Ham2K PoLo Cloud Sync Is Live and It's Just the Beginning

Your logging app is not just a logbook anymore, and Ham2K PoLo is proof. We sit down with Sebastián Delmont KI2D, the creator and lead developer of PoLo, right as his Ham2K LoFi cloud sync service goes live. If you have ever exported an ADIF file, emailed it to yourself, merged duplicates, or realized your other device has the QSO you need, this conversation hits home fast.

We dig into what Ham2K LoFi actually does and why syncing ham radio logging data is more complex than tossing files into iCloud. PoLo syncs at the QSO level, has to survive offline activations, and needs to merge cleanly when you reconnect. Sebastián also breaks down the practical side: app store subscription approvals, backend costs, and why he chose a pricing model that stays approachable at $2.99 a month or $24.99 a year, with a free tier designed to cover most operators while protecting server load.

Then we zoom out to the fun part: what sync enables next. Think shared logs for multi-op POTA and SOTA days, QR code log sharing, and a path toward Field Day logging without the laptop maze. We also talk about upcoming tools like a web-based log browser for easy desktop ADIF export, future push uploads to services like QRZ and POTA, and a bigger Log Filer vision that can import ADIF archives and unify your QSO history across sources like Logbook of the World.

If you are looking for a modern ham radio logging workflow that works on iOS, Android, and even Apple Silicon Macs, hit play and come along for the roadmap. Subscribe, share this with a friend or clubmate, and leave a review. What would you want PoLo to automate next?

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The Everyday Ham Podcast is hosted by James Mills (K8JKU), Jim Davis (N8JRD), and Rory Locke (W8KNX) – three friends who dive into the world of amateur radio with a casual, lighthearted twist. 

Follow us at: Website: https://www.everydayham.com/ 

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Transcript

Welcome And Community Updates

SPEAKER_01 0:12

All right, welcome into a special episode of the Everyday Ham Podcast. This is going to be a fun one. We're going to sit down and talk to Sebastian, uh KI2D, the creator and lead developer of the Ham 2K Polo software and a bunch of other useful ham radio products. If you take a look at his website, uh, we're going to be talking a little bit about his recently released um log filer sync service. That's the actual name of the product, the the Lo-Fi Cloud Sync. Uh, first, certainly if you haven't, take a moment to uh subscribe. If you're watching on YouTube, subscribe if you're listening on one of the podcast platforms. Take a moment to uh give a give a comment, hit the like button, do all the things to help us uh move us up the chart a little bit. Uh if you need help finding our socials, you can find links to everything at everydayham.com. Certainly take a look at our Discord. We have a small but fun community there. We have what I'm calling nowadays the morning crew. Uh we have a fun little morning uh chat behind the keyboard with a couple folks, Rodney, Shane, Steve, Rob, Jason, Mike, and Dennis, as long as well as the three of us get in there and say hello in the morning while everyone has their coffee. We uh I think Rodney starts work at something like 4:30 in the morning or something wild down there in Texas. But uh certainly uh certainly a fun, fun crowd. And it's uh just an informal chat if you get on our Discord. So very good. Of course, before we get into it, we want to make sure that you take a moment to uh visit Sebastian's website too, support his product where you can, his buy me a coffee link at polo.ham2k.com. And of course, there's links in the app itself in the settings section to send him a few bucks. And ultimately, I think after we talk about this tonight, his goal is to get everyone to subscribe to the uh ham2k cloud sync lo-fi service. There we go.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

But uh I'm hoping for some likes and subscribes on that front too.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

So we'll we'll we'll talk about that. Um so first let's start kind of basic. So which platforms uh support polo, of course. So we talk about uh iPhone, iPad with the Apple Store, people can get that. The Android devices can get it from Google Play. Anywhere else we can find the product these days.

SPEAKER_00 2:30

The the the iPad version can also be installed in any of the new uh Macs that support our M1, two, and three, and five processors. Um I've heard good things about it running on the the new MacBook Neo, uh that it runs it just fine. Nice. And uh but for now that's it. For now, the the Polluk is still limited to the to the mobile platforms, Android and iOS. Uh, but we'll we'll talk about it in a little bit if you want.

SPEAKER_01 3:01

Yeah, so I guess uh we were glad to see the ability to run it on the M1 and newer chip. I think uh James, Jim, and myself all made recent MacBook purchases because we wanted to be able to do it. I don't think that's the only reason we bought went out and bought MacBooks. Mine was 11 years old. It still runs fine, it just doesn't hold a charge. But hey, an excuse to buy a MacBook is an excuse to buy a MacBook.

