CW QSO Formats and Conventions

A QSO — a two-way contact — follows conventions that are widely shared but nowhere codified in one place. This page collects what the primary sources actually say: the operating manuals, the club protocols, the contest rules and the activity guides. Every claim below is referenced, because a good deal of what circulates about “correct” CW procedure turns out, on checking, to be one organisation’s house style rather than a rule — and in at least one important case (where <SK> goes) the authorities contradict each other.

It was written as the research behind the QSO Trainer, which generates practice contacts in these formats. The final table sets out which convention that tool applies to each format, and why.

1. The shape of a contact

Every source agrees on the coarse structure. FISTS puts it simply:

“Basically there are three parts to a QSO: The introduction, the middle, and the conclusion.” FISTS, A Basic CW Operating Manual, p.2^[1]

The introduction carries what is conventionally called the Big Three:

“Within the basic CW QSO format there is prominently ‘The Big Three’. These includes the RST, NAME, and QTH. These pieces of information form the basic beginnings of a rag chew CW QSO.” KK6M, Sample CW Rag Chew QSO Template for the Beginner, v10 p.1^[2]

and the middle carries a well-defined second layer:

“If a QSO goes past these, additional information is passed along: a station’s RIG, Antenna; the weather; the age of the operator or how long they have been a Ham; and their occupation are the norms.” KK6M, ibid.^[2]

That two-layer structure is why the teaching programmes emphasise selective copying: the Big Three go in the log, the rest can wash over you. CW Academy states the goal for its Basic class as being able to “handle a short QSO and know what in the QSO is necessary to write down and what can be listened to in their heads”.^[3]

2. The rubber-stamp QSO

“Rubber stamp” describes a contact stamped out to a set pattern, exchanging the standard information and little else.

“Many of the contacts that take place on the HF ham radio bands are what are termed ‘rubber stamp’ contacts. These QSOs consist of a set format and do not normally involve long conversations.” Electronics Notes, HF Ham Radio Contact: QSO Format^[4]

The same phrase is used of signal reports: a “rubber stamp 599” is one given because it is what one always gives, not because the signal was actually perfect.^[4] The format is not a lesser thing than a conversation — it is the standard opening, and for a beginner it is a complete contact in its own right.^[5]

The most authoritative worked example available is in the IARU’s own operating manual, Ethics and Operating Procedures for the Radio Amateur by ON4UN and ON4WW^[6] — a document accepted by the IARU Administrative Council as representing the IARU’s view and translated into more than 25 languages:

G4ZZZ calls; ON6YYY answers.

— IARU §II.9.6, pp.24–25.^[6] (The callsigns in the original are internally inconsistent, W4ZZZ and W1ZZZ appearing where G4ZZZ is meant; reproduced here with that corrected.)

Three conventions are demonstrated in the exchange above:

• Each over is sandwiched between callsigns — THEIR CALL DE MY CALL at the start and again at the end.
• Important information is sent twice: 579 579, BOB BOB, HARLOW HARLOW. This is not padding; it is error correction on a channel with no other kind.
• The exchange is four overs plus a sign-off: introduction, reply, information, reply, close. The two-over “contest-style” contact is a different thing entirely.

3. Abbreviations

Morse is slow — twenty words a minute is a brisk conversation — so nearly everything that recurs has been shortened. Four kinds of shorthand run through every format below, and a single over can use all four. The tables in the margin are copies of those on the International Morse Code page, which gives the fuller lists, the dot-and-dash spellings and the ITU sources behind them. Click any tile to hear it.

3.1 Prosigns

A prosign is two or three letters run together as a single character, with no gap between them: <AR> is di-dah-di-dah-dit, one sound, and not A followed by R. They punctuate a transmission rather than spell anything — end of message, wait, end of contact — and because each is a single character it cannot be mistaken for a word. This page writes them in angle brackets; the sources variously use an overline, brackets, or nothing at all, which may be part of how the disagreement below arises.

Are BK and KN prosigns?

There is some disagreement on which codes are prosigns.

