Your Locations

Location

A location is a place you operate from. You describe it once and pick it when you log a contact, whether that is at home, portable, or activating a park.

Every contact you log copies the location's values onto itself and freezes them. That is what makes your log worth keeping years later: a contact carries where you were when you made it, rather than where you happen to live now. Editing or hiding a location afterwards never alters a contact already logged.

The location is also where your grid square comes from, and the grid square is what sets the distance and bearing on every contact you work.

Your first location is created during the guided setup, filled in from your callsign where QSL Shack can find it. Every location after that is added at Account Settings, then Locations.

How To Add A Location

1. Go to Account Settings, then Locations.
2. Press Add a Location.
3. Enter a Name. It is only what you will see in the list, so use something you will recognize: Home, Field Day site, The boat.
4. Fill in where it is. The fastest way is the lookup described in the next section.
5. Check the Grid Square. It is not required, but it is strongly worth setting, because it is what sets the coordinates, distance and bearing on every contact from here.
6. Fill in the station and any award references if they apply. Both are optional and both have their own sections below.
7. Press Save.

How To Find A Place Without Typing It

The Find this place box fills in the city, state, county and grid square for you.

1. Type a town, a park or a landmark, and press Look up.
2. Or press Use my current location and let the browser supply the position.

You are never asked for a street address and none is stored. What is kept is the town, the county, the grid square and the position.

How To Record The Station At A Location

Under The station here, enter the Rig, the Antenna and the Power in watts. All three are optional.

They are worth filling in for a portable location, because a portable station is usually a different radio and a different antenna from the one at home, and keeping them on the location means you are not re-keying them on every contact.

How To Add A Park, Summit Or Island Reference

Under Award references, enter the POTA, SOTA, WWFF or IOTA reference for the place.

If the place has one, that reference travels onto every contact you log from here, so a park activation carries its reference without you typing it on each QSO.

How To Log From A Ship Or Aircraft

A vessel that is moving is not in a fixed location, so it is described differently.

1. Tick This is a ship or aircraft.
2. Choose Moored or grounded if it has an address, and fill the place in as usual.
3. Choose Under way to record a position instead.
4. Enter your Latitude and Longitude in decimal degrees, with south and west negative, or press Use my current position.
5. Press Set grid from these to turn the position into a grid square.
6. Press Save.

Under way, QSL Shack does not log a country, a DXCC entity or the CQ and ITU zones, because a moving vessel is not in any of them. Your position sets the grid square, and the grid square is what is stored and what appears on a certificate.

How To Use A Location As A Logbook's Default

A logbook can be given a station location, and contacts logged in that book use it unless you pick another one. That saves choosing the same place on every contact. Set it when you create the logbook, or afterwards from Creating And Managing Logbooks.

A logbook's location is a pointer rather than a copy. Correcting the place corrects what the next contact from that book receives, and never a contact already logged.

How To Hide Or Delete A Location

1. Go to Account Settings, then Locations.
2. Press Hide on a place you no longer use, or Delete to remove it.

Hide is the safe choice, and it is usually the right one. A hidden location comes off the dropdowns without disturbing the contacts that reference it, and the contacts keep their history. Hidden places are brought back with Un-hide, and the list shows them when you tick Show hidden locations.

A hidden location that a logbook still uses continues to name itself on that logbook, so a blank is never mistaken for a place you never set.

What To Watch For

Check a location that was filled in from your callsign rather than accepting it. A license record shows a mailing address, which is not always where the antenna is.

The country, DXCC entity, CQ zone, ITU zone and coordinates are worked out from your grid square and your callsign. You do not enter them, and they update when you change the grid square.

Add a location for each place you operate from rather than editing one back and forth. Editing is fine for a correction, but a second place is a second location, and that is what keeps your log honest about where you were.