Here are a trio of recent announcements from the ARRL:
LOTW back online
On July 1, the ARRL returned Logbook of The World (LoTW) to service! They noted that during a brief LOTW opening 6600 logs were uploaded, but not processed until they were sure that the system was functioning properly.
They also ask that you not call ARRL Headquarters to report issues you are having with LoTW. Instead, contact support at LoTW-help@arrl.org.
They conclude the announcement with, “We appreciate your patience as we worked through the challenges keeping LoTW from returning to service. We know the importance of LoTW to our members, and to the tens of thousands of LoTW users who are not ARRL members.”
Personally, I think that they did a pretty good job with getting LOTW back online. It was definitely a difficult task.
ARRL Foundation Club Grant Program July 25
The ARRL Foundation Club Grant Program—funded by Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC)—is an opportunity for clubs to apply for grants up to $25,000 to fund projects in areas that will motivate and develop active radio amateurs, with an emphasis given to projects that are of a “transformational” nature.
The application period is NOW OPEN and runs through Friday July 26, 2024 at 4:00PM Eastern Time. Clubs across the country are encouraged to apply, even if your club is not an ARRL Affiliated Club or not a 501(c)(3) organization—all are welcome to apply. Grant recipients will be required to share progress reports and updates with ARRL.
It seems like the ARRL should have made this announcement a lot sooner to give clubs a better shot at meeting the deadline, but perhaps those clubs who have been working on big projects have been working on their proposals all along. We’ll see.
ARRL developing performance analysis program for NTS
The National Traffic System (NTS) will soon be evaluated with new tools to help improve system performance. The ARRL is developing a web-based Performance Analysis Tool (PAT) to ultimately improve speed and accuracy of the traffic system. Additional training materials will also be developed to improve NTS performance. Once the new tools are complete, the ARRL will hold a test exercise to measure their effectiveness.
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From the ARRL: “Effective 12:00pm ET / 16:00 UTC we will be returning Logbook of The World® (LoTW®) to service.” That is fantastic news!
Current Queue Status for LotW
I uploaded the logs that I had waiting since things went down in early May. When I logged into my account today, this is what I saw:
When I synchronized DXKeeper and LotW, the most recent LotW confirmation was from May 9. So we are a couple of months behind. I was surprised there were only 47K logs in the queue (a 16 Hour delay), but I expect very few people know it is back on line. Hopefully those May and June confirmations will eventually get uploaded.
Turning back time to virtually witness a critical historic method of shortwave communication using the fundamental mode of continuous wave modulation. This is a film from 1944, teaching the basics of Morse code, for military comms. What is the proper (and most efficient) technique for creating Morse code by hand, using a manual Morse code […]
A couple of weeks ago, I received an email with a link to the draft agenda for the second meeting of the ARRL Board of Directors. It reads:
Draft Agenda ARRL Board of Directors 2024 Second Meeting July 19-20, 2024
Roll Call
Moment of Silence
Courtesies
Consideration of the agenda of the meeting
Receipt and consideration of financial reports
Motion to Adopt Consent Agenda
Receipt of Officer’s reports
Consideration of items removed from Consent Agenda
Consideration of recommendations of the Standing Committees
Consideration of additional recommendations as contained in report
Proposals for amendments to Articles of Association and Bylaws
Directors’ motions
Any other business
Closing courtesies
Adjournment
If you can figure out what they’re going to discuss from reading this, you’re a better ham than I am. So, I contacted my director, Scott Yonally, N8SY. I wrote, “I bet you guys received a more detailed agenda than this. Anything that you’d care to share?”
He wrote back:
For full “Transparency” (sic) there’s very little difference between what I get to what you get. I’m sure that you are aware of the issues Headquarters has had recently, and I’m sure that particular topic will consume a huge slice of the Board’s time this time around.
This response is hardly transparent, if you ask me. I tried a second time to get more information out of him, especially item 11, “Proposals for amendments to Articles of Association and Bylaws.” If you recall, it was an issue with proposed amendments to the articles of association and bylaws that raised a big stink last time. Unfortunately, he went silent on me.
If it really is true that the directors don’t get much more than this draft agenda, then that means the directors are going into this meeting very much unprepared. That doesn’t sound good to me. I’m guessing—and this is only a guess—that N8SY isn’t sharing because I’ve been critical of the ARRL in the past. If so, I wish he’d just say that.
Anyway, if you have concerns that you’d like the ARRL board to consider, be sure to get in touch with your division director. If you have concerns about the proposed amendments to the articles of association and bylaws, perhaps you can cajole more information out of your division director.
By the way, if you are an ARRL member, you can have meeting agendas and minutes sent to you. First, log in to the ARRL website, then go to www.arrl.org/opt-in-out and check the box next to “ARRL Board meeting agendas and minutes.” You can also email ARRL Members Services at members@arrl.org.
Update July 1, 2024. LoTW is back up! It is running slow, but it is available. Thank goodness.
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When I wrote the article back in May, I hardly thought that LoTW would be down a month later.
Sadly, the outage continues.
My suspicions were correct, however, that this was something more than a simple networking problem. The ARRL has since admitted their network was viciously and uniquely hacked. I can certainly understand their caution to make sure that every system linked to LoTW is given a clean bill of health before turning the system back on.
Earlier this week, on Tuesday there was apparently a brief period of time when LoTW was accessible. A couple of my ham buddies managed to upload some contacts. They'll have to wait for confirmations when the rest of us can get in.
I do hope it is soon. I'm really missing this service.
EDIT – Seems LoTW was only briefly up. Might have been a test or an inadvertent public access moment prior to reconstruction being fully completed. Or it broke right away again. Comments are open for any reports of new information! I won’t upload anything until after the weekend, but reports are that LoTW came […]
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On July 1, the ARRL returned Logbook of The World (LoTW) to service! They noted that during a brief LOTW opening 6600 logs were uploaded, but not processed until they were sure that the system was functioning properly.
The ARRL Foundation Club Grant Program—funded by Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC)—is an opportunity for clubs to apply for grants up to $25,000 to fund projects in areas that will motivate and develop active radio amateurs, with an emphasis given to projects that are of a “transformational” nature.
Amateur Radio Daily reports that:
A couple of weeks ago, I received an email with a link to the draft agenda for the second meeting of the ARRL Board of Directors. It reads:
