Customizing the Packet Grids

All packet data and spots are displayed on data grids. The grid component used for packet purposes is identical to the one applied for the logbook and log review window. Thus all features presented for this application are in principal available for packet too. The general layout, however, has to be taylored to the packet specifics. Besides these general features the user can customize a large variety of items to his needs.

Customizing starts by right mouse key clicking anywhere into the grid area. The following information pops up on this action:

Figure 223:  Section of the Packet grid with context menu popped up

In this screen shot example the pop up menu has appeared on a Packet Grid with the following parameter selection from  the packet menu:

Main item: SORTED SPOTS,

Submenu: DX_de .

You can now select the following options from the pop up menu by a simple left key mouse click on their captions:

Customize Gridview

This is by all means the most important feature and yields the following working frame:

Figure 224:  Control box for customizing the Packet grids, edited with speak outs

The following columns (fields) are available on the grids. They can be selected, deselected and arranged in sequence as indicated in the screen shot example. The top line of the list will appear at the leftmost position of the grid:

SpotKey:

This is the important keyword by means of which TurboLog 4 has extracted a spot from the packet data stream. Spots are directed to the different instances of the Packet facility by means of these keys.

The implemented keywords correspond to the list of sub menu items of the SORTED SPOTS topic on the packet menu.

SpotterCall:

This is the call of the station which has fed the spot into the packet cluster system.

Frequency:

This is the frequency which was given by the spotting station.

Call:

This is the call which was extracted from the spot.The call's prefix is evaluated for the display of the country information. In case of an ambiguous, odd or irregular call the flow of packet spots will not be disrupted by a pop up requesting a user defined country assignment. The country information frame will just show a message saying "...not found in database". This points into the direction for user interaction: The call should be placed in TurboLog 4's database for irregular calls named CALLS.DAT. This should be done by a separate and offline action. This database can be inspected on the edit menu sub item Calls Database.

Comment:

This is the comment provided by the spotting station.

Locator:

This field contains the locator of the spotting station if provided by the cluster.

Date:

This is the date of the spot.

SpotTime:

This is the time extracted from the spot. It will be used to arrange blocs of recalled spots from the cluster in timely order. Some clusters run off the correct time occasionally. Let's forgive the Sysop...

SpotSource:

Since TurboLog 4 manages different cluster sources simultaneously this field contains the source's shortcut. IP stands for internet, TC for packet radio and DE for demo cluster.

TxRx:

Tx in this field flags data which you have transmitted to the cluster. Rx indicates received data.

PacketSpot:

This is the raw data as it is received from the packet cluster.

Band:

Band information is derived from the frequency of the spot and serves as filter option under the FILTERED item of the packet menu bar.

CallAlarm:

This field must be checked if the user wants Call Alarms being permanently displayed in the Alarms and Messages window.

DXCCIndicator:

This field contains compact information for the extracted spot's call with respect to the user's DXCC achievements. This information consists of 3 two-letter groups of characters, for example: WA/WQ/P-.

The benefit of activating this field for display on the grid is outlined in greater detail in a special topic on the DXCC Indicator Field.

DoAlert:

This quantity controls whether Voice- and/or CW Alerts are being generated for spots recalled by a SH/DX command from the cluster. The default is 0. This means that no hear alerts will be generated for the bloc of recalled spots, except for spot alarms.

Locator,Mode,DXCC,ActivUser:

Currently not used.

FilterKey,IndFlag:

Are used for internal purposes only.

When you have finished making changes click the Accept button to save your modifications under the selected name or click the Cancel button to leave the frame without making permanent changes. Clicking the Delete button will generate a dialogue on whether you really want to delete the selected configuration and remove its name from the list.

If you want to create a new configuration you can start from anyone of the defaults, making field arrangements according to your needs and finally editing the selected name to whatever makes sense to you. Click Accept in order to save the new configuration under this name. Your customized list will immediately be activated.

The Reset Width button should be pressed if you get lost in amending the fields. This results in restoring the factory defaults.

If Fit to Grid is checked the program will try to best fit the columns selected for display to the available space in the packet grid. This fit, however,  is for the current session only unless you leave the frame with the box checked, enter the frame again, un-check and leave.

Besides this procedure the following customization is available "on line":                

•Clicking ( left mouse key ) on the vertical delimiter line between the captions of the grid starts the drag mode and allows you to adjust field widths.

•Clicking ( right mouse key ) on a caption results in displaying a thick black bar at the left side of the field. This indicates the drag mode for the whole column. It can now be moved wherever you want to.

If the field contains more information than currently being displayable because you limited the width of the field, there will be "..." indicating more data available if the field was wider.

Unlike customizing the logbook window there is no sorting availing for the packet grids. The sort order always is the timely order.

The action items Search and Cancel Filter on the customizing  popup will be discussed in greater details under the paragraph The Packet Menu.

The Delete Spot(s) action ( = "Pruning" ) should be used in order to remove the spot(s) under the highlight bar. Likewise a range of spots can be highlighted for deletion by applying the WINDOWS standard procedure. This simply requires to click(=select) one spot in order to define the first range border. Navigating to another spot for the second range border and performing a Shift+Click on this one will select the whole range between both spots. With the mouse over the selected range and clicking the right mouse key will pop up the context menu ( see above ). Selecting the Delete Spot(s) item will prune the spot's database.

Likewise:  Pressing Ctrl+A will mark all spots in the database. Ctrl+Delete will remove all highlighted spots. You are prompted before these actions are performed.

Pruning of oldest spots in the packet database can also be performed from the Packet Control Panel.

Please note:

Pruning in terms of removing large numbers of spots (>100) should not be performed on filtered packet tables but on the Basic packet table. This assures the timely order of the spots being pruned.

In order to effectively reduce the memory space of a large database that was pruned to a much smaller size a Pack & Rebuild operation should be performed. This will result in a release of all unused memory.

Please note: 

If you remove a spot it will disappear from all grid views and for ever.

Active COMMANDS:

KEYS:

CLICKABLES:

BUTTONS:

This topic was last edited on  Monday, 03-Jul-2023,  at  23:57