The IARU is explicit:

“‘BK’ and ‘KN’ are not prosigns, as the two letters of these codes are sent with a space in between.” IARU §II.9.3^[6]

The LICW protocol says the same of BK, and gives the same reason: “BK is not a pro-sign, so there is a little space between the B and the K” but does not comment on KN.^[7] KK6M takes the opposite view and lists both among the “Procedural signals or Pro-Signs” — alongside K, which is a single letter and so cannot be run together with anything — having just defined a prosign as “sent as a single sound no separation between characters”. He is aware of the problem, and says so:^[2]

“As noted by W2LJ, there is some confusion about what is and what is not a prosign! Here is the list I stand by.” KK6M, Rag Chew Template v10^[2]

This one is audible rather than just academic. BK run together is <BK> — one character, dah di di di dah — and does not sound like B followed by K. A learner who knows one may hesitate over the other.

CW Academy takes the disagreement head on and then teaches the prosign anyway. Its Beginner curriculum introduces <BK> alongside <SK> in session 10, with this note attached:^[8]

“NOTE: There are some that say <BK> is not an ‘official’ prosign and should not be sent as one character. Although <BK> is used quite often when working POTA and SOTA contacts. As a new Morse code operator, you will hear it sent both ways, BK and <BK>. <BK> is presented here, as a prosign, to offer practice in hearing and sending it as a prosign. Your advisor has the option as to how it is presented.” CW Academy, Beginner curriculum v4.8, session 10^[8]

That is the practical answer: you will meet both, so you have to be able to copy both. This page goes on writing BK and KN as separate letters, following the IARU and the LICW, and reserves the angle brackets for the codes nobody disputes — but that is a convention for this paper, not a ruling. The QSO Trainer sends BK either way, as a setting, and follows each format’s own house style: CW Academy hands over with <BK>, the LICW quick column with BK.

3.2 Q codes

Q codes are three letters beginning with Q, sent with ordinary spacing rather than run together. Each serves as both a statement and a question, the question marked by a following question mark: QRL says the frequency is in use, QRL? asks whether it is; QTH gives your location, QTH? asks for it. The official list is long, and most of it belongs to services other than amateur radio; a handful do nearly all the work in a contact, and those are the ones in the margin.

3.3 Other abbreviations

The rest is just shorthand, also sent with ordinary spacing: TNX for “thanks”, ES for “and”, UR for “you are”, HW? for “how do you copy?”, OM for “old man”. Two numbers belong here as well — 73, “best regards”, and 88, “love and kisses”. None of it is compulsory, but a contact is mostly made of these, so they are worth learning as sounds rather than as spellings.

3.4 Cut numbers

Cut numbers are a contest convention to speed up sending of the rather long-winded digits, and are documented by the IARU manual:^[6] 1 = A, 5 = E, 9 = N, 0 = T, with 2–4 and 6–8 usually not cut. So 599009 becomes ENNTTN, most often heard as the partial form 5NNTTN; 59914 becomes 5NNA4 or ENNA4. The partial 9-as-N form is far more common on the air than full cutting. Cut numbers belong almost entirely to contest exchanges (§6.7); a ragchew is more likely to send its digits in full.

4. Closing codes

How to finish a QSO is where the published authorities most plainly contradict each other — not on the words, but on what the last character should be and where it goes.

The IARU manual gives an explicit table:^[6]

And it is explicit about where the closing code falls:

“A typical way to gracefully end the QSO would be: ‘…TKS FER QSO 73 ES CUL W1ZZZ de G3ZZZ SK’.” IARU §II.9.6^[6]

So under IARU guidance <SK> comes last, after the callsigns. The ARRL’s Quick Reference Operating Aids state the opposite: “SK — End of contact. SK is sent before the final identification.”^[9] Both are in current use, and KK6M documents the split as regional:

“There are some OPs that send these prosigns AFTER the call signs (EU especially) while currently they are heard before the call signs. I believe BOTH are OK depending on the organization’s protocol you are following.” Bill Leahy K0MP, in KK6M’s Rag Chew Template v10, p.7^[2]

