The 'absolute magic' of Morse code that still connects people globally • Hacker News Board

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

#81

Post by wowczarek » Tue, Jul 14, 2026, 8:14 PM UTC

I was recently facing a real issue with audible phone notifications. For those that I do have enabled, I needed to quickly distinguish what just came in, and possibly from whom, because I need to react to some of them immediately, and I may not have my phone on me at all times, but it may be within earshot.

I needed some dozen of short, reasonably unobtrusive but distinct sounds. You know where this is going.

I ended up assigning a set of two-letter codes, first letter = source, second = same letter for generic, others for specific initials, so things like NN = other, EE = email, WW = WhatsApp, TB = text message from Bob.

When generating the Morse WAVs I set it to 40 WPM where longer sequences mostly blur into "outlines", but they are short, so I manage, and I added some 0.3 s padding on both ends to account for things like sound ducking and other hiccups. Works great.

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

#82

Post by AngryData » Tue, Jul 14, 2026, 9:06 PM UTC

ryanmcbride wrote: post #27

dmoy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well for their sake hopefully it's just September and not Eternal September.

I've been hearing "Eternal September" for a few things over the past few days what does that mean? Just annoyance at new users or tourists or what?

The september is the tourist season. Eternal september is when tourist season completely overtakes the previous communities cultures and standards and style permanently, generally through exponential growth that exceeds the old guard's ability to impress the already established culture on newcomers.

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

#83

Post by wolvoleo » Tue, Jul 14, 2026, 10:59 PM UTC

7402 wrote: post #73

wolvoleo wrote: post #62

In ham radio it's still used a lot for shortwave stuff too. It's not really something used for real communication though. Most people I've seen just swap call signs and give a bogus "5 9" signal report. I've never really understood the fun of making long distance connections and then not actually communicating but ok.. The "contest" scene never was for me.

I hear relatively long conversations going on at higher speeds, e.g. 25-30 wpm. I think those short exchanges you mentioned only dominate at times when there's a popular contest going on.

Possible yes. I've only come across HF at field days. That's my only exposure to it.

I don't have the space for HF antennas so I don't have any radios for it either (after all, portable HF isn't really a thing either and I don't own a car in which I could have used the higher HF bands)

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

#84

Post by brady70 » Fri, Jul 17, 2026, 12:58 AM UTC

wowczarek wrote: post #81

I was recently facing a real issue with audible phone notifications. For those that I do have enabled, I needed to quickly distinguish what just came in, and possibly from whom, because I need to react to some of them immediately, and I may not have my phone on me at all times, but it may be within earshot. I needed some dozen of short, reasonably unobtrusive but distinct sounds. You know where this is going. I ended…

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