Commander Online Help Contents
Using Commander, you can change your transceiver's frequency via
actions in the Bandspread window
If you have configured Commander to support automatic switching between multiple transceivers, then the above actions may trigger a switch from one transceiver to another when a new amateur band frequency is specified.
If you have configured one or more frequency-dependent device, the settings for these devices will be continuously updated as a function of frequency. The panels displaying these settings reside on the left side of Commander's Main window, along with the secondary VFO, Filter, , and PTT panels. This part of the Main window is shared with the Memory Bank panel. If the Memory Bank panel is visible, click the Filters & Devices button and the device panels will appear.
The primary VFO panel on Commander's Main window displays the frequency last reported by your radio in blue font, unless a transverter is active; if you have configured Commander to support one or more transverters on the 6m, 4m, 2m, or 70cm bands, your transceiver will automatically be set to drive the transverter to the frequency specified by Commander's VFO. The primary VFO panel's caption indicates whether the radio is displaying VFO A, VFO B, the Main VFO, or the Sub VFO. For most Elecraft, Kenwood, TenTec, and Yaesu radios, this VFO identification will always be accurate; for Icom and TenTec Omni radios, however, the VFO identification will only be correct if VFO selection is accomplished via the controls on Commander's Main window, rather than via controls on the radio's front panel. You can define up to two sub-bands per band; when the primary VFO frequency does not lie within a defined sub-band, the frequency is displayed in yellow font.
Commander also displays a secondary VFO panel whose caption indicates whether its contents are those of VFO A, VFO B, the Main VFO, or the Sub VFO; the panel's caption and its contents will only be valid for Icom and TenTec Omni radios if VFO selection and modification is accomplished via Commander, rather than via the radio's front panel. If the secondary VFO panel is not visible, click the Filters & Devices button as described above.
Modifying the frequency display contents and striking the Enter key will radio's primary VFO to the specified frequency
The ▲ and ▼ buttons to the
left of the frequency display will shift your radio up or down one band; if
the Ham Bands box is checked, these buttons sequence among the ham
bands from 160m to 2m, otherwise these buttons shift up or down 1 MHz. If
you click and hold these buttons, they will autorepeat at a rate governed by
the VFO Autorepeat
Rate slider.
The ▲ and ▼ buttons to the right of the frequency display will increase or decrease your radio's frequency as shown in the following table:
Control Keys | Change |
10 Hz. | |
Shift | 100 Hz. |
Ctrl | 1 KHz. |
Alt | 10 KHz. |
Ctrl + Alt | 100 KHz. |
If you click and hold these buttons, they will autorepeat at a rate governed by the VFO Autorepeat Rate slider.
Control Keys | Change |
1 KHz. | |
Shift | 5 KHz. |
Ctrl | 10 KHz. |
Alt | 50 KHz. |
Ctrl + Alt | 100 KHz. |
If you click and hold these buttons, they will autorepeat at a rate governed by the VFO Autorepeat Rate slider.
Depending upon your radio's capabilities, one or more of the following buttons and checkboxes may appear in the VFO panel:
A | selects VFO A |
B | selects VFO B |
A = B | sets VFO B to VFO A's frequency |
A X B | simultaneously sets VFO A to VFO B's frequency and VFO B to VFO A's frequency |
Main | selects the Main VFO |
Sub | selects the Sub-receiver VFO |
M = S | sets the Main VFO to the Sub-receiver VFO's frequency |
M X S | simultaneously sets the Main VFO to the Sub-receiver VFO's frequency and the Sub-receiver VFO to the Main VFO's frequency |
XFC | momentarily exchanges the A and B (or Main and Sub-receiver) VFOs |
Split box | selects
split frequency operation
|
Dual receive box | selects
dual receive or dual watch operation
|
The transceiver command buffer overflow message indicates that one or more directives from Commander to your radio have been discarded. This occurs when large frequency changes are attempted by holding down auto-repeating keys or buttons, exceeding the radio's ability to keep up. Recovery in this situation is automatic -- simply click the ok button, wait for your radio to catch up, and continue.
Modifying the frequency
display contents and striking the Enter key will radio's secondary
VFO to the specified frequency.
If you have a wheeled mouse, you can QSY your transceiver by rotating the mouse's wheel whenever Commander's Main window is active; to activate the Main window, simply click somewhere within its borders.
When you first rotate the wheel after starting Commander, a cyan-colored horizontal bar will appear over the right-most digit in the primary VFO panel's frequency display; this indicates the rotating the mouse wheel will adjust the transceiver frequency in units of 10 Hz. Clicking the mouse on any other digit position in the VFO panel's frequency will shift the cyan horizontal bar to that digit position, indicating that subsequent mouse wheel rotation will adjust the transceiver frequency in the units of that digit position.
Note: if the minimum adjustment you can achieve by rotating the mouse wheel is larger than one unit, check to see if you are running the most recent driver for your wheeled mouse.