FISTS uses a third arrangement again — <AR> before the callsigns and KN after (… HW? <AR> WA3XYZ DE KC0OBU KN) — which the IARU table above would mark as incorrect.^[1]

5. The closing dits

“At the end of a QSO both QSO partners often send as very last code two DITs with some extra spacing between them (like e e). It means and sounds like ‘bye bye’.” IARU §II.9.19^[6]

Who sends them, and when, is a third thing the sources (mildly) disagree about — and this one is easy to get wrong because each source states its own rule as though it were the rule:

• KK6M: the dits are a reply. “If you are going to send the DIT DIT at the end of a QSO, only do so after the other station signs with an <SK>, not when you are the first”.^[2]
• FISTS: the station closing sends dit dit and the other answers with a single dit — the second half of “shave and a haircut…two bits”.^[1]
• LICW: both stations send two. “After sending your <SK> send 2-dits. The other station will send 2-dits back & your QSO is done!”^[7]

5.1 Shave and a haircut, two bits

The two dits are the surviving fragment of a joke. “Shave and a haircut, two bits” is an old American music-hall couplet — seven notes, five and then two, which you might also use to knock on a door — with two bits (twenty-five cents) being the price of the haircut. Operators sent the whole thing: one station knocked out the five-note phrase, and the other answered with the two notes that finish it.

“It started back before anyone can remember with one Ham sending ‘shave and a haircut’ – dahdididahdit – and the other station completing it with ‘two bits’ – dit dit. It has shortened over the decades to stations sending ‘dit dit’ and ‘dit’.” FISTS, A Basic CW Operating Manual^[1]

KK6M records the same history from KU7Y, who dates the shortening to modern practice and suspects contesters of it, and adds the reason the reply half matters:^[2]

“The ‘Shave and a Hair Cut’ is the finial wave goodbye or Elbow Bump. You would not say goodbye to someone and not let them also give their final salutations before you turned around and walk away. That would be impolite.” KK6M, Rag Chew Template v10^[2]

The dits are a wave, not a signal. That is also why the three rules above disagree without anyone being wrong — they are three ways of not walking off while the other person is still waving.

6. QSO formats

What follows is the catalogue: the formats that are actually published and taught, each described in the words of whoever teaches it. They differ less in what is said than in how much of it is repeated, how an over is ended, and how much of the middle is dropped — which is the subject of §7.

6.1 The LICW protocol (P1–P4)

The Long Island CW Club teaches an explicitly numbered four-part protocol, prepared by W6JIM, and — unusually — publishes it as two parallel columns, Standard and Quick.^[7]

The same document’s notes page is a rich source of rules:^[7]

• CQ is 2×2: CQ CQ DE (your call) (your call) K; answering is (their call) DE (your call) (your call) K.
• When to repeat: “Repeat important information twice during Standard QSOs. Your choice during Quick QSOs — RST, QTH, and Name and anything else that you feel is important (like club numbers).” This is the clearest published statement of which items get doubled and when.
• BK is not a prosign — “there is a little space between the B and the K” — and when handed a BK you begin your reply with BK.
• R R is conditional: customary before your portion of the exchange, but only if you fully understood the previous over.
• Separating topics: “BT, Comma and Period — Use these to separate topics. BT is also used as a pause.”
• In a Standard QSO “each turn starts and ends with (their call) DE (your call)”; the abbreviated BK exchange drops that, but you must still identify every ten minutes.

LICW also derived its character learning order from letter frequency within this protocol — R E A T I N P G S L C D H O F U W B K M Y Q X V Z J^[10] — a direct link between what a club teaches first and what its learners will actually need to copy.

