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The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

bbc.com

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Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#51

Post by [deleted] »

yayachiken wrote: post #9
don-code wrote: post #2

Morse code has some interesting properties that make it an ideal way to communicate when all else fails: 1. It can be transmitted by simple means through many mediums - radio waves (amateur radio, as in the article), light (turning a light on and off), sound (I once used a boat horn to communicate with another boat)... technically I could even tap it on someone's shoulder. 2. It's self-clocking; you don't need a way…

HAM was a nice rabbit hole to fall into, but unfortunately I couldn't muster enough interest to actually get good enough to go "on air". Some other things that surprised me and may be interesting for other people: Learning Morse code is like learning a new language. The unit of understanding is not dots and dashes but rather every letter is a unit that one (in modern training) learns to recognize intuitively as such…

[deleted]

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#52

Post by braden-lk »

lioeters wrote: post #6
ryanmcbride wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I respect you not linking the website to farm clicks. That said, drop the website link please.

Found it: https://morse.halb.it/ Source: https://github.com/robalb/morsechat

this is difficult! :D

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#53

Post by cenamus »

ThinkingGuy wrote: post #44
don-code wrote: post #2

Morse code has some interesting properties that make it an ideal way to communicate when all else fails: 1. It can be transmitted by simple means through many mediums - radio waves (amateur radio, as in the article), light (turning a light on and off), sound (I once used a boat horn to communicate with another boat)... technically I could even tap it on someone's shoulder. 2. It's self-clocking; you don't need a way…

I've told my family that if I'm ever in a hospital bed due and seemingly unresponsive due to injury or illness, to check whether I'm not trying to communicate (using eye movements, finger twitches, or whatever) in morse code.

Related https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Diving_Bell_and_the_Butter...

Wrote a memoir by blinking at the right time going through the alphabet ordered by frequency

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#54

Post by _whiteCaps_ »

hinkley wrote: post #39

I have never gotten the knack for decoding Morse. I'm so good with music I would have thought some of that would transfer over. It absolutely does not. Zero natural aptitude for the task.

lcwo.net is a great resource for this... however the best way is to get on the air talking to people.

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#55

Post by kqr »

flockonus wrote: post #49
ventana wrote: post #32

I never practiced Morse code, but I read enough about it to quickly realize that the nice sound a friend's cool new Nokia phone made on incoming SMS messages is actually ... -- ..., literally "SMS". The year was 2002 or so. I'm still amazed that someone in Nokia really thought about it back then.

Cool! I also remember from decades ago a friend in high school taught me "SOS" and still stuck with me: 3 short, 3 long 3 short, i suppose ... - - - ...

Fun fact: this procedure word is meant to be sent as a single symbol with no inter-letter spacing.

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#56

Post by greatartiste »

If you ever want to see how many radio amateurs are out there in the field doing activations (summits on the air , parks on the air even bunkers on the air) in your part of the world then this website is excellent ..

https://fieldspotter.radio/

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#57

Post by [deleted] »

isoprophlex wrote: post #47

Ha! What a timely article. Wanting to recapture the magic of the early internet ive been getting into ham radio; i got a low-powered but portable radio & built my own software for SSTV (images) and FT8 (long range pings without much meaningful content beyond "i am here, who reads me). Just today I decided that Morse is the next frontier for me. Tried building a morse decoder in software and it turns out to be surpris…

[deleted]

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#58

Post by numinos1 »

zikduruqe wrote: post #14
yayachiken wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HAM was a nice rabbit hole to fall into, but unfortunately I couldn't muster enough interest to actually get good enough to go "on air". Some other things that surprised me and may be interesting for other people: Learning Morse code is like learning a new language. The unit of understanding is not dots and dashes but rather every letter is a unit that one (in modern training) learns to recognize intuitively as such…

> Learning Morse code is like learning a new language. It is not. Cat is still spelled cat. I passed my 20 wpm morse code license 30+ years ago, and when I hear code to this day, it sounds just as natural as someone spelling cat as "See Aye Tee".

I just spent the past five years learning Morse code, and for me it was significantly more difficult than learning a foreign language. Perhaps I'm just getting old and my brain isn't as pliable as it used to be, but it's been a very long and difficult journey. Here is what I've learned:

- You can memorize the letters and decode up to around 20 WPM. But this is using the low-bandwidth, logical part of the brain which simply isn't capable of decoding much beyond 20 WPM.

- To go beyond 20WPM you have to hand-off the processing to the subconscious mind. This is the phase that's equivalent to learning a new language. It requires a tremendous amount of repetition to build the mental muscle memory to hear the letters as a single sound instead of a series of beeps. It literally took years of daily practice to get there.

- Once you've mastered the individual letters you eventually start hearing combinations of letters as unique sounds. And at some point, you start to hear entire words, not letters.

- If I attempt to perceive individual letters at higher speeds I almost always end up missing the rest of the word. At these speeds, the conscious, logical brain becomes a liability that must be to be surpressed to decode effectively. As a 30 year software developer, this has been VERY difficult to do.

- When I get into the flow, I don't "think" about the letters or "hear" a series of beeps. The words somehow just magically pop into my mind.

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#59

Post by LandoCalrissian »

Do CW contesting and occasional POTA, lots of fun. Ham radio is a pretty cool hobby that I think many tech inclined people would enjoy. There are tons of digital modes too, and with the symbol rate limit being removed lots of fun to be had.

Re: The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally

#60

Post by wkjagt »

LandoCalrissian wrote: post #59

Do CW contesting and occasional POTA, lots of fun. Ham radio is a pretty cool hobby that I think many tech inclined people would enjoy. There are tons of digital modes too, and with the symbol rate limit being removed lots of fun to be had.

I kinda stopped doing CW (and ham radio altogether with that). I did quite a bit of POTA hunting but it became too repetitive. And I didn't find something that felt like a small enough step up from hunting. Activating parks felt like too big of a step up. I would love to be good enough to ragchew a bit but never found a path towards that skill that felt natural to me.
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