SPEAKER_03 3:24

Yeah, that's what I told my wife on why I needed a new MacBook was to download the portable logger app. I love it. And then, you know, she said, sure, go right ahead.

Desktop Plans And Easy ADIF Export

SPEAKER_01 3:30

Sarah said, No problem. No problem. Go do it. Head right to the Apple store. Uh are you are you what are you looking at are you looking at? I know we talked before, you were talking about perhaps a web browser version or or something that could potentially run on Windows. We get that question quite a bit.

SPEAKER_00 3:49

I've been working on building a Windows, not a Windows, a desktop version that would run on Windows, Macs, and Linux. Um the I wanted to get the sync service working first because once you have a desktop version, you want to connect it with all your other devices too. Right. So I I wanted that in place before working on the desktop version. And I realized that um easier than building a full desktop version that has all the features of Polo would be to start with a simple web-based uh log browser that will let you take a look at all the logs you've you've overloaded to the sync service and export your ADIF files from the browser. So if you don't want to do it on the phone and deal with emailing it to yourself or something like that, you can use a sync service and open it on a browser on your desktop and save it from there. Um that's what I'm working on right now. And that should be ready in a couple of weeks, I hope. Uh at least a very simple basic version. It won't let you log, it won't let you do anything, just just browse your logs and export a diff. Nice. Um but then I'll be able to add more features. And that will share some code with the desktop version. So working on that has helped me uh solve some issues that I'm I need to deal with for the desktop. Uh so so it's not it it's progress in the good direction at the same time.

SPEAKER_03 5:13

And you do hope that it's a cross-platform desktop version application?

SPEAKER_00 5:18

Yes. The desktop version will be cross-platform all the way. I'm gonna be using either uh Tori, if you want the technical details, yeah. Uh there's there's there's Electron is a common uh architecture to do that. I'm gonna be using Tori, which is like Electron but more lightweight. Okay. But kind of like sharing a lot of code with the the the mobile versions are written in React Native, which is JavaScript. And the web and desktop versions will be using React Web. Uh, but I'll be able to share a lot of code. So all of the code I've written to deal with soda and PODA and contests and QSO parties, that I I I the plan is to be able to share it among all the platforms. Uh it needs some cleanup and some refactoring before that works uh smoothly. But when I built it in the first place, I was already planning uh in this direction. So it's it should be feasible to share the code among all the platforms.

SPEAKER_03 6:15

That's so cool, actually, to hear that as well. And I'm sure a lot of people are thrilled that it is going to be a lightweight cross-platform application. And honestly, just being able to get the ADIF files when I get home already saves me a step because I export everything to Google Drive to then go upload into PODA and my personal log. So I love it.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

And I think that was funny.

SPEAKER_00 6:36

Oops, sorry, go ahead. I'm also working on on on on I don't call that sync, although it it the the word could be used to describe the features. I'm calling it more like push. Uh mechanism to let you directly from polo and or the the desktop or the upcoming apps, push your logs to the services that support that. Like push it to QRZ, push it to Soda, push it to eventually when when the new version is released, uh PODA, once they finish the the big rework they're doing there. Um so that yes, that that that you should be able to not have to download ADIF files and even like forget about ADIF, Polo will do it for you and and send it to the the services you you want to send it to.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

Yeah, to finish an after activation and and when you're done, hit the button and it goes to all of the things. That would be uh that would be tremendous. And yeah, you know, I think some people have had uh you know, a lot of people have some some reservations in switching to a uh computer-based logger. We still talk to a lot of people who who use pen and paper. Now I've I've pretty much been using polo for everything. You do have to keep the uh the the backup ham2k powerless logger on hand for uh for emergency situations.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

We we have you covered. We have a product for the people who like to log on paper. I love it. Um so it's it's quality right in the rain. It's not any notepad. Nice. It's the the the Ham2K powerless logger.

QSO Party Features And Rule Testing

SPEAKER_01 8:07

It stays on the kit for the big emergencies, but uh nonetheless, uh Ham2K's been been my primary polo's been my primary logger. I used it actually over the weekend. Um Virginia Cuso Party had a little bit of just short of 100, I think 89 Cusos in Virginia Cuso Party over the weekend and used uh used polo on my Mac at my desktop here. I didn't get out of the house, I just did it from home. But uh I'm I'm so happy to see the support for the QSO parties and and select other other uh contests show up in in polo for sure. That's made it uh made it super accessible, super easy to pull the file out of there and send it right into the to the um to the to the sponsoring club for the QSO party. Um any other any other things in the works such as as logging for for QSO parties or or contests that you have in plan?

