Among the many facilities in this programme are:

• Variable character speed and delay.
• 150 ready-made QSO-style Morse tests on disc, (including the new 'M' callsigns)
• Self-generation of Morse tests (which can be saved to disc for future use)
• Sends any plain text (.txt) file as Morse
• Attach your key - send to the PC
• Teaches correct keying
• Tone adjustment
• European characters.
• UK Novice and Class-A facilities
• 238 '3-minute' texts on disk.
• Install/Uninstall for any Win OS

• Random blocks of:
  • numbers,
  • letters,
  • procedures,
  • Q-codes,
  • abbreviations,
  • punctuation,
  • callsigns,
  • words,
  • mixtures, and / or
  • own-made groups.
• Installs on 9x/XP dual boot
• and many other things.

Supa-Tata is far superior to any Morse Tape

Tables of all the Morse characters, i.e.

• letters,
• numbers,
• punctuation,
• procedures,
• Q-codes and
• abbreviations
• European characters

are included in the program together with lots of other on-line help.

PRACTISE SPEEDS
The speed at which characters are sent and the spaces between words and characters can be varied independently of each other. This is essential so that the characters are fast enough to be learned as a pattern of sound rather than as a series of dots and dashes and yet for there to be a sufficient gap between them to give adequate thinking time while learning.

SPEED CHECKING
Because the Character speeds and Space speeds can be adjusted separately you cannot easily work out an OVERALL speed, so there is a facility in the 'Practise' menu to do this for you. It is also used to calibrate the program timing.

THE PRACTISE SECTION
This allows you to gain speed and confidence very quickly The various options are:
 

1. The Standard Alphabet: sends made-up words (1 to 12 letters long) from random selections of the 26 letters A to Z.
    
2. The Special Alphabet: Like (1) above but YOU make it up. You can include *anything*: letters, numbers, procedures, punctuation and European characters. Your special selection can be heard on it's own or added to the regular alphabet. You can load the regular alphabet with characters that YOU find difficult and the more times you enter a character the more often it is sent. The 'Special Alphabet' option is extremely valuable and versatile; you should make full use of it.
   This 'Special Alphabet' section is ideal for learning by the Koch method.
   Your Special Selection is remembered for your next session.
    
3. Mixed numbers and letters: anything entered in the Special Alphabet they will be included here.
    
4. Real words: Over 4260 real words of from 1 to 12 letters long are included.
   (Note: The 'Tests' section will send your own plain texts with as many words as you include).
    
5. Q-codes and abbreviations: All those commonly used by radio amateurs are included.
    
6. Callsigns: Over 3000 callsigns from 3 to 10 characters in length which include the suffixes /P, /A, /M and /MM as well as a variety of prefixes such as G0/, VK2/ etc.
    
7. Mixed Everything: A cocktail of real words, abbreviations, punctuation, Q-codes, callsigns, random letters/numbers and Specials. This option is excellent training and practise for the UK test; if you can copy this your test will be a breeze!
    
8. Respond Mode: Here it sends a word etc. then stops for you to enter what you think it was. If you're right it sends another one, otherwise it offers a re-send.
    
9. Sending periods: The time that the program sends random letters, words etc. for is adjustable from 30 seconds to 6 minutes, or to non-stop. At first you will find it tiring and wearing to receive for more than about 30 seconds, so you start with that and work up to longer periods. You can stop a block at any point.
    
10. Word lengths:  When you are in the early learning stages you might prefer not to be confronted with some of the very long words (e.g. 12 letters). In the Practise section you can set a maximum of from 5 to 12 characters long which applies both to real words and words made up from random letters and numbers. Set it to suit yourself; 7 is suggested for starters.
    Constant 5-character words are also available.

DIY-TESTS (with 30 memories)
The program has a dedicated editor where you make up your own simulated tests or texts either for immediate use or for saving to disk for use later. You can have up to 255 such files in each folder.

The letter/number/procedure frequency of each memory and the time it will take to send is reported for any combination of speed and delay.
* Teachers and examiners: please note this special, very valuable facility! *

You can type directly into the keyboard to hear how the various characters should sound or to send simple messages. You can edit the memories to make proper messages.

DIY BEACON MODE
This is intended for Slow Morse Broadcast Teachers. A message in any selected memory will be sent repeatedly until either Escape is pressed or another message is chosen from up to 30 in store. This is useful for the unattended announcement of an imminent broadcast and for keeping the frequency clear.

Another use is for keeping a rig keyed for long on-air tests during which some such message as "G4UXD TESTING" can be sent.

USING A KEY
To test your own sending you attach an ordinary make-break or "straight" Morse key to a serial port (COM1 or COM2, 9 pin or 25 pin). You can also attach an iambic (twin paddle) key if you have an appropriate interface that would be used to key a rig. The program will key an external oscillator or a rig.

Full details for connecting a key and rig, etc., are provided. Suitable simple circuits.

In this section the speeds are only nominal but give a good indication of your keying technique. The program is very critical. Do NOT start using a key until you can receive properly, i.e. 12 wpm true speed.

There are four modes for teaching correct  keying timing where you can select:

• mixtures of numbers and letters,
• real words
• callsigns
• mixtures of everything

You start off with string length 1, i.e. single characters. Longer words might contain spaces. You are taught to key such that:

• your "cadence" (the rhythm of the sending) and the timing are correct,
• two characters don't merge into one (e.g. TH doesn't become 6),
• delays are not too long causing splits (e.g. 7 doesn't become MS),
• you get spaces only where you should.

One option sends 5-letter words specially composed to emphasise correct timing. E.g. NNCTR can come out as CCC. There is another section which will track your keying speed and which, with a suitable interface, will decode CW off-air.

THE SIMULATED TESTS
The speed of some of the tests is purposely set to the true speed, but others can have slower space speeds.  You can use these tests as models to invent more similar tests in the DIY-Test Memories and save them to disk. The "Character Frequency Analysis" feature, which also calculates the duration of a test as you type it in, will be found to be invaluable for this purpose, especially to teachers and examiners.

This section also has the facility to send any plain text (.txt) files, whatever their length. (New in Version 12)

You use the 'Mixed Everything' option in the 'Practise' section for experience in copying QSO-style passages before starting on the real QSO-style tests.

NOTE: The various settings you make as you configure the program are saved to disk when you quit, so that at your next session things are exactly as you left off.

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