The club’s Student & Instructor Guide places QSO work in “Beginners Carousel 3: Preparing for On-Air Operating”, which is five lessons, one per format: LICW protocol (twice), SKCC, SOTA/POTA and K1USN SST.^[11] The same guide is candid that the protocol is scaffolding to be removed: entry to its Bootcamp requires being able to “express themselves on the air without relying on scripts such as the QSO Protocol or canned exchanges”.^[11]

6.2 CW Academy

CW Academy begins QSO work at session 11 of its Beginner course — “It’s now time to put all the letters, numbers, punctuation, and prosigns together in QSO scripts that you can use as a model when you get on the air” — and continues it through the sessions that follow.^[8] Its Advisor’s Manual sets out the progression:^[3] the Beginner class learns “the typical exchanges at the beginning and end of the QSO”; the Basic class handles a short QSO and learns what to write down versus what to keep in the head; the Intermediate class head-copies words at “25 WPM or faster with no Farnsworth spacing”; and the Advanced class sends QSOs “focusing mostly on the middle part of the QSO”, runs contest simulations and introduces copying from behind.

CW Academy publishes its protocol as material to be practised, in paired copying and sending exercises. The examples below are from the session material used by this site’s CW Academy Morse Code Trainer. Square brackets mark the learner’s own details, which the tool substitutes.

Each session carries three such pairs, one for each of a small recurring cast — K6RB, N3JT and W1RM, all real CWops figures — and they (presumably deliberately) differ from one another. The session 11 overs hand back three different ways (K, DE N3JT, <BK>), and the session 13 closings end variously with E E, with GN, or with nothing at all. The variation is part of the exercise.

CW Academy and LICW compared

The two schools teach the same contact, and the sessions map onto the LICW parts almost exactly:

Where they differ is in the closing sequence:

• Session 13 sends 73 <SK> [your callsign] DE K6RB E E — the ARRL placement. LICW’s P4 ends (their call) DE (your call) TU SK, the IARU placement.^[7] This is the disagreement of §4 showing up as a concrete difference between two teaching programmes.

CW Academy’s overs sit between LICW’s two columns: shorter than Standard — no greeting, no TNX FER CALL in session 11 — but keeping the full THEIR CALL DE MY CALL identification that LICW’s Quick column drops in favour of BK.

6.3 FISTS

FISTS publishes a beginner’s operating manual with a fully explained worked contact.^[1] Its distinctive features are the AR … KN arrangement noted in §4, the club number as part of the exchange, and it mentions a key rule: do not send MY QTH IS. The manual says it twice — “don’t send ‘MY QTH IS’ because that would be redundant…sort of like saying ‘MY MY LOCATION IS IS’”, and “QTH PA is sufficient, not MY QTH IS”.^[1] QTH is a Q-code that already means “my location is”. (MY NAME IS is fine: NAME is not a Q-code, and the IARU’s own worked QSO sends MY NAME BOB BOB.)

FISTS also has an explicitly slower, more forgiving house style: the manual’s closing word on speed is “Accuracy transcends speed. Most operators would rather copy slower accurate code with proper spacing than code sent fast with uneven spacing and lots of mistakes.”^[1]

6.4 POTA

Parks on the Air has no mandated exchange — the official CW guide^[12] describes practice rather than prescribing it — but it is highly formulaic in the field. The community field manual gives three named variants:^[13]

Standard

Terse — for a pileup

Redundant — for weak signals or QSB

The three differ only in how much is repeated and how much courtesy survives: the same five overs, the same information, sent once, four times, or somewhere between.^[13] That is the repetition axis of §7 isolated about as cleanly as a real operating practice ever isolates anything.

The LICW teaches the same contact from a one-page quick sheet, which is worth setting beside the field manual because the two differ in one place:^[14]

The difference is the activator’s own state: the field manual’s standard variant sends it (UR 559 559 RI RI)^[13] and the quick sheet does not, giving only the report. Both close the same way, by naming the hunter’s state — which is the Parks on the Air CW Guide’s point about activators using the QTH code instead of a callsign. The quick sheet also shows the dits going both ways, and confirms the park number from a second source: “The operator at the park typically does not send the park number.”^[14]

Several POTA-specific conventions are well documented and easy to get wrong:

• The park reference is normally not sent. The hunter already has it from the spot on pota.app; QRPer puts on-air sending at “97%+ do not unless asked”.^[15] This is a real difference from SOTA.
• The QTH is the two-letter state or province code, and activators routinely use it almost as a form of address — TU CA 73 e e.^[12]
• Realistic reports are asked for: the CW guide explicitly requests “a realistic RST signal report, not a perfunctory 559 or 599”.^[12]
• Hunters send their call once.^[13]
• The handover is usually BK in the field manual’s examples^[13], though the official guide allows any of BK, K or KN.^[12] Full DE-sandwiched identification largely disappears either way.

6.5 SOTA

Summits on the Air publishes no exchange script. What it publishes is a validity rule, quoted here from the General Rules:

“In order for the activation to qualify for the points attributed to that Summit, a minimum of four QSOs must be made, each of which must be with a different station. QSOs must comprise an exchange of callsigns and signal reports, it is strongly recommended that the summit identifier be given during each contact.” SOTA General Rules, as quoted on the SOTA Reflector^[16]

Callsigns and reports; the summit reference recommended, not required. Everything above that is up to the operator, and the Reflector shows how widely they differ. Four activators, four exchanges:

W7MDN

Activator / chaser, as in every exchange below.

— W7MDN, opening the thread with the question the rest of this section answers: “Is sending their call DE my call an extra unneeded step? What is the preferred operating practice…?”^[16] (“XXXX” stands for the summit reference.)

G8CPZ

AA6XA

N7DA

— G8CPZ from the Reflector^[16]; AA6XA and N7DA from SoCalSOTA^[17].

They agree on the shape: the chaser’s callsign once, the report immediately, hand back at once. No QTH, no rig, no age; the second layer of §1 never appears. Beyond that almost everything varies. Three of the four send the report twice (429 429, 5NN 5NN, 44N being the exception); two cut the numbers and two do not; the handover is BK, KN or K depending on who you ask; G8CPZ exchanges names where the others do not; and N7DA does not close at all, rolling straight into TU QRZ SOTA N7DA for the next caller.

The summit reference is the clearest case of “recommended” meaning “not usually”. Three activators say so independently:

“Regarding the recommendation to give one’s SOTA reference on every QSO, I never do this. Whilst handling back-to-back QSOs during a CW pile-up…” G8CPZ^[16]

“I only send the reference if chaser requests it.” N1EU^[16]

“Note that the summit reference isn’t mandatory. I’ll put it out there early on at least, but definitely not every QSO.” N7DA^[17]

That is a lower bar than POTA’s conventions and a much lower one than any of the club protocols — which is why SOTA exchanges are the tersest here after the contest formats. Activators are on a summit, on battery, and often working a queue. The upside for a learner is the one AI6XG names: “Activation does not require high speed copy, chasers are very patient and understanding, and the exchange is very simple so it does not require a lot of CW experience.”^[18]

One SOTA-flavoured detail worth knowing: 72 is sometimes sent in place of 73, as W7MDN does above. It is the QRP sign-off — less power, so one less than 73 — and G3RJV dated it to the late 1980s. It is not the norm, though: even the QRP operator who wrote the reference concedes it “isn’t as commonly used to convey ‘Best Regards’ as the more standard 73. Not by a long shot.”^[19]

6.6 The K1USN SST

The Slow Speed Test is a contest that exists to be a beginner’s first contest, and it is the one exchange here that a club teaches as a starting point rather than as a specialism: the LICW puts it in Beginners Carousel 3 alongside the club’s own protocol (§6.1).^[11]

The exchange itself is one line:

“Each station sends a first name and state, province, or DX country.” K1USN^[20]

And the club is explicit that the usual contest economy does not apply here:

“Unlike the higher speed contests, where QSO rate is king and a CQing/‘running’ station expects only the required exchange and typically acknowledges a contact with simply ‘dit’ or ‘R,’ the SST will encourage including brief friendly greetings to the other station.” K1USN^[20]

The LICW publishes a one-page quick sheet for it, which gives the pattern from both sides.^[21] Its worked example, between Pi K1RV in Massachusetts (running) and Stuart AK4EX in Tennessee (hunting):

Runner calls; hunter answers.