SPEAKER_00 8:58

I've been updating support for QSO parties for the 2026 edition, like reviewing the rules in case there are changes. Um I've I've done all of the CUSO parties up until April are covered now. Um I'll I'll be reviewing those throughout the year. And if people want to help, they're they're more than well. The app is open source, so you can come and collaborate. And and if you're involved in any of the QSO parties or have a favorite QSO party, one thing I would appreciate is if you download the app and test your favorite CUSA party, not a day before the weekend of the CUSA party, but preferably um a couple of weeks before, and you see if my interpretation of the rules is correct and like the scoring seems correct, and the the cabrilla file has no problems. Um I don't I cannot review all of them and triple check them um to the to the because I don't even understand some of the subtleties in the rules sometimes that that I might have missed. So I need an extra pair of ice to to cover those.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

I don't think people understand the lift, the work that's involved with scouring all the rules from every QSO party to to understand the nuances and all the little things. Uh this one, this uh Virginia the other the other day, or this this past weekend, you know, they had special ones if you had the special event station or special, yeah, the special event stations, they had bonus stations of different point bubbles. It was it was interesting.

SPEAKER_00 10:24

So that's definitely I tried to make polo cover all of those variations. There's still a couple of things here and there that it's they're not fully accounted for. So you might get a a score calculation that's not exactly what the final score will be. But I'm I try to do my best to get as close as possible.

SPEAKER_01 10:41

Um it was it was nice over the weekend for me to, as I was working through the Keyso party, I hit 10,000 points. I said, Oh, well, well, we're gonna go for 20,000 points. So that was fun to watch that creep up.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

And uh and I know that Virginia has has bonus stations. Did polo tell you when you were hitting one of a bonus stations?

SPEAKER_01 11:00

It it did. So it lit up green, green at the bottom, just like the same as if you're doing PODA when you're when you're looking at a park and it's at someone's at a new park. If you're hitting a new bonus station or you're hitting a new county, it lights up green down in the bottom part of polo to let you know uh that that's something new, which is which is exceptionally important because there's uh big rover, there they call it their their mobiles in in Virginia Cuso party. So they're going county to county. Same idea. When they hit a new county, if you put the person's call in and you put in that they're in a new county, instead of giving you the dupe warning, it lets you know they're in a new, a new county. So that all that are all works exceptionally well. Um, Virginia, unfortunately, is still one of the ones that uses a serial number. That is not my favorite type of QSO party. Yeah um, especially since I'm learning CW and I had to figure out how to send numbers that accurately and listen to numbers that accurately.

SPEAKER_00 11:52

Well, that's a challenge. That's part of what what contests are for, like to force you to to put you in an uncomfortable spot and as far as and improve yourself.

Why LoFi Cloud Sync Matters

SPEAKER_01 12:02

As far as CW is concerned, working the QSO parties, which is pretty much one every weekend. Um I I find the CW is coming quick. I I hear a lot quickly, a lot more quickly, and uh yeah, it's it's good practice. But uh we're here to talk lo fi, your cloud sync. So that was a long, that was a long time coming. I know that was a long project for you. You you you dreamed about it, you probably had nightmares about it, but it's here. And tell us a bit about it.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

It's one of those things that I was hoping to have ready like six months ago, and uh part of us of it is the the complexity of writing a sync service that's meant to work with with logging data, not just files. So some people are asking, why doesn't Polo support like iCloud? That's easy. Um yeah, no, it's not that simple. Um Polo syncs everything at the at the QSO level, it does it every time you do a QSO, but if you're offline, then it cannot do it, so it has to do it later. So there's some complexities involved that I need to make sure got addressed. And then um this is the first part of Polo that that will be a paid service. There's a free tier, but the the the core service is is gonna be a subscription service. So I had to deal with all the parts of managing a subscription service, getting it approved by Apple, getting it approved by Google. Those those uh app stores are very strict. Yeah. They're very picky about some of the things, uh, and you have to do them right, and they complain about even the wording if it's not perfect. Uh so that took that that took like an extra pair of months that a couple of months I was not expecting to spend doing that. But it's it's done, it's ready, it's running.

