Right and it makes a lot of sense to use them because otherwise there is a problem with logging, especially if, like me, you use LotW.
I wonder what the ARRL are going to do about RSLs, they can’t just ignore them going away because of the way their account/callsign system behaves.
Regional Secondary Locators (I think). It’s the changing/additional letter that indicates whether you’re in Wales or Scotland or wherever (M0ABC becomes MM0ABC in Scotland, MD0ABC on the Isle of Man, etc)
The extra letter after “G or M” so W Wales, M Scotland I N Ireland, J Jersey and U Guernsey although there are others available if you have a club call. Most people use them. It is really only optional on G/SB-004 when you could be in either England or Scotland or if very careful both! (This is starting to sound like an explanation from “I’m sorry I have not got a clue”) It isn’t optional if you have a call beginning with 2 when you must use the appropriate RSL. Anyway It is no longer compulsory if you have a G or M in your call.. To make things even easier in the UK there is also a system where you can change your callsign from the one you were born with so even more options and use a variety of suffixes. I hope this has made it really easy to understand. Not surprisingly it can make writing the database code harder……..
It doesn’t matter for LoTW because the DXCC is set in the callsign certificate. So if you use your call in more than one entity (e.g. England and Scotland) then, as long as you upload with the right certificate, the correct DXCC will be logged.
Today’s teaser: Which DXCC entities are not uniquely determined by the callsign prefix?
Before RSLs were made optional, an example was GB which could be in any of 7 DXCC entities. This now applies to G and M, but not GE, MM, MW, GI etc.
Is that the posh version?
Thanks, Andrew, @VK3ARR for the very useful spots page.
is that a variation on Goodnight Irene?
Apparently so but I must admit I had never heard the phrase used as “goodnight Irene” before.
“Irene, goodnight Irene; I’ll see you in my dreams ………..”
Thats half the line: “Irene goodnight, Irene goodnight, Irene , goodnight Irene, I’ll see you in my dreams.” Unusual for me to remember the words, as a musician I usually just remember the melody and chords for these “golden oldies”!
It’s “Irene, goodnight” twice, then “goodnight, Irene” twice. In the hundreds of times my folk singing duo did that piece, it was always last and always audience participation. We did not sing the part where he threatened suicide if she ever left him.
Elliott, K6EL
Interesting. There seems to be several versions of it, even Leadbelly who it is credited to sang it in more than one version, even the method of suicide varies (drowning or taking morphine) and apparently it evolved from a ballad by Gussie L Davies published in 1886. I’m most familiar with it as a waltz sung for dancing when I was a kid back in the paleozoic!