Four things in that are worth copying deliberately, because they are what make the SST gentle:

• Names, not numbers. No serial, no zone, no member number — a first name and a state. Nothing to write down that you cannot also say.
• The greeting is the hunter’s. The runner answers with call, name and state; the hunter opens with GM, GA or GE, and then names the runner before giving their own details — GM PI STUART TN.^[21]
• The runner signs off by name. GL STUART TU K1RV SST — good luck, thanks, and the callsign again so the next caller knows who is running.
• Callsigns are sent once. Even at 20 wpm, and even in a contest that is trying to be kind, the doubling of §2 does not appear.

It is the shortest thing on this page that still feels like a conversation, which is presumably the point!

6.7 Contest exchanges

Contest exchanges are the shortest and most rigid formats, and unlike everything above they are genuinely specified — by each contest’s rules.^[22]

SKCC

The Straight Key Century Club is the odd one out here: it is a club whose exchange happens to be used in contests, and it has two forms. The LICW’s protocol sheet for it, prepared by W6JIM, opens by saying what the standard form is:^[23]

“This is simply Standard QSO Protocol with the addition of your SKCC Number.” LICW, SKCC QSO Protocol^[23]

So the callsign exchange stays, the important items are still doubled, and the club number is one more line in the middle: CQ SKCC CQ SKCC DE KF6FCV KF6FCV K, then GE ES TNX FER CALL · UR RST 599 5NN · QTH CA, CA · OP BOB BOB · SKCC 15169T NR 15169T · OK HW? and the calls again. Three habits of the club show in that:^[23]

• OP rather than NAME — “either is fine”, but OP is what you will hear.
• The QTH is usually just the state abbreviation, as in the sprints, and commonly in standard contacts too.
• The number carries an award letter — C, T or S for Centurion, Tribune or Senator, appended to the number^[20] — so 15169T, not 15169.

The second form is the sprint, used during the Weekend Sprintathon and the like, and is different again: BK replaces the callsign exchange entirely, the endings shorten to RR TU 73 DIT-DIT, and there is a signalling convention worth knowing — “when the ‘DITS’ are sent up-front, it is a signal to keep your good-bye short”.^[23]

One detail in both quick sheets is that the RST report appears twice but in two different forms — UR RST 599 5NN, UR 559 55N — once plain and once cut, which could be helpful to the receiver who might miss one but copy the other. It does not seem to be mandated in the club’s rules though.

SKCC contacts are made with a manual key (straight, sideswiper or bug), though some special exemptions may be granted.^[26]

DX and pileups

At the extreme short end, a DX contact is effectively (your call) 5NN TU and nothing else. The IARU manual covers answering a CQ and tail-ending in §II.9.11–II.9.13.^[6]

7. What actually varies

Reading the sources together, the differences between these formats are not arbitrary: they resolve into a small number of independent axes. Naming them is useful, because it turns “learn six formats” into “learn six settings of the same thing”.

8. Conventions used by the QSO Trainer

The QSO Trainer generates contacts in ten named formats. Each one is a setting of the axes in §7, and the table below is the tool’s actual configuration — every one of these can be overridden individually if you want to hear, say, a POTA exchange with IARU closing codes.

Three of those settings are worth explaining, because they are judgements rather than transcriptions:

• CW Academy hands over with <BK>, the LICW quick column with BK. Each follows its own house style: the syllabus that presents the prosign for practice (§3.1)^[8] against the club that says there is a space between the B and the K^[7]. Where CW Academy closes the contact it puts <SK> before the final identification, as its session 13 scripts do, while the LICW and ragchew formats put it after the callsigns. Neither placement is “correct” (§4) — the point is that the format you select determines which one you hear.
• Both POTA and SOTA double the report. POTA’s standard variant sends the report and the state twice^[13], and three of the four SOTA activators in §6.5 send the report twice as well: 429 429^[16], 5NN 5NN^[17], and W7MDN’s 449 44N^[16], which sends it plain and then cut.
• Neither sends a park or summit reference. For POTA that follows the 97%-do-not finding^[15]; for SOTA it follows the reference being recommended rather than required, and not sent in every contact (§6.5)^[17]. A summit reference is worth adding as an option later — it is genuinely part of some SOTA contacts — but sending one every time would be less accurate than sending none.