SPEAKER_02 13:46

It's uh it's extremely affordable too. So while we're talking the service, it's$2.99 a month or$24.99 for the whole year, which is very very affordable.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

And and I mean, I I my my my business philosophy is that things are a lot easier if you have if you get people to give you money when it makes them happy, not when they're forced to. Uh so even the the sync service, the the free tier will let you sync uh and cover all your needs. In fact, right now the the limits is that it will sync the last seven days of data you've uploaded. Okay. I might even live that that number of seven days and probably let you sync all your data anyways. Um I only put some limits in terms of of the speed and the number of devices you can connect. Um in part because I want to limit the the load on the servers on the free accounts.

SPEAKER_02 14:42

The cloud services cost money, right? No two ways about it, right? So when we when we're talking about keeping it up and running, it costs money to run polo. So that that's simple.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

And and and you can you can run this on a$10 uh droplet on on one of this online services. Like you can say, I can get a server for$10 a month. I'm running it on on a bit more complex infrastructure than that with with redundant databases. And and I don't want to lose a single Q. So I don't want to risk having my my SQL database go down and not having a backup. Right. So I'm I'm I'm paying for a lot more servers than than the bare minimum. That makes sense. Um I do plan, not yet, but I do plan to actually make the the server side code open source too. Nice. Um so if you if you want to self-host, that should be a possibility. I haven't done it yet because uh there were too many moving pieces between the ad this the the part on the app, the part on the back end, that that if I make it open source, then I have to make sure people update their servers that they installed. Right. And then if I needed to change something in a hurry because I I I needed to change something in a hurry, that was gonna be a problem. So as soon as I feel like the the the that backend server is stable, I'll probably come up with an open source version that people can self-host um at their own sites. Right. But and like I could I can do a demo of the sync server, of the sync service. It's really not that impressive. All you can see is like when you put something in one phone, it shows up in the other. Sure. Um which is kind of like duh, that's what you expect. No, that's that's like it so it it's it's very anticlimatic in that sense. It does open up the door for a lot a lot of things that were not possible before, including being able to share operations between multiple people, uh so that you can do if you are the two of you are doing an activation in a park, you can share that log uh even if you have separate accounts. Yep. Or uh think field day. If you're a club and you are doing field day and you have multiple people there, they could log from their own phones instead of having to deal with laptops and and N1MM or F N3FJP. Um I that's not built, that's not there uh uh yet, but it's something I wanna uh with with Lock I'll have a beta by the time field day comes. I don't think many clubs will want to risk their operation running beta software software, but I hope to get a couple of uh of early testers. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 17:26

Um I could see you getting a few small groups that are that are into it and that really want to give it a shot. They'd probably test it without any problem.

Multi-Op Logging And Field Day Vision

SPEAKER_00 17:34

Um my my local club has run their last two field days using beta versions of polo, including syncing. Um I did I did New York Cuso party with a friend. We were a multi-multi-portable station, so we're basically two pickup trucks driving around and we were running on the same account. So we were syncing our CUSOs with each other. Uh and we did like 1300 CUSOs, so it it was able to manage that without a problem in 12 hours. Um so the the the sync opens us there there's a few features are gonna be coming up that are that were not possible before and that I think will will make a difference to to some people. Um I'm still not sure if I might require a different kind of plan if you want to be able to share activations like this. Um again, it it has a a not insignificant impact on the load on the servers. Sure. Um plus I want to try to to make the most out of polo and try to to get I again polo is free and open source, and I believe in making it open source, and I believe in in letting people uh use it as much as they want and and and not have to pay for it on on unless they want to pay for it. But I also want to give them good reasons to want to pay for it. Right. Um so I I want to build these features and try to to see if I can I mean thinking of doing like a club subscription that's that will allow you to share operations and then it'll be a more expensive uh plan, say$100 a m a year, but then it'll give you a 20% discount for all club members. Okay. So in the end, if you have like five people, that might end up being about the same as as just paying for your regular price subscription.

SPEAKER_02 19:19

Yeah, it would be neat. I think it's it's it's funny because what I hear, Sebastian, is a lot of like downplaying the cloud sync is out, and right, you can go or subscribe to it today. But what it really means is there's a lot of really exciting things coming that are built on the foundation of cloud sync, and that is actually what will probably be more exciting as we continue on through the year. So that for me, I didn't I didn't totally wrap my head around where we were going with it. And hearing some of these you know, multi-op situations, uh the real-time uh syncing between two operators is just that's the kind of cool thing that uh will be really exciting to see.

SPEAKER_03 19:52

Especially for PODA and Soda. I mean, that that's almost what you do now is you go out as a group and you activate a lot of times. And yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:00

So imagine you go you go out and then one of you decides, okay, I'm gonna open the logo on my phone, and then you can actually share. Yep. And the the share button will show a QR code on your phone, and everybody else can can take that link from your phone and it'll show up on theirs. Um and then at the end of the operation, you don't need to give them their files. They can export them themselves on their own phones, um, or they can collaboratively edit the log as you're as you're logging.

