[Dxspider-support] Hamclock connections

[Keith Maton]

Bit of a bump to this thread but it’s following the one I started a couple of days ago regarding HamClock.  That issue is still being investigated but it’s not the same thing as was happening previously.

I’ve been in contact with the author and he’s been very helpful and understanding.  

Prior to HamClock 2.90, as we know, it was very ‘chatty', sending a heartbeat (set/qra) every fifteen seconds.

In 2.90 onwards, that changed and he now sends show/date after five minutes of idle time.

From 2.92 (not released yet), he’s increased that idle time to ten minutes and instead will send ‘ping’ rather than show/date.

I set up a HamClock instance on a spare Pi earlier today and I have to say, it’s a great addition to the shack.  It’s already earned me a couple of new band slots, 7Q7 and 8Q7 on 10m.

Of course, not every HamClock user will update immediately but I think it’s been very nice of him to take our concerns on board and act on them.

73 Keith


> On 3 Mar 2023, at 14:31, Dirk Koopman via Dxspider-support <dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk> wrote:
> 
> As you seem to have his ear, could I suggest three things:
> 
> 1. Reset the timer if he receives *any* data.
> 2. Increase the timer to something reasonable like 5 minutes.
> 3. Use the command 'ping' with no arguments (not too frequently). It will return a string "Not Allowed' on older versions and 'PONG nn' (where nn is an incrementing counter on later versions). Later versions will also allow 'ping <string>' which will return 'PONG <STRING>' if software wants to maintain their own counter or whatever. The PONG (and any string) is always sent back in upper case. 
> 
> Please, gently, point out to the author that failure to do something reasonable may result in measures to prevent his stuff from filling the logs with useless data. Please pass my email address to him and encourage him to contact me for any help he may need. 
> 
> Dirk G1TLH
> 
> On 03/03/2023 07:52, David Spoelstra via Dxspider-support wrote:
>> I believe he says, "and cranking up the timeout to 5 minutes". So wouldn't that mean he calls it every 5 minutes and not every 15 seconds?
>> 
>> Regardless, he's obviously willing to change his code to minimize the impact to our systems. He's obviously also not a DX Spider expert. So, he asked a question of the people that are supposed to know our systems the best - us - and all we do is ridicule his guesses of what he should do? How about instead someone who really understands the DX Spider code works with him to modify his code for least impact?
>> 
>> Obviously even we're not sure of the answers. I saw a comment from our own group about timeouts and I saw Mike mention that "firewall/routers running NAT will sometimes expire or otherwise lose NAT connection" so I'm not even sure we know how to help him.
>> 
>> So again, how about we approach this from the positive side and work with him to minimize the impact of HamClock on our systems instead of walling them off?
>> 
>> -David, N9KT
>> 
>> On Fri, Mar 3, 2023 at 12:03 AM Iain Philipps via Dxspider-support <dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk <mailto:dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk>> wrote:
>>> Steve,
>>> 
>>>  
>>> Timeout... let me wrap my head around this latest suggestion. So, instead of sending "set/qra" every 15 seconds, his solution is sending "show/date" every 15 seconds instead? Am I reading that correctly?
>>>  
>>> You are [unfortunately] reading that correctly …
>>> 
>>>  
>>>  
>>> 73 de WR3D
>>> 
>>>  
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>> 
>> 
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