[aprssig] spaces in object names

[Pete Loveall AE5PL Lists]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Steve Dimse
> Sent: Thursday, August 13, 2009 7:40 AM
> >
> > Because the trailing spaces are irrelevant.
> 
> Nowhere in the spec does it say that. It was assumed, but as Pete
> pointed out, when we were discussing trailing spaces he said all nine
> characters are significant, and that I "misinterpreted" that to mean
> the trailing spaces were significant. Semantics, I don't understand
> how all nine characters are significant yet you can ignore trailing
> spaces, but now that Pete has clarified what he meant I can move on.

Steve, quit misquoting me.  I said your -assumption- that I was talking about what I do on jFindu is incorrect.  Nowhere did I say that trailing spaces are insignificant.  If you store Objects separately and display them separately, all 9 characters are significant in Object names according to the spec.  What we as authors have done (as stated multiple times before) is to incorrectly combine Object names and station callsign-SSIDs either in our databases or on our displays or both such that they are indistinguishable and that is what introduced the ambiguity.  I wish you would quit misquoting me or making statements about what I meant when you obviously have no idea what I said or meant.

> > Remember that the object name
> > is fixed length 9 caracters, with space fillers. This means that
> > there is
> > no object name beeing transmitted as "VE2PRT"  or "VE2PRT  "; they
> > both
> > are transmitted as "VE2PRT   " (with exactly 3 spaces at the end).
> 
> No, but there are item names being transmitted with 1 to 7 characters
> (trailing spaces not required but not prohibited), and there are real
> stations being transmitted without trailing spaces. That is the issue.

And, as I also stated in an earlier post, Items complicate the mix even more.  But that still does not say that the spec is incorrect or that we should begin adding unrelated restrictions because one person or another finds their display ambiguous.  What we as database designers should do is revisit our databases and separate Objects from station from Items and then present them as obviously different entities (I am considering how to do that with javAPRS right now.  The jFindu database is a much simpler issue to correct.).

So what we agree on is that as currently displayed on APRS clients and web sites, it is very difficult to distinguish between stations, Objects, and Items, both in the client databases and in the client displays (clients=PC applications, web applications, etc.).  This is why the statement "trailing spaces may be disregarded in clients" to alert users to the fact that if they use the same name for an Object that they use for an Item or for a station (when trailing spaces are ignored), their Object may be displayed or handled improperly.  To try to extrapolate this to add language to prohibit use of any particular sequence of characters including multiple embedded spaces just doesn't make sense to me and most other here.

73,

Pete Loveall AE5PL
pete at ae5pl dot net