SPEAKER_02 20:31

We just wrapped up our space coast rove.

SPEAKER_03 20:34

And at the end, we're sitting in the restaurant having a beer, and James is emailing us the uh the ADIFs for sitting on my phone because I left my iPad out in the car, and we're trying to sort out and count the number of logs we each had, and I was like, ah shoot, now I gotta run back out to the car, grab the iPad because we were missing one of the logs.

SPEAKER_02 20:51

So it was felt just acutely.

unknown 20:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:53

So there used to be a time when you would have to log and then save that log and open it in something like add ADIF Master to change everything, to make it fit for everybody. And if you did like three parts, you'll have to do that three times three and it and then submit them all.

SPEAKER_04 21:08

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 21:09

Um right now you can do a single log and then export and get all your files. You still have to distribute the files and submit them, but I want to get to the point where you have a single log, all you have to do is log the keys once. And then at the end you press one button, it sinks everywhere, and it submits whenever whatever is relevant. That's the dream. Um I I don't think well, I wouldn't bet on getting there for 2026, but I'd be surprised if by 2027 we don't have direct upload for PODA for and and all our services.

SPEAKER_01 21:41

Yeah, I think uh the the building up to all of these these advanced things for polo and and and the future, it's it's it's excellent to see the kind of the roadmap of where you're headed and you know where where we're at and where we're going and and how we're getting there, and how everything's based on the projects along the way. I will say polo as it is now, we we talked about our Space Coast rove, which we did uh three stops but five parks. So two two two fers and one single park. And using polo, even even in its current setup, I I certainly encourage. People to do this in a multi, multi-op, multi-park day because even though you're working on improving it, I will say it's super easy to pull those files out. Yeah, it was for three operators. Uh James was able to do it on his phone at his iPad without any problem and send them to us. It was it was super easy. Um having having the multi-parks uh in there. And I think we had all of our yeah, we did it all sitting at the restaurant. I we like like most hams.

SPEAKER_03 22:38

Yeah, after your robe, you go and celebrate a little bit and hang out and we uh sort logs.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

We avoided whatever those wildfires that were going on in Florida, Central Florida that weekend and and um and uploaded our logs at the restaurant. But yeah, that was uh certainly certainly you've done a lot to make it easy now, but it'll be excellent to see where it goes with these items that you're talking about.

How To Enable Sync And Subscribe

SPEAKER_00 22:59

Yeah, there's always improvements, there's always ways of making it more more smooth and and and easy. Um so we're not stopping at at this point. We're we want to to go further and and make it even better. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:13

I I have a question. If someone so I we subscribed right away because we we follow on some of the socials and we saw that you were launching the the lo-fi. But if someone wants to subscribe and they're like, man, I want to sync my logs and I want to do it now, how do they how do they find that subscription area?

SPEAKER_00 23:28

Go on go to the settings uh screen, and there's an option there for sync settings. Okay. Um the first thing you should do, whether you're subscribing or not, is polo will will polo will be sending your QSOs to the sync to the cloud server even before you subscribe. So I I I I want to back up everyone's QSOs just in case something goes wrong. Thank you. The only time polo does not do that if is if you choose that option to not share data with the developers. So if you want full privacy, polo will respect that. But if you if you enable the share data with developers, polo is already syncing your QSOs to the cloud. The first thing you should do is go on the settings and configure your email account. So tap on the account. There's a button that says tap here to configure, enter your email and and and verify that email address by clicking the link you get on your inbox. Okay. That will make it easy to recover your QSOs if you happen to lose your phone or switch phones or or whatnot.

unknown 24:27

Very cool.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

We can still recover them by emailing me and and and and crying, I lost my phone. I don't need I didn't do what you told me to do in the uh in the show, the Everday Hams, and it didn't put my email, and like, okay, I'll figure we'll get it fixed. But if you configure your email, that'll be a lot easier.

SPEAKER_02 24:46

It doesn't scale when Sebastian gets 15 emails like that every day.

SPEAKER_00 24:50

Right. Right. Um so I prefer people to do what's what's known as self-service.

SPEAKER_02 24:54

Yes, yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 24:55

Okay. So enter your email and and and then if you have more than one device, after you confirm the first one, go on the second one and confirm and do the same thing.

