Release 5.4 (40139) 2026-01-04
See History for previous build notes.
New: Debugging system:
New: A custom USB-HID manager that eases supporting external devices like XK24 and YCCC SO2R+.
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There are many changes listed below. As a general rule SkookumLogger now disables menu items and other controls instead of hiding them, with the exception of Radio menu items.
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Change: Relocated menu items for showing and hiding windows to a new View menu. Most were on the Window menu. All of the leaf menu item titles now begin with 'Show' or 'Hide' and are synchronized with the true visibility state of the item's window. SkookumLogger remembers the visibility state for most windows across restarts. MacOS automatically adds the titles of most open windows to the end of the Window menu.
Change: Added a menu named Station to the menubar that replaces the previous Radio 1, Radio 2 and Rotators menus. The Panadapter items at the end of the Radio menus are now in the View menu.
Change: Renamed the '2T2R' menubar menu to OpMode and added three menu items for choosing the operating mode. Replaced the terms '1T1R', '1T2R' and '2T2R' with SO1R, SO2V and SO2R everywhere in the user interface.
Change: Converted the Rotators window to use three tabs instead of a fragile custom disclosure layout.
Change: Converted the Radio window to two tabs and merged the auxiliary settings window into the tab views. Renamed the 'Enable Radio' checkbox to 'Connect'.
Change: Converted the Time Tracker to use 3 tabs.
Change: Cleaned up the Text encoder/decoder window layout.
Change: Cleaned up the Grid Information window layout.
Change: Cleaned up the Port Device Name Editor layout and relocated its Show/Hide menu item from View > External Devices to View > Editors >. Also alphabetized the list editors list.
Change: Cleaned up the Rate Tracker window layout
Change: Each of the two radios is always 'connected', using the simulated radio named Phantom as the default radio type. Choosing the radio type immediately updates the Station > Radio n menu items and the settings values and connection properties shown in the Radio window.
Change: Renamed the 'Antenna' window and its View menu item to 'SteppIR'.
Change: Disabled antenna-related items in Station > Radio n menus when the Antenna Switch isn't active.
Change: Removed text after colon in Country entity names when displaying in checksheets.
Change: Round the frequency in kHz to 10 Hz when announcing spots.
Change: AudioRecordingController modifications to prevent generating a corrupted m4a file. Thanks W6FB.
Fix: The download URL for SCP changed.
Fix: QC QP Inside was accepting QSOs with VE2s as both province and administration region multipliers.
Fix: Potential crash when testing whether or not SkookumLogger found an Antenna configuration file.
Fix: Hang when initializing Antenna Switch.
Fix: Crash with WRTC2026 log containing 4K QSOs and many activities being processed. This is a symptom of a threading issue that will take some time to address, but there was a safe workaround in this case.
Fix: Crash due to bad implementation of sorting on serial number columns in Log table.
Fix: Updated Quebec QP practice config to allow straddlers. This contest is not a supported practice contest, but its practiceDelegate maxCountyLines was wrong and has been fixed.
Fix: Labeling bug when a recording event ends and a new one starts.
Fix: XK-24 wasn’t updating key ID maps when the XK24 UI changed the key associated with a menu name. Additionally, some keys (notably Morse > Keyboard Mode) require that only a single XK24 key be associated with them. Added logic to enforce only a single key being assignable to a given action the exception being the “…for Key ID” actions which remain assignable to multiple keys.
Change: Add DC as multiplier in Michigan QSO Party inside entrants. Thanks AI6W.
Change: From discussing with W6FB and JH5GHM, improve how cut numbers and leading zeros in serial numbers and zones are generated for callers in practice mode.
Fix: The sent serial number in Log table was sorting alphabetically instead of numerically. Thanks AI7SK.
Fix: Changes to message content in messages editors were not being saving in the log file. Thanks W6FB.
Fix: Was initializing sent exchange with State instead of County for new QSO Party Inside logs.
New: Warning message in Status Messages window when creating a new log and calendar information from the current WA7BNM 8-day isn't found.
Change: Add more information to the DX Cluster chapter in the Guide.
Change: Fuss with Panadapter window toolbars to reduce size on Tahoe.
Fix: Set minimum off time duration to 60 minutes for CQ WPX. Thanks W6FB.
Fix: Practice mode likelihood of other stations sending leading zeros in serial number contests was always 100%.
Substantial revisions to DX cluster support. You might want to save a screen grab of the Edit List window in DX Cluster settings, because this beta will reset the content to four defaults cluster nodes. The DX Cluster chapter in the Guide has been almost entirely replaced, has some hints about getting started with the N2WQ node type, and a few hints for DXSpider nodes. Please contribute any wisdom for those types and especially the other two supported node types, CC and ARCluster.
