Home › Contest › Installable contest logger
A logger for the computer in your shack: works offline, calculates points, kilometres and multis exactly like the scoring on afu.tools and brings the right layout for each contest. First up: the Frankencontest.
One file, no installation. Version 0.2.12. Built in: Frankencontest, WAG, WAEDC (CW, SSB, RTTY), CQ WW and CQ WPX, plus every contest in the afu.tools contest module.
chmod +x afu-contestlogger-linux-x86_64, then start it.~/.local/share/afu-contestlogger/logger.log.The Frankencontest layout, 2 m section: at the top the schedule of the four sections, on the left the log with the entry line as its last row, on the right the score per category, the district's DOK grid and the check.
Points, kilometres, multis, dupes and categories come from the same rule set as the scoring in the contest module. What the logger shows is what counts later.
Each contest can bring its own view: schedule, fields, multi grids (one per kind, for CQ WW zones and countries), texts. The Frankencontest has a ready-made one, everything else uses “Allgemein” (general). In a wide window all boxes grow with it; what you don't need you collapse with ▾ or hide with ✕, and Ansicht › Kästen (View › Boxes) brings it back.
In the Frankencontest each category counts on its own. You log everything in one log, the logger scores per category and writes one Cabrillo file per category. The DOK grid shows per band and category what's still missing: on 40 m a DOK counts once in CW and once in SSB.
Dupe, new multi, points, country and kilometres are shown before you press Enter. The check knows over 80,000 contest callsigns, including ones a character off. It suggests DOK, locator and name: from your log, otherwise from the afu.tools callsign list. The zone (CQ or ITU, depending on the contest) comes from the country file, even where it changes within a country, like W6 in zone 3.
Everything lives on your computer. On start-up the logger fetches new contests, DOK lists and countries from afu.tools if there's a connection. Without one, the last state applies.
Directly via USB (Yaesu, Icom, Kenwood, with auto-detect) or via rigctld, including to a running afu-remote station. Band and mode follow the rig, F1 to F8 send CW, ESM, Run/S&P, auto CQ, speed by key. CW also through your own WinKeyer, whose speed pot sets the speed in the logger. Footswitches that send keystrokes work like any key; PTT via footswitch goes straight to the rig.
You record F1 to F8 through the computer's microphone, and the logger evens out silence and volume. In SSB and FM they transmit like the CW messages, with ESM and auto CQ too: PTT via the rig, audio via its sound card. You enable this once, and Esc or a click elsewhere releases at once. You set the transmit level in the logger itself (in dB, works during transmission too, and the audio dialog can send any recording for level setting), independent of the sound card slider that other programs keep moving. If you like, you can monitor what's being sent on the computer's speaker. If your rig has its own voice memories that can be triggered via CAT (Icom, for example), F1 to F8 can use those instead: then no sound card is needed, and you hear the monitor tone right at the rig. The logger can also record what you receive; ▶ on a QSO plays from 20 s before to 10 s after.
With the rig's sound card the logger decodes CW, RTTY, FT8 and FT4, the same decoders as in the remote control. Heard callsigns become buttons, and Alt+D pulls the exchange since your last transmission into the fields. The waterfall shows spots, decodes and your transmit tone, and a click tunes. For RTTY, F keys, ESM and auto CQ send audio from the computer; in FT8/FT4 you call by double-click or call CQ, and the sequence runs by itself up to logging. If you prefer doing FT8 in your own digimode program, connect it via its UDP interface: decodes appear colour-coded (dupe, multi), a double-click makes the program call, and logged QSOs go into the log. You enable transmitting from the computer once under Ton (audio). FT8/FT4 decoding uses ft8_lib (MIT licence).
Two entry lines: with one rig VFO A and B, with two rigs one each. Alt+V brings the other one to the front, and callsign and exchange stay with their radio. Auto CQ keeps calling on one while you search on the other; it never transmits on both. A switch box using the open OTRSP protocol switches transmit and headphones (Alt+B: stereo). Plus a band decoder per radio (via the box or an HTTP call on the LAN), antennas per band (rig socket, Antenna Bridge, HTTP) that the logger picks itself when you change band, and a rotator: Alt+K turns to the short path, Alt+L to the long path to the callsign.
The logger connects to an afu-remote station just like the control page: via afu.tools with the bridge key or directly on the LAN. The station's rules apply (operation, calendar, transmit rights). Every QSO also lands in the station's logbook, and what others log there on the control page comes into your log: both see the same.
Share a log: the other positions join with a code. Everyone sees the same QSOs, dupes and multis apply to all, and the session hands out the serial numbers. Plus chat, passing a station on (Alt+G) and skeds. Without a connection the logger collects and sends later. At a field day without internet, one logger offers the session on the LAN (port 8090, only from your own network); the others enter its address. Windows asks about the firewall once.
Spots from the DX cluster and, if you like, from the Reverse Beacon Network, rated against your log: multi in green, dupe struck through. “ohne Gearbeitete” (hide worked) removes stations already worked from map and list, “nur SSB” (SSB only, or CW, depending on the contest) removes everything in a mode that doesn't count there: so no CW or FT8 spots in an SSB contest. The mode comes from the spot comment, otherwise from the band plan. A click or Ctrl+↑/↓ takes over frequency and callsign. A coloured line in map and list shows where you are right now, and the view slides along as you tune. The clicked station stays marked until you pick another or tune away.
Alt+S shows points per band, rate as a chart, time at the rig with breaks, run versus S&P, countries and directions. An earlier log or a number is the target, and the box keeps telling you whether you're ahead or behind.
Alt+U creates a practice log: simulated stations answer your CQ, with speed, QSB, noise and impatient callers. You work them with the same keys, and the logger tells you what was logged wrong. Nothing is ever transmitted.