SPEAKER_04 25:05

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 25:06

Connect your email and it will link the devices all to the same account. Um one of the things that happens if you have multiple devices and the there's different QSO data on each one of those devices is when you configure that email and you link them, Paulo will ask you what you want to do with the data. Do you want to combine the data or do you want to replace the data? You most likely want to combine it. It's a bit scary. I want to scare people into reading, yeah into reading the the note carefully. You most likely want to combine your QSOs from your different devices. Okay. Unless you are using that iPad for something else and and you want to throw those QSOs away, uh your best answer is to combine and Paul will put all the QSOs in one account and it will sync the start syncing between the devices.

SPEAKER_04 25:58

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 25:59

Then on that same sync settings screen, there's a button to manage your subscription. And if you tap there, you get your typical uh in-app subscription screen that says, hey, this is wonderful. You can do$2.99 a month, or if you decide to do the whole year, you get a discount and it's only$24.99 a year.

SPEAKER_04 26:21

There you go.

SPEAKER_00 26:22

You only need to do that on one of the devices. That subscription applies to all of the devices you sync with that email, the email you configured, that's what the where the subscription applies. Very cool. So even if you have a Mac, an iPad, and an Android phone, you subscribe on one of the devices and that applies to all of them. Tons of value. As long as they all sync with that email account.

SPEAKER_03 26:47

Yeah. So if I if I have another device, I just go and enter the email step again, and then it should sync with that device for the subscription. It should sync with that device.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

That's correct. Easy. And then everything should sync. Um if it doesn't, uh I I consider the sync service to still be in beta. There might be problems. If it doesn't, shoot me an email at help at ham2k.com, stop by the Discord or the forums, and we'll try to sort it out right away.

SPEAKER_01 27:16

I think uh I think it's it's come a long way very quickly. And and the process of I have three devices on my um my sync account, and it was it was very simple. Add the email address, tell it to combine, and that was my thing. I wanted all three of my devices to have the exact same data on each of them, which you know I might go do a midday POTA activation while I'm at lunch at work. I don't I don't have my iPad with me, but I have my phone.

SPEAKER_04 27:42

Right.

SPEAKER_01 27:43

I I can put my I can log on my phone and it's it's in there with the rest of my logs when I go back on my iPad the next time. I might take my MacBook out the next time and they're all they're all there together. And they all go to one thing. Yeah, the one thing I like to recognize people who I work several times. This is this is it's cheesy, but this is one reason I like to tell, you know, hey Jim, I have you in the log three times, good to work you again. Now, now that's an accurate, accurate count because it's it's syncing from regardless of the device, it's it's telling me the data is all there. So very good. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 28:18

I'll give you uh another uh hint of where we're trying to go, which is that I named this uh the whole thing, uh the the sync server uh log filer, not just because lo fi was a cool short name too. That's pretty cool. But also because I I want to build a whole separate app around it to help you manage your logs.

SPEAKER_04 28:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 28:38

Including I my my my ideal scenario is drop all your ADIF files into this window and we'll sort them out. We'll have all your history, and then on your phone, it'll let you say, okay, you worked this guy five years ago. You work him 25 times, and on any device you connect to that account, it'll know that full history of all your contacts. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. By syncing from the server.

SPEAKER_02 29:04

Is there a vision there where we would be able to bring something in from like our QRZ logbook, right? Like export the whole thing, bring it into lo fi, right? Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_00 29:12

You will have a little button that says bring everything from from from QRZ, bring everything from logbook of the world, be bring everything from or just drag and drop all the those files you never uploaded to QRZ because they were for PODA. Yep. Um so so the plan is to be able to combine all the sources of of QSO data that you might have into a single database and let the rest of the apps in the ecosystem take advantage of that.

SPEAKER_02 29:38

Right.

SPEAKER_00 29:39

Without even having to download all that QSO data into your phone. The phone will be able to query the server and say, hey, I I just got a contact with K8JQ. Here's the five years of contacts you have with all the things, right?

SPEAKER_03 29:53

So I I I kind of maybe have a controversial question. So polo stands for portable logger, for maybe those that don't know. And you're building a large infrastructure. So you're working really hard on QSO parties, you're building a pretty robust app. It's great for beginners. And now you're building out this sort of behind-the-scenes infrastructure with cloud sync and then maybe this eight if or this uh logging back end, right? Are you gonna keep it named Portable Logger? Because you're really building a very robust logging suite.

