QRZ Logbook Sync

QRZ Logbook Sync

A QRZ connection keeps a QRZ logbook and a QSL Shack logbook carrying the same contacts. QSL Shack can send your contacts to QRZ, bring QRZ's contacts into your log, or both, and each direction is a switch you control.

One connection joins one QRZ logbook to one QSL Shack logbook. If you hold several callsigns and keep several QRZ logbooks, you add a connection for each.

Connections are managed at Account Settings, then Integrations, then the QRZ tab.

What You Need Before You Start

A QRZ XML Logbook Data subscription or higher. QRZ requires it to open their data stream, and it is a low annual fee from the QRZ store. The screen links it.

The API key for the logbook you want to connect. QRZ issues a separate key for each of your QRZ logbooks. The key is on that logbook's own settings page at QRZ, and you have to be signed in to QRZ to see it. Copy the key belonging to the logbook you intend to connect, not one belonging to a different logbook.

How To Connect A QRZ Logbook

1. Go to Account Settings, then Integrations, then the QRZ tab.
2. Press Add QRZ Connection.
3. Paste the QRZ logbook API key and press Look Up This Logbook. Nothing is saved yet. QSL Shack asks QRZ which logbook the key opens.
4. Read the confirmation screen. It shows the QRZ logbook's name and ID, its owner, how many contacts QRZ holds in it, the range of dates it accepts, and which of your QSL Shack logbooks the contacts will go to.
5. Press Save This Connection.

You do not choose the destination. QSL Shack works it out from the callsign the QRZ logbook belongs to, because you hold at most one logbook per callsign.

The confirmation screen is the safety net for a key copied from the wrong logbook. If the name and owner on it are not the book you meant, cancel rather than saving.

How To Bring Your Existing QRZ Contacts In

Do this before you switch anything on. The order matters and the reason is in the last section of this page.

1. On the connection, press Pull from QRZ. It reads the whole QRZ logbook.
2. Review the preview. It shows what would be added, what is a duplicate and what could not be read.
3. Press Add QSOs to my logbook.

Nothing enters your log until you have approved it. Running it again later is always safe, because anything already in your log is skipped.

How To Keep Contacts Coming In Automatically

Switch on Check this QRZ logbook for new contacts automatically, once your existing QRZ contacts are in.

QSL Shack then asks QRZ every four hours for contacts newer than the last one it brought in, and notifies you when new ones arrive. Because it only asks for newer ones, it will never backfill a book that was already full when you connected it. That is what the Pull button is for.

There is a second switch, Bring this logbook's QRZ contacts in as private. Contacts arriving from QRZ are visible on your public logbook unless you switch this on, and it does not change contacts already in your log.

How To Send Your Contacts To QRZ

By hand. Press Push to QRZ. It sends a batch at a time, so a large backlog needs the switch rather than repeated presses.

Automatically. Switch on Send this logbook's QSOs to QRZ automatically. Contacts waiting to go, including ones already in your log, are sent at about a thousand an hour with nothing more to press.

Anything QRZ refuses is listed with QRZ's reason on your QRZ Exception Report, and on the contact itself.

How To Read The Connection Card

Feeds is the QSL Shack logbook this connection fills.

Accepts QSOs dated is the range that QRZ logbook was set to accept when you connected it. QRZ rejects any contact dated outside its own range, so if contacts are refused and the dates look right to you, check the range on the logbook at QRZ first.

Connection Status reads Active unless there is evidence of trouble, and it reports the last attempt rather than judging how often you sync. An operator who pulls twice a year is not broken.

Last Successful Pull and Last Successful Push read Never until each has happened.

How To Remove A Connection

Press Remove, then confirm.

Removing a connection deletes the QRZ key stored for it. Contacts you have already imported stay in your logbook. To connect again, paste the key from QRZ once more.

What To Watch For

Pull before you push. A member who pushes a full logbook before pulling gets his whole back catalog refused by QRZ as duplicates, and each refusal is recorded against the contact. The buttons are in that order on the screen for this reason.

A changed contact is never overwritten in either direction. If a contact differs between the two logbooks, it is listed on your QRZ Exception Report with both versions, and you decide which is right.

QRZ confirmations are not confirmations here. A contact is confirmed on QSL Shack only when both operators have logged it here. See How QSO Matching And Confirmation Work.