When a file contains text, calling it *.txt makes sense. When it’s some kind of Amateur Data Interchange Format, I’d call it *.adi too. But when it’s a contest log, why do you call it Cabrillo? Google tells us a lot about Cabrillo. And some fine tuned searches lead to the Cabrillo format hosted by Trey N5KO. But why the name Cabrillo? I wanted to know so I asked the CQ-Contest reflector.
G3XTT writes:
As I told Franki, Trey was staying with me on one occasion and he mentioned that he had noticed the place name Maidenhead en route to here (it’s about 10 miles away from where I live). I explained that Maidenhead locators were so-named because they were agreed at an IARU conference held in Maidenhead. So when Trey developed the logging format he decided to adopt a similar approach and name it after a local place name.
Don G3XTT
Here’s what the ‘father of Cabrillo’ has to say:
Don G3XTT has the story right, because he was there. 🙂 And now for the rest of the story…
In the early 1990’s there was a thing called the "ARRL Format" for submitting contest QSO data to the ARRL on floppy disk. Cabrillo was an extention to the ARRL Format that added summary sheet info and a few other things to help automate tabulation of contest results. At the time it’s name was ARRL Format V2.
In order for ARRL Format V2 to succeed I felt it required unanimous support from the ARRL, CQ, and the authors of the most popular contest software. All parties gave support without hesitation except for CQ — the CQ representative said "CQ will give support, but only if you remove ‘ARRL’ from the name." Oof!
Remembering the story G3XTT told me about Maidenhead I started noticing the names of nearby streets and businesses — there’s a Cabrillo Highway and a Cabrillo beer shop and so on. Out of desperation (and exasperation) I chose the name Cabrillo.
–Trey, N5KO
All quotes directly from the public CQ-Contest reflector.