References

Every source below was fetched on 19 August 2026.

1. FISTS CW Club, A Basic CW Operating Manual (PDF). See also FISTS operating activities.
2. KK6M, Sample CW Rag Chew QSO Template for the Beginner, v10 (PDF), hosted by Morse Code Ninja.
3. CWops, CW Academy Advisor’s Manual (PDF).
4. Electronics Notes, HF Ham Radio Contact: QSO Format and CW QSO Formats.
5. G3PNH, A Beginners Guide to CW QSO Procedures (PDF); see also the LIDS CW QSO template.
6. John Devoldere ON4UN and Mark Demeuleneere ON4WW, Ethics and Operating Procedures for the Radio Amateur, v3 2010, amended 2021 (PDF); chapter II.9 covers CW. An ARRL-corrected edition is also published. The quotations here were checked against that edition, whose §II.9 text and section numbering match.
7. Long Island CW Club (W6JIM), LICW CW QSO Protocol (PDF).
8. CWops, CW Academy Beginner curriculum, v4.8 (released 28 September 2025); the <BK> note is in session 10. See also CW Academy options.
9. ARRL, Quick Reference Operating Aids.
10. Long Island CW Club, Developing the LICW QSO Protocol Sequence.
11. Long Island CW Club, Student & Instructor Guide, v7.91 (PDF).
12. Parks on the Air, CW Guide (source); see also the Activator Guide and Hunter Guide.
13. CW POTA · A Field Manual.
14. Long Island CW Club, POTA — Quick Sheet (PDF) (Rev 2a, January 2025, by AK4EX).
15. QRPer, How to send a standard POTA CW exchange. See also KB6NU, A POTA procedural proposal.
16. SOTA Reflector. The W7MDN and G8CPZ exchanges, and G8CPZ’s and N1EU’s remarks on the summit reference, are from SOTA CW shorthand / shortcuts and Please exchange and confirm information for QSO credit; the General Rules passage is quoted in Definition of a valid SOTA QSO. See also SOTA CW for beginners.
17. SoCalSOTA, Optimal SOTA CW exchange? — the exchanges in §6.5 are those posted in that thread by AA6XA, KX6A and N7DA, and the summit-reference and rules quotations are N7DA’s.
18. SOTA, Introduction to Activating; AI6XG, How to do a SOTA activation; EA2CW, Tips for a successful SOTA CW activation.
19. QRPer, Why I send “72” instead of “73”; the convention dates from the late 1980s and is associated with the G-QRP club.
20. Contest rules for the three exchanges the trainer generates: K1USN SST, CWops CWT, SKCC Weekday Sprint. CQ WPX’s “RS(T) report plus a progressive contact serial number” is from its own rules.
21. Long Island CW Club, K1USN SST — Quick Sheet (PDF) (Rev 4, January 2025, by AK4EX).
22. WA7BNM Contest Calendar and N1MM+ supported contests, which document the exchange for each event.
23. Long Island CW Club (W6JIM), SKCC QSO Protocol (PDF), and SKCC WES — Quick Sheets (PDF) (Rev 2, January 2025, by AK4EX).
24. CWops, QTX / MQTX program — awards for conversational QSOs of 20 minutes or more.
25. ITU, Radio Regulations, Article 19 §III — Formation of call signs (PDF), and the Table of International Call Sign Series (Appendix 42). Nos. 19.68 and 19.69 govern callsign structure — including the exemption that lets amateur callsigns use the digits 0 and 1.
26. Straight Key Century Club, SKCC Key Policy. The three accepted key types are also stated in the Weekday Sprint rules: “all participants must use a manual key (straight key, sideswiper, or bug) unless granted an exception using the SKCC Key Policy”.

Callsign structure is treated only in passing here; the trainer’s callsign generator follows ITU Article 19^[25].

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