If my text/Iridium/APRS spot doesn’t work from some remote summit then there a good chance I’ll not get picked up. I might then get a failed activation and the chasers are denied somewhere unusual to chase. So both can lose out.
To be honest it comes down to this good old acronym.
Prior Preparation Prevents Poor Performance (there are other versions of that, some not so polite).
Fail to Prepare and you Prepare to Fail.
etc.
If I could ensure it was working with a recent test that didn’t propagate all over the Internet I’d be happy to do it. Until then I’ll have to do my best to make it clear it’s a test as per Fraser and Andy. I probably end up testing once or twice a year. Given the overall number of Spots in the system the level of test traffic is “noise”. If it was truly starting to become a big volume I guess something programmatic could be done, but in the meantime I am guessing those scarce volunteer resources are better directed to more pressing needs.
One “quick fix” would be to add a true Test Summit to the DB?
TEST/TE-001 Test Summit
There’s probably a multitude of reasons why that’s a bad idea (which I might find out in the next couple of days when people tell me).
Anyway, hopefully I can “buy you a beer” and chat amicably about it on Saturday night 