After clicking on the primary VFO's frequency display or the Bandspread window, you can increase or decrease your radio's frequency by striking the PageUp or PageDown keys respectively:
Control Keys | Change |
10 Hz. | |
Shift | 100 Hz. |
Ctrl | 1 KHz. |
Alt | 10 KHz. |
Ctrl + Alt | 100 KHz. |
After clicking on the VFO panel's frequency display, you can select its contents by striking the Insert or CTRL-A key; any digits subsequently entered will replace the frequency display's contents; strike the Enter key to change your radio's frequency to that shown in the VFO.
Clicking the Main window's Bandspread button displays Commander's Bandspread window, which provides a vertical slide rule dial showing range of frequencies around your radio's current frequency, and a Band panel containing an array of buttons corresponding to the 160m through 2m amateur bands. You can resize the Bandspread window both vertically and horizontally.
The Range panel determines the range of frequencies depicted on the slide rule dial. You can vary this range from 1 kHz to 100 kHz in six steps; your radio's current frequency will always appear centered in the dial.
Clicking on the dial will QSY your radio to the associated frequency. Double-clicking the dial will QSY your radio to the associated frequency and then reduce the range by one step, unless the range is already 1 kHz. Allowing the mouse cursor to hover over the dial will produce a small popup showing the associated frequency to which your radio would be QSY'd if you were to click or double-click.
You can also QSY via the PageUp nad PageDown keys.
Commander remembers the last 5 frequencies you visited on each band, and the mode in use for each such visit; this information is stored in a Band Stack associated with each band. If you QSY the radio, and then let it remain on a frequency for longer than the dwell time setting, the new frequency and mode will be saved on the appropriate Band Stack. The Bandspread window's Band panel contains a button for each band between 160m and 2m. Clicking a band button sets the radio's frequency to the most recent frequency used on that band, and sets its mode to the mode in use at that time; the Band Stack is then advanced, so that clicking the same band button a second time sets the frequency/mode to the next-most-recent frequency/mode used on that band. Using this mechanism, you can QSY to the most recent 5 frequencies.
The memory used to provide the slide rule dial and Band
Stack are freed when the Bandspread window is closed.
If SpotCollector (version 2.7.4 or later) is running and Commander's Bandspread window is open, then SpotCollector will automatically send to Commander spots of DX stations operating on the transceiver's current band that meet SpotCollector's current filter criteria (with the exception that wildcard characters in the Call and DXCC filters are not handled). Commander displays each DX spot on the Bandspread window's slide rule dial unless its age exceeds the specified lifetime. The size of the font used to display DX spots can be specified as a function of the slide rule dial range, making it possible to use larger font sizes with smaller ranges. DX Spots that are close together in frequency are separated horizontally to form a list of up to 8 spots; for busy frequencies and a long lifetime, it may be necessary to expand the Bandspread window horizontally to see all of the spots; alternatively, zooming in to a smaller dial range may separate the spots, or a smaller spot font size can be specified.
allowing the mouse cursor to hover over a DX spot displays a small popup window showing the spot's callsign, transmit frequency, QSX (listening) frequency if operating split, mode, UTC time last spotted, areas from which the station was spotted, and spot notes
clicking on DX will\
if WinWarbler is not running, or if WinWarbler is running but the station's mode is CW, SSB, AM, or FM and Commander has been configured to not route spots in this mode to WinWarbler
if the station is operating simplex
if the station is operating split
if WinWarbler is running
if the station is operating PSK31, PSK63, or RTTY, direct WinWarbler to the specified mode and optimal frequency
if the station is operating CW, SSB, AM, or FM and Commander has been configured to route spots in this mode to WinWarbler, direct WinWarbler to the specified mode and frequency
direct DXKeeper (if running) to
initialize its Capture window with the DX spot's callsign, frequency, mode, and gridsquare (if available)
filter its Log Page Display to show all previous QSOs with the DX spot's callsign or DXCC entity, as specified by the Log Filter setting
if both DXView and DXKeeper are running
direct DXView to perform a lookup of the DX spot callsign
if the CTRL key was depressed while clicking on the DX spot, rotate the antenna to the short path bearing to the spotted station
if the ALT key was depressed while clicking on the DX spot, rotate the antenna to the long path bearing to the spotted station
double-clicking a spotted callsign performs all of the operations described above under single-clicking, and then reduces the slide rule dial range by one step, unless the range is already 1 kHz.
When the radio QSYs from one band to another with the Bandspread window open, Commander clears the DX spots from the slide rule dial, and SpotCollector sends Commander each Spot Database entry on the new band that meet its current filter criteria (subject to the above-mentioned wildcard character limitation). Thus Commander always displays that subset of SpotCollector's filtered Spot Database entries that are operating in the range of frequencies shown on the Bandspread window's slide rule dial
Commander displays a rectangular indicator in the lower-left corner of the Bandspread window. This rectangle's color indicates the maximum degree of need for any DX spot received by SpotCollector but not visible on the Bandspread window's slide rule dial.
allowing the mouse cursor to hover over this indicator displays a small popup window showing the most recent and needed unseen spot's callsign, frequency, mode, and time of arrival
clicking the indicator resets its color to that corresponding with unneeded
double-clicking the indicator sets the radio's frequency and mode to that of the most recent and needed unseen spot
Clicking the SpotCollector button activates SpotCollector's Main window, if SpotCollector is running.
The memory used to maintain and display DX Spots are freed when the Bandspread window is closed.