[Dxspider-support] Network degradation

[Rudy Bakalov]

Hi Keith,

Thanks for taking the time to provide a detailed and in this case unemotional response. To be clear, my one and only goal is to take a calm approach to this topic. I don’t have a horse in this game as I run CC Cluster for contesters that consume spots thru their loggers.

I must admit that I have missed reading the emails from the Italians. My immediate reactions:

1/ Put yourself in the shoes of a software developer- how would you know about the “rules” you are referring to? I am thinking about an email from a few days ago talking about documenting all the spider variables and what they do. But where is the overall documentation on clusters in general, as a network? Where are the dos and don’ts? I first joined this reflector trying to learn about the cluster protocol in general and guess what- was told there isn’t a single source. Kin suggested I read code repositories and essentially reverse engineer the network. My point is that from my vantage point it is extremely difficult to figure things out.

2/ There is a big change management problem here trying to implement rules across hundreds of clusters and tens of thousands of users. How is the cluster communicating all this to the world? How does the world communicate with the developers? How do special event stations proactively announce their operations to avoid friction?

All I am thinking, in plain English, is that these problems will only persist without two-way communications with the ham community.

And instead of pointing fingers at Lee VE7CC, partner with him on communications and coordination; like it or not, he has the reach. Splitting the cluster network in two digital islands is bad for end users.

Rudy N2WQ

Sent using a tiny keyboard.  Please excuse brevity, typos, or inappropriate autocorrect.


> On Feb 27, 2025, at 7:37 AM, Keith, G6NHU via Dxspider-support <dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk> wrote:
> 
> 
> Rudy, 
> 
> During the January Hamaward event, I had many users complaining to me that their feed was being filled with spots for the stations, sometimes we were seeing multiple spots for the same station sent at the same second from dozens of different people.
> 
> What makes a spot legitimate is that it has been entered by a real person.  Not generated automatically and pushed onto the network by a callsign that doesn’t exist via a node which that non existent person doesn’t have access to.
> 
> I don’t know the percentage.
> 
> It’s been explained many, many times what a fraudulent spot is.  One that’s submitted by a fake callsign, using a fake IP address and pushed into the system, faking the node that the non existent user was logged on to.  I’m surprised I have to explain this to you, you’ve been reading this list for long enough to know this.
> 
> Two of the ‘alleged’ bad guys have posted to this list already, unable to explain themselves and ignoring any questions that were asked of them.
> 
> I’d tried to find out who was behind HamAward and found this comment from one of them particularly amusing:  "We are unable to understand the reasons for this ban, especially since we never received any prior communication, neither directed to IU1NSA nor to HamAward. From the emails you exchanged, it is evident that some of you visited our website: I therefore wonder why none of our contacts, clearly visible on every page, were used to reach out to us and clarify any doubts. This total lack of communication has left us puzzled and concerned, considering the impact such decisions can have on the activities of thousands of operators."
> 
> I’d spent quite a lot of time looking around the HamAward site and what he states above is a complete lie.  Not only are their contact details not clearly visible on every page (as stated), there are no contact details to be found on any of their pages or any of their sites.  There’s no mention of who runs the scheme, no mention of how to contact them and even the two names we finally have, one didn’t give their callsign when asked and the other doesn’t have an email address visible on qrz.com.
> 
> It’s even more galling when he says: "We believe that banning nodes without first attempting to contact us for clarification is inconsistent with the Ham spirit, especially when all the necessary means to do so were readily available."
> 
> I refer you to these posts/threads:
> 
> This one was answered by some of us.
> 
> https://mailman.tobit.co.uk/pipermail/dxspider-support/2025-January/019579.html
> 
> 
> And then we received this one a few days later after which the original post was made, replied to and then he replied again.  We’ve heard nothing since.
> 
> https://mailman.tobit.co.uk/pipermail/dxspider-support/2025-February/019700.html
> 
> 
> Please don’t assume we’re making accusations based entirely on logs, there’s a lot more to it than that.
> 
> 73 Keith.
> 
> 
>> On 27 Feb 2025 at 12:15 +0000, Rudy Bakalov via Dxspider-support <dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk>, wrote:
>> These are really big words that need support rather than speculations and emotions.
>> 
>> Who outside of this reflector is complaining? What is their pain point?
>> 
>> What makes a spot legitimate beyond the obvious call and frequency accuracy? Does the world share and understand your definition of? Or you assume they do?
>> 
>> Flooded? What percentage of overall traffic are the alleged fraudulent spots?
>> 
>> Fraudulent? What makes these spots fraudulent beyond not meeting your expectations for their origin? Who’s been defrauded?
>> 
>> A lot of accusations solely based on logs, no interactions with end users or the alleged bad guys.
>> 
>> Rudy N2WQ
>> 
>> Sent using a tiny keyboard. Please excuse brevity, typos, or inappropriate autocorrect.
>> 
>> 
>>> On Feb 27, 2025, at 6:49 AM, Keith, G6NHU via Dxspider-support <dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk> wrote:
>>> 
>>> We all want the same thing, we want to give our users good, reliable, trusted spots, they want to provide spots for their users. Let’s get it sorted so they can do it legitimately without flooding the network with fraudulently injected spots.
>>> 
>>> 73 Keith G6NHU
>> 
>> 
>> _______________________________________________
>> Dxspider-support mailing list
>> Dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk
>> https://mailman.tobit.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/dxspider-support
> _______________________________________________
> Dxspider-support mailing list
> Dxspider-support at tobit.co.uk
> https://mailman.tobit.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/dxspider-support
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://mailman.tobit.co.uk/pipermail/dxspider-support/attachments/20250227/8b108ef4/attachment.htm>