SPEAKER_00 30:22

I mean the idea is that the the porta polo will remain polo. The the app you have on your phone will remain portable logger and it will be geared towards portable activities. Um the the desktop app, and I'm I'm still undecided on whether you will have a desktop version of portable logger, or you would have a desktop logger called Dello, maybe.

SPEAKER_03 30:46

Or you would have I love the naming schematic, by the way.

SPEAKER_00 30:52

Um I I I want to build like a whole desk set of desktop apps around station management, log management, contest logging, uh and and I'm not sure if there will be all be one app with all the features and and call it desktop logger or or or maybe rename polo to power logger, desktop edition and power logger phone edition.

SPEAKER_02 31:19

There we go.

SPEAKER_00 31:20

Um so there will be multiple apps. Um there will be multiple confusing names because that's what happens. Um there's no way around that. Um I will try to to just have fun with those names if I can. Yeah. But yes, there's there's there's multiple apps coming and and it will go beyond what polo does right now.

SPEAKER_03 31:43

It's interesting because I I do recommend polo. So uh there's some few people that have asked, like, hey, I'm getting new into ham radio. What logging tool should I use? And there's so many out there. And I do say start with the free polo version because it does more than just Poda and Soda. It does the QSOs, it gets you started in contesting, it does a lot of really basic functionalities in a very simplistic way. And now you know it's starting to stack these extra features. You see the more and more value being added to the bigger.

SPEAKER_00 32:11

The name polo has uh has acquired some brand value that I don't want to toss aside. That's what I'm thinking of. Maybe the the desktop version could be polo desktop edition. But maybe then polo be means powerful logger, power logger. I don't know. Um rebranding is hard. Rebranding is hard.

SPEAKER_01 32:31

It's gonna take it's gonna take a life of its own as as it as it grows. I like you know, being able to run being able to run polo on my Mac this weekend with the Q so party sitting here nice and comfort comfortable and warm in my shack, it was uh just simple. I mean, that's what it comes down to. There's no there's no extra nonsense. Uh uh, oh, I forgot to mention my favorite thing I found in the in the uh QSO party, and that's the the fact that the spots come in to polo, like PODA spots come in. You can you can activate and look at the the the Q so party spots right in the right hand pane very cool of of polo. And that was uh I I may have shrieked when I when I found that because I I turned that on and I what and it's just like it is in doing the park when you're working that station, you click it, it goes right in your log, and uh and you can work them. That was uh that was a pleasant surprise. I didn't know that was there till I stumbled upon that.

SPEAKER_00 33:26

No, and and and polo polo is meant to be the kind of app that that it makes the simple things easy and makes the hard things possible. There we go. Polo lets you walk and chew gum at the same time. If you want to do the Virginia Cuso party and at the same time activate a summit and a park twofer, you can do that and activate them all together.

SPEAKER_04 33:48

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 33:48

And you can even do where you go out for the whole weekend for the Virginia Accuso Party and do three park stops at different parks and put that all in one log. And at the end of the day, Polo will produce the I don't know, five, six different files that result in the combinations of whatever you did. And during the event, Polo will try to tell you, this guy's a dupe for the Virginia Accuser party, but it's a new park for you, so you have to work them, or this is a new day for PODA, but and a new county for the Virginia Accuser Party for this contact based on the information you put in. So it's not that you can do one of these things at the same time. Polo will send your spot information, will auto-spot you on the relevant servers for for the Virginia Accuser Party and Poda and Soda at the same time. It'll put all that information in the spots for you for to pick if you're picking somebody. So the the the that combination of things, that's as far as I know, polo is the only app that lets you do that kind of combinations. And I do it because I do that, I do those activities. I get I get annoyed when I didn't have when I had to deal with managing that kind of logs without something like polo. So I built that because I wanted it.

SPEAKER_02 35:01

What is your uh so QSO parties, of course, uh we know folks are using it for QSO parties now. It really feels like that's kind of uh a big add-on for polo now. What what what have you seen a lot of folks starting to use polo? Do you have numbers on that yet? Are you feeling like yeah, there's definitely some traction there with QSO parties or or is that word still getting out for polo?

SPEAKER_00 35:20

It it's still getting out. I think that that what what I feel we're I'm seeing is is a dozen people doing one of some of a popular QSO parties, but not more than that. Okay. I think that that the people who go out and do Cuso Party Portable and do Poda are likely to use Polo.

SPEAKER_02 35:44

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 35:44

And and I mean I'm I'm ruining my advantage here, but the best secret if you want to break all the records in your QSO party is combine it with PODA. Okay. And if you kind combine PODA with a with a county line, you're that's that's the winner. There you go.

