W3WN
04-18-2014, 07:36 AM
A recent query on the Ten Tec reflector got me thinking about this one again...
Last time the subject of online call databases & lookups in general, and possibly implementing one here in particular, came up... a couple of ideas got thrown around, but eventually the discussion just petered out.
So, outside of Over Yonder, what's out there right now -- not just for North America, but for the world? And just as important, which of these are easy to access, either by download or online?
I'm a big fan of the work Dean AE7Q did a few years back, but his system is limited to the US & Canada (by design). And while it's great for one-time lookups, trying to do something on a regular basis...
My long-term goal is to come up with something that I can use to automate the drudgery part of QSL'ing -- at least for the physical cards I still send out. I'd love nothing more than to extract the appropriate calls from my log, feed that into a little app, and have properly prepared QSL cards & envelopes spit out of the printer. My only option to do that right now appears to be an XML subscription Over Yonder. And, well, I'd like an alternative.
(Buckmaster's CD won't do. Data is encrypted, and the only thing it will produce are labels/envelopes, in a pre-arranged format, which you can only get one call at a time. Not what I want to do. RAC data is encrypted as well. AE7Q's system is SQL based, and theoretically you could have an app send SQL requests for the US & VE data... but do a lot of that, and Dean will notice & ask questions; and I hate to bother him)
Thoughts?
Last time the subject of online call databases & lookups in general, and possibly implementing one here in particular, came up... a couple of ideas got thrown around, but eventually the discussion just petered out.
So, outside of Over Yonder, what's out there right now -- not just for North America, but for the world? And just as important, which of these are easy to access, either by download or online?
I'm a big fan of the work Dean AE7Q did a few years back, but his system is limited to the US & Canada (by design). And while it's great for one-time lookups, trying to do something on a regular basis...
My long-term goal is to come up with something that I can use to automate the drudgery part of QSL'ing -- at least for the physical cards I still send out. I'd love nothing more than to extract the appropriate calls from my log, feed that into a little app, and have properly prepared QSL cards & envelopes spit out of the printer. My only option to do that right now appears to be an XML subscription Over Yonder. And, well, I'd like an alternative.
(Buckmaster's CD won't do. Data is encrypted, and the only thing it will produce are labels/envelopes, in a pre-arranged format, which you can only get one call at a time. Not what I want to do. RAC data is encrypted as well. AE7Q's system is SQL based, and theoretically you could have an app send SQL requests for the US & VE data... but do a lot of that, and Dean will notice & ask questions; and I hate to bother him)
Thoughts?