2004
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I agree with you that sending excessive periods or double dashes on CW is equivalent to saying too many "uhs" and "ums" when speaking.
More serious. though is the spacing problem and general sloppiness you bring up (such as sending "nag" for "name"). I recall a friend of mine years ago who called me on the phone and said he heard a lot of "YH" prefixes on 20 mteres, and wanted to know what country that was. I laughed and told him those were K6's in California!
I suspect that many ops don't know what good code sounds like. A good way to "calibrate" oneself, so to speak, is to listen to W1AW code practice once in a while. I still do this, even though I learned the code 45 years ago.
73 de Chuck NI0C
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What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by AE1X on September 5, 2004
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I agree. Listening to W1AW is important even for those of us with a lot of experience. We all need to brush up after long periods of silence.
I love Radio Telegraphy. It's a true challenge to learn a new language and learn to express oneself in it on the air. I love it because it is different than the other everyday stuff I do.
Ken
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What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by K5BGB on September 5, 2004
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Larry:
Your little brain teaser is indeed easy for someone like myself who has been a cw op since 1955. It's "name is Bob" sent by someone who fails to use enough space between the dots and dashes and adds a few extra dots for a good measure! That kind of cw was much more common in bug days, but I still hear it today in the age of paddles and keyers.
Cheers...73,
Rod
K5BGB
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RE: What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by W5HTW on September 5, 2004
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Yep, the changes in CW have been coming along for a while (probably like the changes in fone as well.) A couple of reasons come to my mind. One is today's careless method of doing everything or anything. On my web site is an article I wrote called "Close Enough is NOT Good Enough." We use 'there' for 'their', 'here' for 'hear' and most excruciating of all to me, 'your' for 'you're.' And we think it is fine. Not only that, we resent being corrected as we think 'close enough is good enough. ' So if we spell B with a dah and four or five dits, so what? It's 'close enough.' If we spell 'cat' as 'kat', so what? It's close enough. I think we live in the Close Enough age. And it is extremely aggravating to those of us who feel accuracy is as important as quantity, who grew up being graded on being correct, not just close enough.
The other aspect may be that in the mid-days of ham radio, what I call the "golden era' a good many hams had military experience, or were taught code by hams with military experience, as I was. In the military CW operations, the point was to get an accuracte message across, not just be 'close enough.' So they were taught code in radio school, and they learned it the right way. Later, out of the military, they taught code to new hams using the techniques, and seeking the sound, they had learned.
But I really think the 'Close enough is good enough' is the primary reason. If we got 'near' what we wanted to say, then that's all we have to do. We see that attitude in speech, definitely in writing. Heck, look at the classified ads in any major newspaper and see how many spelling and wording mistakes you can find in a single column. You will be surprised at how this professional publication allows "close enough" to be their practice.
Many of the hams who are sending 6o6 for Bob, or 5ih for 'his', don't want to be corrected. They don't want to be told they aren't doing it right. Close enough works for them.
It doesn't work for me! Not in English, not in work, and not in code.
Ed
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What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by KW4N on September 5, 2004
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It's the dead giveaway "body language" of the less-than-fully competent operator.
Nervous novices that are gaining in competence stall since they may fear the loss of the contact.
Excellent operators don't waste time. They also don't send a couple of dit's everytime a mistake is made because he recognizes that the operator at the other end knows an error was made. Only a short pause is required.
de KW4N
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What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by N5XM on September 5, 2004
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I've wondered about this. I've only been doing CW for 6 years and thought maybe it was a prosign from the railroad I didn't know about, but it sure puzzled me. I do agree there are way too many sloppy fists out there, and Ed, you are right on the money again, as usual. I want to say it was Otis Redding who did the old R&B song, "99 1/2% won't do".
I guess it doesn't mean as much to some as it does to us. I want to be the best CW op I can be for all the great Hams that came before me. I owe it to them and to the hobby. CW is an art form to me, and I don't understand why anyone would want to do less than their best. I guess I'm just lucky in the sense that I have been a musician for 35 years and have perfect pitch and great timing from music. I have wonderful hands from helping do surgery for 30 years, so at least I have some tools to work with. I've been lucky, but I've worked very hard. The ones that half-a** it really bother me, and I wish they had to copy themselves. I don't mind the newbies, 'cause you can tell the ones that are working hard to develop their skills. Three cheers for CW!
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What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by N0XE on September 5, 2004
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Not to mention the lack of DE, and the slant bar(dadididadit) for portable operations (see it all the time now), drives me crazy, hear CQ and then just the call, no 'DE?? When I was a Novice I was taught that if you wanted to call a certain state or country you would call CQ and the state or DX you wanted to contact so no other stations would call you, then send DE and your call, now when I hear just a CQ and then followed by the call with no DE, then I think some ham is calling just one station in fact since it is his own call it is like he is calling himself, hi, OK yeah I know if I listen long enough and hear no other call then I should take it that he is just shortning his time on the key, but to learn and use CW for years and to go as the book teaches as well, then have these changes creep in, makes it harder to maintain tradition and good cw practice. In QSO it can be bad as well to not use DE and the slant bar it as there are times that stations, especially visitors in DX land may have to use two calls (assigned and US Call) depending on the rules of the country and all of a sudden, a typical exchange can can be up to three calls in a row with no break, talk about being confusing at times when a simple slash bar and proper DE makes it very clear what is going on. , I know a lot of ops think it saves time and most CW ops should get it, but it counters what has been taught for years and has been a tradition, also the use of many non standard abreviations, seems like a lot of ops invent them as they go and expect every ham to understand what they are saying, maybe at 10 WPM you might figure it out, but clicking along at 30 plus is another matter. I know we can blame a lot of this on the keyboard as sometimes we forget typing a letter and sending CW is not necessariy the same thing, I also see a bunch of 100 WPM code being sent via keyboard and computer copy, guess it is ok for those who want to fool with that, but seems to take the magic out of the mode for me when you let machines do it all. 73 N0XE
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What’s Up With Didadidadidah ?
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by N0XE on September 5, 2004
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Not to mention the lack of DE, and the slant bar(dadididadit) for portable operations (see it all the time now), drives me crazy, hear CQ and then just the call, no 'DE?? When I was a Novice I was taught that if you wanted to call a certain state or country you would call CQ and the state or DX you wanted to contact so no other stations would call you, then send DE and your call, now when I hear just a CQ and then followed by the call with no DE, then I think some ham is calling just one station in fact since it is his own call it is like he is calling himself, hi, OK yeah I know if I listen long enough and hear no other call then I should take it that he is just shortning his time on the key, but to learn and use CW for years and to go as the book teaches as well, then have these changes creep in, makes it harder to maintain tradition and good cw practice. In QSO it can be bad as well to not use DE and the slant bar it as there are times that stations, especially visitors in DX land may have to use two calls (assigned and US Call) depending on the rules of the country and all of a sudden, a typical exchange can can be up to three calls in a row with no break, talk about being confusing at times when a simple slant bar and proper DE makes it very clear what is going on. , I know a lot of ops think it saves time and most CW ops should get it, but it counters what has been taught for years and has been a tradition, also the use of many non standard abreviations, seems like a lot of ops invent them as they go and expect every ham to understand what they are saying, maybe at 10 WPM you might figure it out, but clicking along at 30 plus is another matter. I know we can blame a lot of this on the keyboard as sometimes we forget typing a letter and sending CW is not necessarily the same thing, I also see a bunch of 100 WPM code being sent via keyboard and computer copy, guess it is ok for those who want to fool with that, but seems to take the magic out of the mode for me when you let machines do it all. 73 N0XE
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