>>>AA6YQ comments below

-----Original Message-----
From: dxlab@... [mailto:dxlab@...]
Sent: Friday, July 14, 2017 5:38 PM
To: dxlab@...
Subject: RE: [dxlab] QRZ again?

I must say I see a large number of requests for QRZ.com Pathfinder help and thus diversion of Dave's, AA6YQ, time to respond to and fix these requests.

However, fixing this may be an ethical issue, not a convenience to DXKeeper users issue.

The DXLab community possibly doesn't understand that the QRZ errors come from Pathfinder's attempt to read a web site intended for human consumption and extracting it's best guess what is the desired QSL/contact/location information. QRZ occasionally changes the format of the data presentation for security, style, and software updates. It is their right to do so. Microsoft changes their offerings regularly. So why can't QRZ?

>>>QRZ is free to change their web page however and whenever they like.

Guess what? QRZ doesn't want DXLabs or any other program to programmatically access their Web Site.

>>>That's not correct.

>>>I have discussed Pathfinder with QRZ.com owner Fred AA6BQ on several occasions. DXKeeper's free "QRZ.com via Pathfinder" option exists with his blessing. Fred can ask me to remove it at any time; were he to do so, I would immediately comply. So far, he's only asked that the rate of callbook lookups via this mechanism be limited to one every 4 seconds -- a policy implemented in DXKeeper several years ago.

>>>Note that Pathfinder displays QRZ's advertising, and thus does not diminish QRZ revenues - as would a scheme that scrapes downloaded HTML without displaying it to the user.

>>>My point earlier today is that if QRZ, for whatever reason, is no longer sending information in the same format to every user, then it may no longer be possible to maintain "QRZ.com via Pathfinder.

>>>Removing the "QRZ.com via Pathfinder" option from DXKeeper would require no change to Pathfinder, nor would it simplify the web browser issues discussed here in a different thread.

73,

Dave, AA6YQ