I had a couple log entries that looked weird and had a few log fields missing data that at one time were there. I looked in USERFIELDS and found a bunch with duplicate entries, like many with 2, 3 and 4 duplicate entries for VE PROV:, I had a few so far that had as many as 7 duplicates. While fixing those I also found entries of what I think was the old userfield for QSL Sent and Rcvd, which is now QSLRDATE and QSLSDATE. So the entries look like | QS:20APR90| QR:13JUN92| QSLSDATE:1990420| QSLRDATE:19920613|. I think I can delete the old QS and QR entries without harm as I don't believe those are valid anymore, even the syntax of the date ddmmmyy stopped being supported by FoxPro from what I remember, so all the more reason for me to think I can get rid of them. I want to delete them as I found several entries that have run out of USERFIELD space due to the field truncating the data. I hope I don't have too many of these.....my log starts in 1985 and I'm finding a fair number of entries up into the 1990's so far that have duplicate data.

Thanks for any advice,

73 de Brad

Dennis,

Ok...I wasn't sure where QR and QS came from, in fact I probably created them myself too many years ago, like in the mid to late 80's and since I never really paid much attention to what was in USERFIELD it was out-of-sight out-of-mind. I did some more investigation of the multiple entries for VE PROV, I have hundreds with from (2) up to (7) in the field...I was able to narrow this down so far to only those log entries that were contest based where my active logform was "ARRL DX FOR W & VE", or "sweepstakes", in those contests every single entry with a VE PROV had multiples in the field. The other contest 'CQWW" only had a few entries, maybe 10% of the VE's logged. I also found the same issue for any entry that contained an Oblast. I attached a snippet of both a VE Prov and an Oblast. I've cleaned most of these out manually as I didnt know the best way to do a mass change, but, that's what got me to see the pattern of only occurring when the QSO was logged from a contest logform. I haven't gone back as yet and dug into each the logforms but will do that next. I don't log any data from the callbook so that's not playing a role and not sure if copy from previous qso's is somehow related.


One last one for ya, I also see in USERFIELD where for example I have an entry for CONT, some are displayed as CONT:NA| others have a mess of "pipes", from (2) to (8) or more like CONT:NA|||||||||. Again these are also related to only those QSO's logged via a contest logform.


Thanks again, de Brad

I'll research the best way to mass-change out the duplicates.

The repeating pipes are easy to get rid of. Mass change "||" to "|" Repeat several times until no more subsequent || are left.

You won't actually use the REPLACE USER-DEFINED FIELD CONTENTS. That deals with individual fields in the overall USERFIELDS field. Just do REPLACE FIELD CONTENTS and select USERFIELDS.

Make a backup first!

Tnx & 73,

Dennis WN4AZY

FYI,

All looks good. BU was important as I mistakenly didn't notice I had'nt selected USERFIELDS and ended up changing Call for every log entry....lol....LOGic didn't like it either and complained....oops!!
All extra pipes gone (did STRTRAN(USERFIELDS,"||","|") more than several times to get them all, but a success. Also all old QS & QR fields cleaned and gone. I got all the VE Prov multiple entries cleaned out manually and only the Oblasts are left. I feel Squeaky Clean now.....I'll run some reports tomorrow just to validate, but all looks fine. USERFIELDS looks really good from 1985 to present.

Thanks Again for all your help !!

Issues Resolved !!

73 de Brad, N8GLS

Well, don't feel bad. I wrote it.

The misc util is a text file, so you could edit out the parts that you don't want. But it is pretty solid. I have never had any complaints about it messing anything up.

Tnx & 73,

Dennis WN4AZY