http://online.wsj.com/public/article...206850468.html

This was a front page article.

73 de Jim, N2EY

wrote:
:http://online.wsj.com/public/article...206850468.html
:This was a front page article.
:73 de Jim, N2EY

Thank for the tip. Nice writing.

73 de OH2EF (aka OH5SW), licensed since 1958, now at 63yrs
(Helsinki, Finland)

http://www.helsinki.fi/people/Erkki.Komulainen/

In oups.com
wrote:

http://online.wsj.com/public/article...206850468.html

This was a front page article.

"Like all Morse experts, Mr. Adams rarely breaks signals down into
letters, instead hearing complete words much as readers recognize words
on a page. When he transcribes a message at high speeds, his fingers are
five or 10 words behind his ears."

I've been licensed since 1961, and I've heard and read things like this
ever since.

I operated strictly CW for most of that time and I've never come close
to being able to copy like that.

I can copy by ear at 30-35WPM, but can only transcribe at about 20WPM
because I write down each letter as I hear it; copying behind is an
absolute mystery to me, as is the idea of hearing words instead of
individual letters.

It's probably way too late for me to get over 45 years of bad habits,
but how do people achive this state?

--
Bert Hyman St. Paul, MN

Bert Hyman wrote:
In oups.com
wrote:

http://online.wsj.com/public/article...206850468.html

This was a front page article.

"Like all Morse experts, Mr. Adams rarely breaks signals down into
letters, instead hearing complete words much as readers recognize words
on a page. When he transcribes a message at high speeds, his fingers are
five or 10 words behind his ears."

I've been licensed since 1961, and I've heard and read things like this
ever since.

I operated strictly CW for most of that time and I've never come close
to being able to copy like that.

I can copy by ear at 30-35WPM, but can only transcribe at about 20WPM
because I write down each letter as I hear it; copying behind is an
absolute mystery to me, as is the idea of hearing words instead of
individual letters.

It's probably way too late for me to get over 45 years of bad habits,
but how do people achive this state?


I don't think it's too late for you at all. You simply need to make
some adjustments to your method. I run mobile CW and the thing which
makes that possible while in motion is that one never writes anything
down. The pen or pencil is what's getting in your way.

If you don't write it down, you're forced to remember the fellow's call,
name, QTH and the like. When I operate from home, I type a callsign
into my log. I might write down his weather or the type antenna he's
running, if I plan to ask more about one of those items.

Try finding a couple of speed merchants on 80 or 40m some evening and
don't even pick up your pen. Sure, you're likely to miss a few things.
Go ahead and miss them. You'll get better at it in a short time.

Dave Heil K8MN

Bert Hyman wrote:

I can copy by ear at 30-35WPM, but can only transcribe at about 20WPM
because I write down each letter as I hear it; copying behind is an
absolute mystery to me, as is the idea of hearing words instead of
individual letters.

It's probably way too late for me to get over 45 years of bad habits,
but how do people achive this state?


Just force yourself into the habit of waiting for each word to complete
before scribbling it down. Your brain will still be listening for the
stuff which arrives while you write. You will miss things at first but
persistence will pay off.

It helps to be able to write without looking at the paper, this is
just a coordination and neatness exercise which you can develop off
air by copying from a book or newspaper to a scratchpad keeping
your eye on the book.

Bert Hyman wrote:
"Like all Morse experts, Mr. Adams rarely breaks signals down into
letters, instead hearing complete words much as readers recognize words
on a page. When he transcribes a message at high speeds, his fingers are
five or 10 words behind his ears."

I've been licensed since 1961, and I've heard and read things like this
ever since.
[...]
It's probably way too late for me to get over 45 years of bad habits,
but how do people achive this state?

Like you, I have heard and read about this often (copying whole
words rather than single letters), and I think it is a little bit
misleading. I can easily copy plain text CW in German or English
at around 60 WpM, but still, if I actively, consciously listen, I
*do* hear every single letter.

But that does not mean that I have to concatenate those letters
to form a word, like a first grade pupil does, when he reads an
unknown word (I also recently encountered this problem again
while learning Macedonian, written in cyrillic letters!). I
rather make an assumption on what the word could be, often even
before the word is transmitted. By making such predictions (and
in most sentences you can easily predict the following word; or
if not, you can predict the word based on the first letter, or
make some rough assumptions of what might come next), you can
stop to worry about the word after you have recognized the start.

If, however, an unexpected word appears, you have to change the
plan in your mind, and decode it consciously. In most cases
again, the first two or three letters will be sufficient to make
a safe assumption on what the word will be. In cases of unknown
names (operator, QTH, ...) you might have to go back to putting
it together letter by letter.

I think everyone copies plain text CW similar to this, to a
certain degree. It starts with your first standard QSOs: Those
ever repeating phrases ('tnx fr rprt = ur rst 599 ='...) are soon
'hard coded' into your brain. They are so easy to copy because
it's what you *expect* to hear. If the other station suddenly
starts sending something _unexpected_, you're getting into
trouble or at least you'll suddenly have to pay close attention.
The reception is moving somewhere from your subconsciousness to a
higher level of consciousness.

After my first 50 CW QSOs, I stopped to write down every single
letter, and only had to write everything that was not the
expected stuff like "my name is", but the names/QTHs itself.

So, hearing a whole word as one 'sound' does - in my personal
experience - not work, you still hear it letter by letter. But
the more routined you are, the deeper the process of perception
slides into your subconsciousness.

73,
--
Fabian Kurz, DJ1YFK * Dresden, Germany * http://fkurz.net/