Using WintelnetX to Combine Skimmer and Cluster Spots(Rev. 1.2, 10/29/08)
Recently, Dave (K1TTT) released version 4.17 of his WintelnetX software, now making itpossible to merge Skimmer and one or more DX cluster spots into a single stream ofdata to send to any logging software. WintelnetX is a little complex at first, though, andas yet there is no Help file, so I decided to write this brief guide to help people set it up
and get it working with CW Skimmer.
First, download WintelnetX from http://www.k1ttt.net/software.html#wintelnetx . Expand
the zipfile into a new folder (typically, program Files\WintelnetX). Now start the program.
This is what you will see:Now click File and choose Open:If you’re not already there, navigate to the WintelnetX folder and you’ll see this. Selectthe file titled “Skimmer plus 2 nodes to logger.ini” and click Open.

First restore the minimized window at the lower left. Now click on Window and chooseTile. That will produce this:Note that the upper left window is titled Main. This is your operator’s console, whichkeeps you up to date on what the program is doing. The window immediately to its rightis the RXTEL window, which will send the combined data stream to your logger.
The window immediately below the console is titled “Node”. That is the first Telnet
cluster connection. Let’s find out some more about it. Right above the console window
is a drop-down box that currently shows “ALL”. Click the down arrow, and you see:Select “node.” Now click “Setup” in the main menu and select Edit Port! You will see:This same dialog appears whenever you edit a port. The only thing you need to beconcerned with here is the name, it’ll help if it is something a little more distinctive. In
this case, I changed it to LPL and OK’d out. That takes you to another dialog for setting
up an automatic log-in.

This one is really easy. Just type the last little bit of text that the cluster sends whenasking you to log in, in the Prompt column. For most clusters, that is simply “callsign:” –omit the quotation marks but don’t forget the colon. I also suggest you check the Enable
automatic reconnect option, just to make things easier, and set it to 120 or 180 seconds.
Here’s how one of the script windows looks with these things done:If you need to get back to any of the script windows, you can do it by selecting the port in
the edit window, and then clicking on “Setup” and selecting “Edit Script!” When it’s as
you want it, OK out, and you’ll be back at the main window.
Note that the edit window is now empty. That’s because the port “node” has beenrenamed. You’ll need to click the drop-down arrow again and select either LPL oranother specific port.
So now select the “TEL” port and go through the Setup|Edit Port! Process again. Thistime you see:This is the port that connects to CW Skimmer, and a couple of things need to bechanged here. Dave’s example points to one of the computers on his multi-multinetwork. Assuming you are a single op with one computer running Skimmer, WintelnetX
and your logging program, change the Host Name or IP to 127.0.0.1. By default,Skimmer puts out spots on port 7300, so unless you have changed that, leave thisalone – in any case, they must match.
I would also change the port name to SKIM – easier to remember. When you set up thescript for Skimmer, remember that its prompt is “callsign:”, not “call:”.
This is how the main screen looks now:

Let’s see if anything needs fixing on TTT.

No, that should work fine. Instead of the IP address, this one uses the Host Name. Setup the logon script just as you did for LPL.
OK out, get back to the main screen, and – believe it or not – you’re ready to connect tothe various data sources. Before you do that, though, there are a couple of things inSkimmer that you need to check. So start Skimmer and click on the Settings button (orselect “Settings” from the View menu. You’ll see this dialog:

Now click on the Telnet tab, and you’ll see:

Make sure that “Enable Telnet Server” is checked, that the port matches the one you
designated in the SKIM window in WintelnetX, and that “Do not send callsigns withoutCQ.” This last one is very important, because you don’t want Skimmer to spot S&Pers
that won’t be there if you go looking for them.
Now go back to WintelnetX and select ALL from the dropdown list. To its right you see
two buttons. The one to the left is to connect to all the nodes at once. The one on theright (with the big black X) is to disconnect. Now click the “Connect” button.

Wow, just like downtown! In each of the telnet windows you can see the prompt fromthe node (or in the case of Skimmer, from the program). If you have set up the logon
prompts, each cluster and Skimmer will be automatically logged on. If not, quickly typeyour call in the bottom line of each node window, just like you would with your telnet
client in response to the prompt if you were connecting directly.
Suppose you’re not quick enough and a node disconnects you. Simply select thatnode’s name, click “Disconnect” and then “Connect” again.

That’s what I am doing on the screen above. You can see that both Skimmer andW3LPL began sending spots immediately.
I really do recommend the scripts, though – it’s just too easy. If you set them up as I‘ve
explained, when you click on the “Connect” button you’ll see all the ports go throughtheir logon processes automatically, and it’ll look like this:Now open the RXTEL port for editing:Nothing to edit here, unless you want to change the name. It is all set up for a logging
program or other telnet client on the same machine as WintelnetX. Just OK out.
Now comes what you’ve been waiting for. Start your logger and point it to 127.0.0.1,
port 23. Different logging programs have different syntax for this – for example, N1MM
Logger uses “127.0.0.1:7300”, while DX4WIN uses “localhost:7300” and the Windows
Telnet client uses “127.0.0.1 7300”.
The merged stream of spots will immediately start to flow, like this:The KF5W and JA6 spots came from one of the cluster nodes, while that for W9NGA
came from Skimmer.
To understand what’s going on, go back to WintelnetX and select “Routes” under theSetup menu item.

This is really pretty self-explanatory. The SKIM, LPL and TTT ports are set up to senddata to RXTEL. RXTEL can also send data to TTT. What that means, for example, isthat you can type any standard DX cluster command in your logging program’s telnet
window, and that command will be passed to the TTT node. It will not be passed either
to Skimmer or to LPL.
You can change this to meet your needs. For example, if you also wanted to pass thosecommands to W3LPL, you would just enter the from and to nodes (RXTEL and LPL, inthis example, click on Add Routes, and voila!

So this will get you started with WintelnetX, Skimmer, and telnet DX clusters. If you
want to automate logging onto the various nodes, the script windows we saw earlier are
pretty self-explanatory.
Please let me know how this guide works for you, and what I can do to improve the nextversion.