What’s
New in cocoaModem 2.0 v0.44, v0.45, v0.46, v0.47, 0.48,
v0.49
Kok
Chen, W7AY [w7ay (at) arrl.net]
Last updated: February 18, 2008
Click here
for the previous (v0.37-v0.43) What’s New.
What has changed in v0.48, v0.49 ?
* Japanese MacOS users who use the Kotoeri component for keyboard input will now receive an alert when passing characters other than English alphabets.
* Fixed a sequencing bug that caused macro problems in the CW interface when not using QSK. Macros in the CW interface should now work with or without QSK.
* Fixed the CW interface so that it no longer puts out multiple lock messages to the Console on Leopard.
* The microHAM microKeyer has an audio router that switches sound card input and output and microphone input to various connections on the radio. The configuration of the audio router is saved in an EEPROM which could be defaulted for voice keyer routing when the unit is shipped from the factory.
cocoaModem is supposed to modify the audio routing in the microKeyer for AFSK use. However, a bug caused this step to be bypassed. Unless the EEPROM in the microKeyer had been previously programmed for AFSK routing, audio from the computer will not reach the radio.
This should now been fixed, and you no longer have to change the default EEPROM for AFSK routing. cocoaModem will temporarily force the microKeyer to use AFSK routing until you power cycle the microKeyer, or until another application changes this temporary setting.
(For those who would like to change the default EEPROM setting - including audio routing, PTT delays, etc, I also have an AppleScript that you can run which stores a different settng into the EEPROM. Please email me if you would like the AppleScript script file.)
* v0.49 has a bug fix (v0.48 was running an unlocked loop in one of the threads).
What has changed in v0.47 ?
The
width of the waterfall in the Wideband RTTY and PSK
interfaces can now be selected between the original "2
kHz" and a new "4 kHz" width. Before using it, be sure
that your transmitter is capable of wider bandwidths
than 2.4 kHz. Except for software defined radios, most
transceivers don't have the capability. For more
details, see the User's Manual's Wideband RTTY and PSK
chapters.
NetAudio has been added to the input and output device menu
(see the sections NetAudio and NetAudio Preferences in the
User's Manual). This allows
cocoaModem to send and receive audio streams to and from
a different application (e.g., an SDR front end) that
uses the AUNetSend and AUNetReceive components of Core
Audio. NetAudio also allows the client apps to run on a
separate computer on the same local network.
NetAudio is implemented as a new framework in cocoaModem.
Because of that, cocoaModem installations will copy four
instead of three frameworks to your /Library/Frameworks
folder. The NetAudio framework is documented here, and the Xcode project and
sources for it and sample codes is available for
download from here.
v0.47 fixed PSK31/PSK63 mode selection bug. When xcvr1 and
xcvr2 do not both have the same PSK modes selected, the
transmission could be in the wrong mode. This is now fixed.
Thanks to Sergei KD6CJI for reporting this anomaly.
What has changed in v0.46 ?
RTTY and PSK ring
buffers are cleared at the end of each transmission. Under
some circumstances, end-of-transmission characters had
remained in the buffer and caused a subsequent macro to
fail.
What has changed in v0.45 ?
I've changed the IMD
measurement scheme, added a transmit filter to PSK31 and
fixed a freezing/crashing bug in the contest interface.
In the past, cocoaModem would wait for a long idle pattern
(when you see two unmodulated carriers from the PSK31
signal on the waterfall) before it attempts to take an IMD
reading. This is to provide enough SNR from an FFT so the
reading is not noise limited. This scheme has changed in
v0.45 so that shorter idle patterns are accumulated and
when there is sufficient SNR, the IMD is then computed. It
still requires idle patterns, but it can now work on
multiple short idle patterns rather than needing a single
long contiguous idle pattern.
PSK31 has a raised cosine envelope when there is
modulation. This means that except when transmitting an
idle pattern, there will be some low level (below -34 dB)
keying sidebands from PSK31, since the spectrum of the
baseband raised cosine waveshape itself is not band-limited
to 32 Hz. This is a very low level signal and unless the
signal is over 45 dB above the noise floor of the receiver,
it will not bother anyone else at that receiver. However,
with a strong (9 S-Units above the noise floor) station,
you will start to notice the effect on weak adjacent
signals that might have otherwise been decodable. In an
attempt to provide a cleaner signal, cocoaModem now passes
the baseband of the transmit audio through a lowpass
filter. This only affects the cleanliness of the
transmitted signal. No change has been made to the receive
filter.
When capturing contest exchanges (the next control click
after capturing the callsign), if the cursor does not land
near enough of actual text (for example when the screen is
actively scrolling) the contest interface could freeze or
possibly crash. This should now be fixed in v0.45.
If all the newline scrolling during a contest makes it hard
for you to point the cursor at the correct spot to click,
remember that cocoaModem's contest interface has an option
to ignore all incoming newlines (so the screen will only
scroll more predictably when each end of line is reached).
This option (not sticky) can be selected with the
Ignore Newline menu item in the Contest menu of
the main Menu Bar.
What has changed in v0.44 ?
Recently, some PSK31
apps have been using both carriage return and linefeed
characters to represent the new line character. cocoaModem
v0.44 will now accept both carriage returns and linefeeds
as newlines in the receive text view. Any program that
sends both CR-LF for a single newline will create a double
spaced line separation (I have not encountered one yet, but
there might be some...).
A bug caused a prolonged silence (nominally seven basic
time elements -- i.e., 7 times longer than a dit) to fail
to emit a space character from the CW machine decoder. This
should now be fixed in v0.44.
Remember that under noisy conditions, do not use Auto
speed. Instead, pick the closest receive speed from the
speed menu. That will give more reliable decoding. However,
with stations that send with extreme CW weights, Auto may
be more reliable.
Also, please don't use the CW decoder as a permanent crutch
-- please use it as an aid to help you pick up your aural
speed. Other digital modes with proper character timings
are much more suitable and reliable as a keyboard mode.
When under AppleScript control, a switch from receive state
to transmit state in PSK used to cause the transmit buffer
to reset, losing anything that has been loaded into the
buffer prior to the switch to transmit mode. With v0.44,
you can now send a transmit buffer to cocoaModem through
AppleScript before switching to transmit mode without
losing the buffer. (This does not affect manual typing
since manually typed text is buffered in the transmit text
view rather than buffered in the transmit ring buffer.)
Click here
for the previous (v0.37-v0.43) What’s New.