New: Support for three additional types of DX cluster nodes.
New: Support for logging into DXSpider nodes that require a password.
New: Buttons for showing and resetting spot filters in the DX Cluster window.
New: Option in DX Cluster settings for plotting spots for yourself on maps.
Change: Removed DXSpider-specific spot filter editor in DX Cluster settings.
Change: When a call fails the DXLog regex validity test, look for a match in the AD1C countries file before declaring invalid.
Change: When synchronizing a N2WQ node to log's modes, ignore the log Data mode instead of enabling spots for FT4, FT8 and JS8.
Fix: Potential memory management crash in Panadapter waterfall code.
Fix: Was failing to use WA7BNM 8-day calendar data to override stale default values for contest rules web site URL. Thanks KD9UYC.
New: Add pause comments to cue files when recording contests.
New: Download NOAA WWV text file for display on Great Circle Map, instead of requiring a DX Cluster connection.
New: First cut at support for the N2WQ contesting DX cluster. Details in updated Guide.
New: Support bonus points for mobiles/rovers in Ontario QSO Party. Thanks VE3CX.
Change: Remove auto-pause/resume due to Time Tracker off periods.
Fix: Bug where multiple contest recordings were created simultaneously.
Change: Update ONQP points and bonus points rules.
Fix: Contest Recording issues identified by W6FB.
New: Support for North American QSO Party RTTY. Thanks KB6NTW.
Change: The Event Recorder in the Audio Recorder is now named Contest Recorder. A pulsing red dot indicating the recording state and a Start/Stop grace period has been added. See the updated Guide for details. Thanks W6FB and AI6W.
Change: Untested updates for Colorado QSO Party rules changes. Thanks W1NV.
Change: Updated bonus points rule for Virginia QSO Party. Thanks W2RU.
Change: The list of worked calls at the end of a statistics report now shows more than just the maximum-possible count calls, excluding dupes and suspect QSOs.
Change: Removed the settings button from the New Log Chooser, to prevent a conflict with the blocking chooser panel blocking panel. Thanks W6FB.
Fix: Crash when macOS doesn't supply a valid contest log at startup. Now SkookumLogger creates a new CQ WW CW default log. Thanks W6FB.
Fix: Wrong code for one VT county. Thanks N5EP.
Fix: Corrected initialization order at startup to show useful database versions instead of (null) in the Status Messages window.
Change: Support MX as a region code for Winter Field Day. (Note: this contest has an exceptionally unusual multiplier scheme that cannot be fully determined from QSOs alone. SkookumLogger reports the score for the case of no "Objective Multipliers".)
Change: The "check" QSO entry field is use in a variety of ways, including age, years since licensed and category-class, depending on contest rules. The code for managing this now consistently handles entry validity testing and tooltip, log table column name and tooltip, and explanation for a QSO marked excluded due to an invalid check field entry.
Change: The Snippet audio recording enable checkbox is now a toggle button. Thanks W6FB.
Change: Pressing F1 while beacon mode is on now aborts sending and pauses beacon mode. Then, pressing F1 restarts beacon CQing. Thanks AI6W.
Fix: The Tune button in the Amplifiers window for KPA1500 TCP wasn't running the amplifier's TUNE function.
Fix: Crash when an audio device disappears unexpectedly.
Fix: Audio recording could fail when waking from sleep.
Guide: Added subsection to Audio Recording chapter describing cue files that are generated for Event recordings. Thanks W6FB.
New: Report the version (modification date) for the Exchange database at startup, in the Status Messages window. Do not report versions for SCP and the Exchange database when they are disabled. Do report when the Exchange database is updated. Thanks VE7KAJ.
Update: INQP QSOs are 2 points regardless of mode. Thanks KS9J.
Change: Remove the Enable Audio Recording Logging preference. This had no effect; use of audio inputs is managed by the macOS microphone access system setting. Thanks VE7KAJ.
Change: X-Keys keypad commands for setting panadapter span apply to both Main and Sub pans.
Fix: Menus in the Panadapter window toolbars for choosing tracking mode and span width were dysfunctional. Thanks VE3MM.
Fix: Editing a QSO flagged as XQ in the Log table to remove the cause of the flag wasn't clearing the highlighting (italics). Similarly, Editing a clean QSO such that it became suspect didn't italicize the QSO. Thanks AI6W.
Guide: Preliminary revisions to the Audio Recording chapter. More to come.