Ham Radio Deluxe Blog

Pre-Release Status Update | HRD Alert

The purpose of this newsletter is to provide an update on product development.

PRESS RELEASE | HRD Software, Makers of Ham Radio Deluxe, Ownership Change

We are at once happy and sad to announce the departure of our admired and respected partner, Randy Gawtry.

As of July 31, 2021, HRD Software has acquired Randy Gawtry's equity in the company, leaving Dr. Michael Carper, WA9PIE as sole owner of HRD Software.

TO: Ham Radio Deluxe Customers Who Use JTAlert

This is an open letter to the JTAlert user community. My goal is not to drive wedges or to continue a rift. But some things we said in a post in the JTAlert groups.io forum recently that I feel deserves to have further explanation to "set the record straight."

Annual Auto Renewal Explained

Greetings and Happy Holidays again!

I am writing this in “newsletter style” but sending it as a promotion (I never talk about sales in the newsletters).

In my last newsletter, I made mention that we have a deal where you can buy a 12-month renewal of Software Maintenance and Support for just $29.97 (a 40% discount). In the 24 hours that followed, we have sold a ton of these and we have gotten a few questions about this. I thought it would be helpful to explain how this all works as briefly as I can. That is the purpose of this email.

Ham Radio Deluxe Pre-Release Announcement

We are pleased to provide an update on the November 2020 release of Ham Radio Deluxe. There are just a few minor items left to tend. A release is imminent.

Here is what will be included in this release:

Bulk Callsign Lookup – this feature will allow you to select multiple QSOs in your log and perform the callsign lookup function on them. You will be able to choose whether to fill only empty fields or fill all fields in the QSO. If your enabled lookup sources have data to fill those fields, it will do so automatically. This will be very helpful for those who import logs into HRD Logbook from other programs. This feature will be perpetually available to customers whose Software Maintenance and Support expiration date is beyond the release date for this release.

Many other improvements. Read this story for more information.

Trending Issues Related to 64-bit Microsoft Office Updates

The purpose of this email is to advise you all about a trend that's accelerating recently.

When operators install the 64-bit version of Microsoft Office, or updates are applied to it, Ham Radio Deluxe Logbook loses its connection to its databases. The resulting error message pops up:

"The operating system is not presently configured to run this application"

At this point, Logbook can only be closed from Windows Task Manager. Logbook then is unable to connect to the databases.

The most important thing is - the databases aren't deleted by this. No data loss occurs. (Additionally, Logbook is pre-configured to make backups of the logbook.)

This problem will affect ANY version of Ham Radio Deluxe, when the 64-bit version of Microsoft Office is installed or updated on the computer where Ham Radio Deluxe is running.

Reverse Beacon (Skimmer) Spots Now Available on DX Cluster

The author of DX Spider - the popular DX cluster software that runs many DX nodes around the world, including WA9PIE-2 - has updated the cluster software to add "skimmer spots" from the Reverse Beacon Network (RBN).

Ham Radio Deluxe Software Development Update as of 6.7.0.301 Release

Ham Radio Deluxe Software Development Update Following v6.7.0.301 Release

In this blog post, I will provide some insight into the next steps planned for the software development team at HRD Software.

Ham Radio Deluxe v6.7.0.301 Was a Big Success!

This blog is going to be rather brief and straight-forward.

We have had good response to our 6.7.0.301 release of Ham Radio Deluxe. I'm pleased that everything is working as designed.

There are two common questions that we have had and I wanted to include these in a broader communications to you all.

HRD Development Priorities as of 21-June 2020

With the Ham Radio Deluxe 6.7.0.275 release, all open items related to FT4 as a Submode of MFSK are resolved. The QSOs now go properly into Logbook, upload to LOTW, eQSL, ClubLog, QRZ Log, and HRDLog properly, and will match upon download from these services.

FTDX101D/MP added and much more

The 6.7.0.301 version of Ham Radio Deluxe is now available for download. This release contains several important customer requests, including - Yaesu FTDX101D/MP is added, last QSL comment is gathered into callsign lookup, Comment field returned to the filter dropdown, IOTA data is updated, delays in creating QSOs when Enter is used, partial and Exact fixed in the ALE, start time when time is "Set by User", fixed problem connecting to DX cluster when callsign has slash, callsign with slash not showing up in My Station.

The Case for Moving Ham Radio Deluxe off of Microsoft Access

Though Microsoft put Windows 7 on the end-of-live junk heap in January, lots of people are running this operating system that is no longer supported by Microsoft for security vulnerabilities and patches.There's (at least) one remaining problem that a few folks will face - particularly if they have done in-place upgrades from Windows XP and/or 7 to Windows 10. It has to do with Microsoft Access.

Though the frequency of serious problems has dropped considerably as hams have moved to Windows 10, we still get calls from customer running Windows 7 (or in some cases, after an in-place upgrade from Windows 7 to 10) where customers complain that Logbook is slow. We often advise them about how to upgrade to Access Runtime 2013 32-bit. After the customer creates a new database and restores their log to it - problem solved!

The purpose of this post is to raise your awareness to this problem. I'll describe what you can do and what our plans are to deal with the problem.

The Ham Radio Deluxe Welcome Email | Reference

With our new software license platform that we migrated to in July 2019 (Soraco QLM), we now have the ability to send out welcome emails to new customers. These welcome emails contain some good information about their purchase, their key, and obtaining support.

I'm re-posting it here for those who are existing customers and would not have received this welcome message.

The legacy software activation key platform was decommissioned today (26-April 2020).

This is the platform that generated and managed software activation keys for Ham Radio Deluxe prior to v6.6 (released July 2019).

Ham Radio Deluxe version 6.6 was the first version that moved away from the legacy license server and onto Soraco QLM. This move was necessary because the legacy license server was not able to sustain the growth in our business. It also had numerous defects that were causing inconveniences for our customers and dealers.

Why haven’t you activated your new software activation key? I really want to know.

If you’ve purchased this software in the past… prior to July 2019… a new software activation key was created for you in our new system. You are ENTITLED to activate that key. You are always ENTITLED to be running the latest version of Ham Radio Deluxe (you are not expected to stick with the version that was current when you made your purchase). You’re entitled to all the fixes and improvements made to the software – past, present, and future.

Tips-n-Tricks for Correcting Your Log Data | LOTW Upload Problems

The problem here is that we've all been uploading to LOTW has a whole lot of errors in it. (Yes, me included. TQSL v2.5.2 has shown me that even my log has errors in it. I've uploaded these errors.) Regardless of what logging program you use, you'll need to fix these data problems in your log and in your software.

I had a great call with Bart (W9JJ) at the ARRL earlier today. We both agree that our software is working properly.

The purpose of this post is to help you identify and fix those errors.

You can avoid using TQSL v2.5.2 (and use the prior version). However, you will eventually need to fix the data entry errors in your log. What I'm going to describe applies generally to ANY logging program. But I'm going to show you how to clean up your data in Ham Radio Deluxe so you can take advantage of great new features that will become available in LOTW in the future.

Release Announcement | Ham Radio Deluxe v6.7.0.275

FT4 QSOs upload compatibility in eQSL, ClubLog, QRZ Log, and HRDLog

This is a maintenance release that resolves a problem where properly formatted QSOs that use Submode (FT4, for example) were not being uploaded correctly to eQSL, HRDLog.net, ClubLog, and QRZ Logbook. This completes the work for Submode and FT4.