Guided Setup

Guided Setup

Guided setup is what runs the first time you sign in. It is two steps, and both are filled in from what QSL Shack already knows about you, so in most cases you are checking answers rather than supplying them.

Its job is to get you to the point where you can log a contact. Everything it creates can be changed afterwards, and you can add as many callsigns, locations and logbooks as you need later.

The progress bar at the top of each screen shows which step you are on.

How To Complete Step One, Where You Operate From

1. Read the location QSL Shack proposes. If your callsign gave up an address, the town, state and grid square are already filled in.
2. Check it rather than accepting it. A license record shows a mailing address, and that is not always where the antenna is.
3. If nothing was found, enter the place yourself. The fastest way is Find this place, which fills the city, state, county and grid square from a town, a park or a landmark.
4. Open The station here if you want to record the rig, the antenna and the power at this location. Optional.
5. Open Award references if this place is a park, a summit or an island. Optional, and the reference then travels onto every contact you log from here.
6. Press Accept if you are taking what was proposed, or Save and continue if you entered it yourself.

Every contact you log copies this location onto itself, so it is worth the minute it takes. Full detail is on Your Locations.

How To Complete Step Two, Your First Logbook

1. Give the logbook a name. It is only a label, so use something you will recognize. You can change it later.
2. Check the callsign. Only callsigns without a logbook are offered, and the choice is permanent for that book.
3. Choose the station location. The place you just created is already there.
4. Press Create logbook.

You create this logbook. QSL Shack never creates one for you, which is why a callsign you add later has no logbook until you make one. Full detail is on Creating And Managing Logbooks.

What The Last Screen Shows

The completion screen shows your details for review and the QSL card QSL Shack has already built for you, and offers four places to go: your feed, your logbook, finding operators, and linking QRZ and LoTW.

You do not have to design a QSL card to finish. The default card exists so you can start exchanging cards immediately. The card designer is deliberately not part of guided setup, and you can change your card whenever you like.

How To Add More Later

Everything guided setup created is managed in Account Settings afterwards.

Callsigns are added under Your Callsigns. Locations are added under Your Locations, and most operators end up with several: home, portable, and each park or summit they activate. Logbooks are added under Creating And Managing Logbooks.

What To Watch For

Guided setup only runs for an operator. An account registered without a callsign has no location or logbook step, because a logbook belongs to a callsign. Add a callsign whenever you are ready and nothing has to be redone.

A skipped location has to be filled in before a logbook can be created, because a logbook needs a station location to hand to the next contact. The logbook step offers a way back if you arrive there with no location saved.