Hi All,

First, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! After months and months of work, I am really excited to share this announcement with you!

NAQP Contest Log 3.0 Beta is Now Available - Free!

As many of you already know, I'm in the process of rewriting all our software in C#, so our logging programs will continue to run on future operating systems after Microsoft stops supporting VB6 programs. Since March of 2012, I've been working on the C# template that will be the basis for all the individual programs, and AC Log too.

Folks have been beta testing the template for the last few weeks. While I'm sure some additional bugs are waiting to be found, we've likely squashed the big ones and we are now to the point of bringing any remaining to light by giving it a good try in an actual contest!

The tried and true, VB6 versions of NAQP programs are still available on the website, but if you are willing to give the new C# version a try, understanding that it has never been tested in an actual contest before, I would really appreciate it! Version 3.0 has just about all the features of the old VB6 programs (it is networkable) and lots of new ones, such as a display map, post contest statistics and many others, too numerous to list here, that you'll discover as you explore the menu options.

I really want to encourage as many folks as possible to try version 3.0, so I've disabled the 30 contact limitation for unregistered users to make it free to everyone for this winter's NAQP contests! All I ask is that you send me a quick e-mail after the contest and let me know if all is okay, or if you encountered any anomalies. I would really like to hear from everyone trying the new version, and especially folks who run multi transmitter in a networked environment.

If you aren't familiar with the North American QSO Party contest, you'll find all the rules here:

http://www.ncjweb.com/naqprules.php

The dates for the contest are 1/12/13 for CW, 1/19 for SSB and 2/23 for RTTY

(Note - Winkey in version 3.0 functions much like my VB6 programs, but enhancements to the Winkey portion of the software are in the works thanks to Steve, K1EL. Also, the rewrite does not presently interface with K7RE RTTY).

You can download version 3.0 from the NAQP page of my website, www.n3fjp.com or directly from this e-mail by clicking on this link: http://n3fjp.ky1v.com/NAQP.exe

Before I can move forward, converting the template to other contesting programs (which will be a big job at 2 weeks per program and about 50 programs to rewrite), it's really important we verify the template is working well. Your using version 3.0 for this contest and letting me know how it goes will be a great help and I will really appreciate it! Thanks in advance!