SPEAKER_01 35:59

Yeah, that's that's killer. I had just had a kind of email conversation with uh with Dean over from the California Cuso Party. I'm trying to come up with this call because you know I like to give calls when I give a name because otherwise, who are you talking about?

SPEAKER_03 36:13

But uh because you're a ham, and that's what hams do.

SPEAKER_01 36:15

Dean N6 DE from the California Cuso Party, he's the chair. I had an email exchange with him over the last week or so because California's done an exceptional job with their POTA overlay. And uh it's something it's something I look forward to every year as uh I I did win the out of state POTA POTA scoring spot this past year for the California CUSA party. So that's uh you know, but anyway, I was talking to him about their approach to that, and polo makes it easy because there are a lot of people now and they're trying to encourage that out there. And I think other CUSA parties should as well encourage people getting out and operating portable, operating in the park, and uh the log is having an easy way to log it is uh is paramount.

SPEAKER_00 36:58

Yeah, yeah, and I mean you see those plaques there, that's those are my New York Cusa party plaques. I've got three, two of them were at parks. Uh one was uh was a county line park, and I'm waiting for this year's uh plaque also, which we easily won again by going to to county line to two separate county line park locations with a multi-multi-station uh at two different locations, all all running polo. Um and and we broke all the records with that operation. That's what we're doing. Again, the trick, when you when you operate Poda at a Cuso party, you basically get twice as many people calling you.

SPEAKER_01 37:35

Yeah, yeah. It makes it it makes it fun. And and for people like, you know, I don't have an excellent station at home. It's nice to get out where there's no where there's no RFI and you can do all the things. But uh all right, I think we've we've hit all the things. We look forward to uh seeing where you're gonna take polo even in the next couple months. So let's see, seven weeks and five days till Dayton Hamvention. We'll probably see you down there. That's coming quickly. I got my plane ticket already.

SPEAKER_00 38:03

The plans have been finalized. I'll be there. I I'll be there Wednesday afternoon to Sunday morning.

SPEAKER_01 38:11

Okay, yeah. We're all the three of us are down at Caesar Creek in the campground, and uh, and I think we all arrived Wednesday, so we'll we'll be in the area for sure. Uh so again, for anyone wanting to support Sebastian, uh polo.ham2K.com and hit the buy me a coffee link or uh right in the app. You can uh send them a few bucks if you wish. Uh just use the product, download it in the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store, and uh send send Sebastian some love because this is a project that I think will be here for a long time and it's serving us well.

SPEAKER_03 38:44

And maybe not that our endorsement means the most, but we all did subscribe. So it isn't it is an everyday ham endorsed product. I got it.

SPEAKER_00 38:52

Your endorsement, your endorsement means means something.

SPEAKER_01 38:54

I got a note from Sebastian because we must have all subscribed right about the same time. He he sent me a note asking, he's like, don't you guys just do everything together? And I'm like, well, well, well, well, the word, the word got out. But uh well, thanks for taking some go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 39:09

No, I I want to say something that that that again, I said I said it already. It's like polo is free and open source, and I believe in making that available to everybody. I believe I know that there's people who can't afford to pay five, ten bucks for an app or or twenty-five dollars. If you can't afford$25 because you're on limited income and you're retired, shoot me an email and I'll sh I'll hook you up with a subscription. That's not I'm I'm I'm here to make money because people are happy giving me money, not because they have to. I I I will say that every time. Um but but when you send me money because it makes you happy, it makes me very, very happy. So I want to encourage people to send me money as much as you can and as much as you want. But but it's like only because I want to create that that diff it's a different relationship with with my users. And and that's I I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 39:59

It makes me happy every time I see somebody donating money because we love talking to you because you're you build good products, but you're also a hell of a guy, too.

SPEAKER_01 40:07

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 40:08

And that's that's that's what makes this hobby and such every meeting people like you such a great thing is that spirit.

SPEAKER_00 40:15

This worth making me almost as happy as the donations you sent already. Yeah. Well, good, good.

SPEAKER_01 40:20

Almost. All right. Well, we won't we won't take up any more of your time tonight. I think we could go on for hours, to be honest with you. But uh with that, like I said, visit visit Sebastian's website, download it in the Google, Google Play Store, Apple App Store, all those places, and uh have some fun logging. We'll say 7 3 on this one.

SPEAKER_03 40:40

7 3.

SPEAKER_01 40:42

73. Thanks for having me, guys.

SPEAKER_03 40:43

Thanks, Sebastian. Appreciate it. Good night.