Don't wait for the contest: a test run creates a log in which the contest starts now. The sections run one after another (with or without breaks), and “▶ jetzt” (now) in the schedule brings a section forward. Points, multis, grids and hints are calculated as in the real contest. A test run never goes into your account and is never submitted.
Ctrl+Q sends or receives QTCs: the logger knows who may exchange with whom, how many are still possible with that station and which of your own contacts are still open. Header and lines go out in CW via the rig, and you can ask for repeats line by line. The QTCs count in the scoring and are in the Cabrillo file.
If a contest has an SWL category, you create a listener log. What a line contains comes from the contest's rule set: the heard station with its exchange, the station it worked with or without exchange, what counts as a dupe, blocked periods and how often the same worked station may appear. The heard station stays after logging, and Alt+T swaps the two. A listener log never transmits, and SWL reports don't go into the logbook. Cabrillo, ADIF and submission work as usual.
Kilometres and bearing as you type, a map of worked squares per band and EDI export per band with station, power and antenna in the header.
If a contest on afu.tools shows live scores, the logger can report (Log-Daten, log data) QSOs, multis and score per category every two minutes. The contest page shows the table during the contest.
Pair once (confirm a code in your account), then every QSO also lands in your logbook on afu.tools, including corrections and deletions. Contests of the contest module you submit straight from the logger (Export › Einsenden). Without a connection it waits and goes later. Without an account everything stays on your computer.
You import a log from another program (ADIF or Cabrillo) as a new log, scored by the rules of the contest the logger suggests from the file. Your own callsign lists (callsigns only, or with DOK, locator or name, also as a table with a header row) add to the check and pre-fill. Summary and dupe sheet are available as PDF for printing. It checks the computer's clock against a time server at start-up and every 30 minutes and warns from one second off.
Every QSO is in the file straight away, and deleted and changed ones stay in the history. After every QSO it writes ADIF and Cabrillo to the folder “sicherung” (backup).
Your hands stay on the keyboard. Callsign, space, DOK, Enter. Because the logger has its own window and doesn't run in the browser, nothing takes F1, F3, F5 or Ctrl+F away from it.
| Key | What happens |
|---|---|
| Enter | Log it. If a field is missing, the cursor jumps there. |
| Alt+Enter | Log silently: nothing is sent, even with ESM. |
| Strg+Enter | Log even if the exchange is incomplete. |
| Leertaste | Next field. From the callsign it skips report and sent and goes straight to the DOK or serial number. |
| Alt+E | Unlock “Gesendet” (sent) for editing and lock it again. By default it's locked and shows the preset (59/599, serial, DOK), and Tab and space skip it. To keep it unlocked: Einstellungen › Betrieb (Settings › Operation). |
| Esc | Clear the entry; when correcting: cancel. |
| Strg+K | Correct the last QSO (any other: double-click its row). |
| Strg+↑ / ↓ | Next new spot up or down, with Shift multis only. |
| Alt+F3 | Send a spot to the cluster. |
| Alt+S | Statistics and target. |
| Alt+U | Practice with a simulated pileup. |
| Alt+G / Alt+C | Multi-op: pass a station to another position, or go to the chat. |
| Strg+Q | WAEDC: send or receive QTCs with the station in the callsign field. In the dialog, Enter for the next line, F8 to ask for a repeat. |
| Alt+← / → | RIT ±20 Hz when running, the frequency in S&P. Alt+0 clears RIT and split. |
| Alt+P / Alt+1…9 | Remember callsign and frequency, recall later (for stations you can't work right now). |
| Alt+Q | Jump between CQ frequency and last S&P frequency. |
| Alt+N / Strg+X | Note on the QSO, or mark it invalid (X-QSO). |
| Alt+F1 / F2 | Band down or up, only bands of the categories and the section. |
| Strg+F1 | Next mode. Otherwise you change band and mode in the entry line only by clicking and choosing, never by accident while typing. |
| F1 to F8 | Send the view's CW messages (CQ, exchange, TU …) via the rig, per run or S&P. Esc stops. |
| Enter with ESM | In CW, Enter sends the right message: when running CQ, then callsign and exchange, then TU and log. On and off with Ctrl+M. |
| Alt+R | Run or search and pounce (S&P). |
| Strg+R | Auto CQ: repeat F1 until someone answers (any key stops it). |
| Bild↑ / Bild↓ | CW speed ±2 WpM. |
| Alt+V | Two radios: bring the other radio (or VFO B) to the front. Alt+B switches the headphones between the front radio and stereo. |
| Alt+K / Alt+L | Turn the rotator to the short or long path to the callsign in the entry, Alt+Shift+K stops it. |
| Alt+A | Next antenna for the band; the logger remembers it per band and radio. |
| Alt+D | Decoder (CW, RTTY): the exchange since your last transmission into the fields, with Shift the last heard callsign. |
14025 Enter | A frequency in the callsign field changes rig and band (without a rig, just the band). |
CW, SSB, 2M, 20M, RUN, SP, ESM, WPM 28 Enter | Short commands in the callsign field: mode, band, run/S&P, ESM on/off, speed. They can't be mistaken for a callsign. |
More contests are next.
Bugs or wishes please via “Report” at the top of the page. Where the data lives: on Windows in %APPDATA%\afu-contestlogger, on Linux in ~/.local/share/afu-contestlogger. The file logger.db in there is the whole log, logger.log is the program's log file. Which version you have is shown in the window title and bottom left; a click on it shows folders and details to copy into a report. The logger announces new versions itself (“Update” top right) and updates at the push of a button: download, verify, restart, and the rig reconnects afterwards.