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15 <H2><A NAME="s7">7. Filtering (New Style v1.45 and later)</A></H2>
17 <H2><A NAME="ss7.1">7.1 General filter rules</A>
20 <P>Upto v1.44 it was not possible for the user to set their own filters. From
21 v1.45 though that has all changed. It is now possible to set filters for just
22 about anything you wish. If you have just updated from an older version of
23 DXSpider you will need to update your new filters. You do not need to do
24 anything with your old filters, they will be renamed as you update.
26 <P>There are 3 basic commands involved in setting and manipulating filters. These
27 are <EM>accept</EM>, <EM>reject</EM> and <EM>clear</EM>. First we will look
28 generally at filtering. There are a number of things you can filter in the
29 DXSpider system. They all use the same general mechanism.
31 <P>In general terms you can create a 'reject' or an 'accept' filter which can have
32 up to 10 lines in it. You do this using, for example ...
41 <P>where ..... are the specific commands for that type of filter. There are filters
42 for spots, wwv, announce, wcy and (for sysops) connects. See each different
43 accept or reject command reference for more details.
44 <P>There is also a command to clear out one or more lines in a filter. They are ...
52 <P>There is clear/xxxx command for each type of filter.
54 <P>and you can check that your filters have worked by the command ...
63 <P>For now we are going to use spots for the examples, but you can apply the same
64 principles to all types of filter.
66 <H2><A NAME="ss7.2">7.2 Types of filter</A>
69 <P>There are two main types of filter, <EM>accept</EM> or <EM>reject</EM>. You
70 can use either to achieve the result you want dependent on your own preference
71 and which is more simple to do. It is pointless writing 8 lines of reject
72 filters when 1 accept filter would do the same thing! Each filter has 10
73 lines (of any length) which are tried in order. If a line matches then the
74 action you have specified is taken (ie reject means ignore it and accept
77 <P>If you specify reject filters, then any lines that arrive that match the filter
78 will be dumped but all else will be accepted. If you use an accept filter,
79 then ONLY the lines in the filter will be accepted and all else will be dumped.
80 For example if you have a single line <EM>accept</EM> filter ...
84 accept/spots on vhf and (by_zone 14,15,16 or call_zone 14,15,16)
87 <P>then you will <EM>ONLY</EM> get VHF spots <EM>from</EM> or <EM>to</EM> CQ zones
90 <P>If you set a reject filter like this ...
97 <P>Then you will get everything <EM>EXCEPT</EM> HF CW spots. You could make this
98 single filter even more flexible. For example, if you are interested in IOTA
99 and will work it even on CW even though normally you are not interested in
100 CW, then you could say ...
104 reject/spots on hf/cw and not info iota
107 <P>But in that case you might only be interested in iota and say:-
111 accept/spots not on hf/cw or info iota
114 <P>which achieves exactly the same thing. You should choose one or the other
115 until you are comfortable with the way it works. You can mix them if you
116 wish (actually you can have an accept AND a reject on the same line) but
117 don't attempt this until you are sure you know what you are doing!
119 <P>You can arrange your filter lines into logical units, either for your own
120 understanding or simply convenience. Here is an example ...
124 reject/spots 1 on hf/cw
125 reject/spots 2 on 50000/1400000 not (by_zone 14,15,16 or call_zone 14,15,16)
128 <P>What this does is to ignore all HF CW spots and also rejects any spots on VHF
129 which don't either originate or spot someone in Europe.
131 <P>This is an example where you would use a line number (1 and 2 in this case), if
132 you leave the digit out, the system assumes '1'. Digits '0'-'9' are available.
133 This make it easier to see just what filters you have set. It also makes it
134 more simple to remove individual filters, during a contest for example.
136 <P>You will notice in the above example that the second line has brackets. Look
137 at the line logically. You can see there are 2 separate sections to it. We
138 are saying reject spots that are VHF or above <EM>APART</EM> from those in
139 zones 14, 15 and 16 (either spotted there or originated there). If you did
140 not have the brackets to separate the 2 sections, then Spider would read it
141 logically from the front and see a different expression entirely ...
145 (on 50000/1400000 and by_zone 14,15,16) or call_zone 14,15,16
148 <P>The simple way to remember this is, if you use OR - use brackets. Whilst we are
149 here CASE is not important. 'And BY_Zone' is just the same as 'and by_zone'.
150 <P>As mentioned earlier, setting several filters can be more flexible than
151 simply setting one complex one. Doing it in this way means that if you want
152 to alter your filter you can just redefine or remove one or more lines of it or
153 one line. For example ...
157 reject/spots 1 on hf/ssb
160 <P>would redefine our earlier example, or
167 <P>To remove all the filter lines in the spot filter ...
175 <H2><A NAME="ss7.3">7.3 Filter options</A>
178 <P>You can filter in several different ways. The options are listed in the
179 various helpfiles for accept, reject and filter.
181 <H2><A NAME="ss7.4">7.4 Default filters</A>
184 <P>Sometimes all that is needed is a general rule for node connects. This can
185 be done with a node_default filter. This rule will always be followed, even
186 if the link is isolated, unless another filter is set specifically. Default
187 rules can be set for nodes and users. They can be set for spots, announces,
188 WWV and WCY. They can also be used for hops. An example might look like
193 accept/spot node_default by_zone 14,15,16,20,33
194 set/hops node_default spot 50
197 <P>This filter is for spots only, you could set others for announce, WWV and WCY.
198 This filter would work for ALL nodes unless a specific filter is written to
199 override it for a particular node. You can also set a user_default should
200 you require. It is important to note that default filters should be
201 considered to be "connected". By this I mean that should you override the
202 default filter for spots, you need to add a rule for the hops for spots also.
204 <H2><A NAME="ss7.5">7.5 Advanced filtering</A>
207 <P>Once you are happy with the results you get, you may like to experiment.
209 <P>The previous example that filters hf/cw spots and accepts vhf/uhf spots from EU
210 can be written with a mixed filter, for example ...
216 acc/spot 2 on 50000/1400000 and (by_zone 14,15,16 or call_zone 14,15,16)
219 <P>Note that the first filter has not been specified with a number. This will
220 automatically be assumed to be number 1. In this case, we have said <EM>reject all
221 HF spots in the CW section of the bands but accept all others at HF. Also
222 accept anything in VHF and above spotted in or by operators in the zones
223 14, 15 and 16</EM>. Each filter slot actually has a 'reject' slot and
224 an 'accept' slot. The reject slot is executed BEFORE the accept slot.
226 <P>It was mentioned earlier that after a reject test that doesn't match, the default
227 for following tests is 'accept', the reverse is true for 'accept'. In the example
228 what happens is that the reject is executed first, any non hf/cw spot is passed
229 to the accept line, which lets through everything else on HF. The next filter line
230 lets through just VHF/UHF spots from EU.
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