Re: [Xlog-discussion] Log as diary

[Patrick Ouellette]

On Tue, Feb 26, 2008 at 09:46:57PM +0100, Joop Stakenborg wrote:
> 
> 
> Op dinsdag 26-02-2008 om 14:44 uur [tijdzone -0500], schreef Martin
> Ewing AA6E:
> 
> >   Conventional logging apps seem to grow out of contesting needs 
> > historically, and they're not  trying to fully emulate the way I (for 
> > one) used my paper log.
> 
> Hi Leigh and Martin,
> 
> interesting topic. There are already plans to add XDIF support to a
> future version of xlog, although it make take a while. XDIF would add
> much more log-information such as which transceiver was used, from which
> QTH did we make contacts and so on...
> 
> In the meantime, adding a general note field to the log is not such a
> bad idea. But how do we display it? Would this information need to be
> visible all the time or is a simple popup dialog sufficient? I am open
> to ideas...
> 

Seems like yo want a union data type - either a qso entry or a general
comments entry.  My thoughts turn to an XML DTD representation (cause I've
been working with XML, and when all you have is a hammer everything
looks like a nail) like the following:


<!DOCTYPE log [
<!ELEMENT log (note*, qso*)>
<!ELEMENT note (date, time, comment)>
<!ELEMENT qso (frequency, mode, date, time, serialnumber, callsign, myrst, 
theirrst, exchange)>
<!ELEMENT frequency      (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT mode    (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT date (day, month, year)>
<!ELEMENT time (hour, min)>
<!ELEMENT serialnumber    (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT comment    (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT myrst    (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT theirrst (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT exchange (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT day    (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT month (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT year (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT hour (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT min (#PCDATA)>
]>

So the xml data file would look like:

<log>
  <note>
    <date>
      <day>29</day>
      <month>JAN</month>
      <year>2008</year>
    </date>
    <time>
      <hour>15</hour>
      <min>05</min>
    </time>
    <comment>This is my log comment, changed antenna guy wires</comment>
  </note>
  <qso>
     .... qso information  ....
  </qso>
  <note>
     .... another station log note ......
  </note>
</log>


I'm sure I've made a error or two in the above, but you should be able
to see what I mean.

The down side to this is all the extra tags XML needs compared to the
current xlog file format (but if you were going xdif you are adding tags
anyway).

I was looking at creating a contest logging program with an XML
definition file for contest rules, and XML for the native log format.
The idea behind the XML rules was to be able to describe all the quirky
rules and not have any of that hard coded into the logging program (like
all the other contest loggers seem to have).

If you are interested, I can forward my thoughts on the rules XML format
too.

Pat

-- 

Patrick Ouellette                 address@hidden
address@hidden                   Amateur Radio: KB8PYM 
"Crank the amp to 11, this needs more cowbell - and a llama wouldn't hurt 
either"
"Your arguments are an odd mix of overly optimistic on one side and overly 
pessimistic on the other"