Ham Stuff

I wrote a new azimuthal map generator in JavaScript using D3 and a much more up-to-date and higher quality map database. Like many of my personal ham radio projects, I got it to a certain point and then other projects seemed more interesting. I’ve decided to go ahead and release this to the public rather than waiting to finish all the features or iron out some of the problems.

By default, this map shows the current gray line. The parts of the Earth that are currently in the sun (i.e., daytime) appear brighter, and the parts of the Earth that are experiencing night appear darker. You can turn this feature off in the General Settings tab for printing. Unless you turn it off, the website will dynamically update the gray line as time passes. The gray line display can go a little wonky at sunset or sunrise, but it normally clears up in a minute or two. Thanks to Bob N6TV for the suggestion to put the gray line display on the map.

After approximately 13 years, my HF solar WordPress widget stopped working, so I need to make some repairs. I learned the new Widget API and re-implemented the widget plugin. I’ve tried it out on my site, and it appears to be working. Overall, I think the new API made the implementation much easier. A new version of the plugin is available on the linked page.

Because the new Widget API seems simpler, I went ahead and re-implemented the QRZ Callsign Search widget too. A new version of the plugin is available from the linked page.

Thanks to N8PWM and NJ0F for reporting the issue. I am working on it.

Update: I recently upgraded to Ruby 3.0, and the fast CGI interface wasn’t working with this version of Ruby. As of Sunday 12-Dec-2021 12:18pm PST, the failure that was making every map request fail should have been fixed.

73 de Tom NS6T

Dave Casler KE0OG made a video explaining explaining how an azimuthal map can be useful for ham radio operators, and he also gives some guidance about how to use my website to make maps. Thanks Dave!

I am getting close to a DXCC award. I’ve got 99 worked and 93 confirmed. However, QSLs for some of the 99 were requested multiple times without any success.

I’ve upgraded to Prawn and Ruby 1.9, so the map generator is back in business. There are still a few bugs that I need to resolve, so I’ll be fiddling with it for a while. Let me know if you see any other problems.

I hadn’t realized it, but the geo location function was broken. It should be fixed again now.  The site is up to over 111,000 maps generated. I should mention that the “Estimate Location” button uses a free service provided by http://ipinfodb.com/.

I’ve started to think about turning off commenting. Even with RECAPTCHA, I am getting tons of WordPress comment spam. For example, while I’ve been writing this paragraph, 5 more spam comments came in. For the sake of recording 117 legitimate comments, I’ve had to filter out 7,783 spam comments. A pretty poor signal to noise ratio.

If I decide to turn off commenting, amateur radio operators can find my email address from my call sign using any of the normal means. I may also try activating a second level of spam protection. It’s sad that i has to come to this.

I am going back to the Boy Scouts of America’s Rancho Los Mochos this year. I’ll be on VHF and HF on Saturday October 20 trying to make contacts around the country and globe.